I just ordered a set of 914rubber eyebrow grommets... is there a trick or tool for installing these things without a) piercing them with a screwdriver, or b) screaming words that young children shouldn't hear?

Also, how on earth do you get enough leverage to install the one that's inside the fender?

Palmolive. Marge, you're soaking in it!
For those of us who remember that commercial.
Seriously, it works.

Sorry, swearing is mandatory but piercing is not. +1 on lube. I prefer glycerine but soap does work. I used a the largest round and blunt punch I had that would fit inside the concave part of the grommet to push all the way through to engage the chassis and eyebrow. The grommets tolerated a surprising amount of stretch without tear or cutting so I was able to stretch them through.

Wrap some dental floss in the groove of the gromett. Thread the floss through the hole. Pull on it and it will work the lip through. And a little vasoline on the hole

@roblav1 thanks!

I'm originally from England, so I only have completely useless English ads from 30 years ago trapped in my brain


@bbrock
"Sorry, swearing is mandatory but piercing is not. +1 on lube."
Reminds me of my time in federal prison...

Punch is a good call. I'm thinking maybe a hex key for the one inside the fender.


@bdstone914
Thanks Bruce! This is absolutely genius, will definitely give floss a try.

That's a good one! Hex key would be perfect. But now I'm really curious about the floss method.

Right? It never would have dawned on me, but I can see how pulling it from the other side at the same time as pushing could make it way easier.

I just picked up my new grommets from Sierra Madre Collection so I'll give this a shot tomorrow and report back.

K-Y is the slickest

What are the eyebrow grommets for?

They attach the eyebrows to the car - two through the trunk, one through the fender. They're the only thing holding them in place, so if you lose a bung, you may lose an eyebrow on the freeway (ask me how I know... ).

I warmed the rubber up a bit with a heat gun to make it more pliable, and used about a 1/4" bolt to push it through.

Stupid question here - what's an eyebrow?

The metal plate between the eye (headlight) and the front bumper.

Not a stupid question because eyebrows are normally ABOVE the eye, not below. Our 914s are quirky creatures though .

Always use the water based lube. The silicone stuff is too difficult to clean up

The factory designed the grommets to be installed in the eyebrow with the pointed ends facing out. The eyebrow is then slid into place with tension holding the pointed end into the body panel. This allowed the eyebrow to push down out of place if something got in the way of a closing headlight. All the aftermarket grommets I've seen are too small to be used as the factory intended. Someone should make an accurate reproduction of this NLA part.

Been there, done that. Hit a bump on 114 north of DFW airport and saw a red flash go past the driver's window. With all the truck traffic on that road, I didn't bother to go back and try to find it.

I just pulled another out of my parts stash and sent them both to the body shop to get the replacement painted. He needed the other one for a color sample.

When they come back, I will be putting a screw in one end to make sure they don't go flying again.

Clay

That is the way mine where installed, and the same way I put them back in. The replacements are loose and popped out once or twice when I installed the eyebrows.

A few have already pointed out the obvious: Reason the factory used rubber hardware instead of nuts/bolts or other similar.

Ever got your hand caught in the bucket when the light goes down? Could be replacing a bulb or other maint, someone pushed the knob by mistake. Maybe something just fails and the light goes back down. If you can't pull the eyebrow out or at least back a little bit. Gonna hurt worse. That upper lip of the headlight cover turns into a dull knife real quick.

Wow, who knew there was so much I didn’t know about eyebrow grommets… mine were installed with the point facing in, so now I know that was wrong too.

Working from Bruce’s floss method I took it a step further and used 030 mig wire.

Simply threaded the wire through the holes until the grommet was in place and then pushed the other end in with a blunt punch until the pointy end of the grommet came through the hole. Then pull the wire and the grommet snapped straight into place.

https://flic.kr/p/2m3Kowu

https://flic.kr/p/2m3Kovx