Broken bolt on undercarriage heat shield (pic attached)

Over the past few weeks I've noticed a rattling sound when driving my 2008 Tacoma 4x4 4cyl. After some time on the creeper today I think I've narrowed it down to a loose heat shield attached to the undercarriage above one of the catalytic converters. The bolt fastening this part of the heat shield is rusted through and about to break off (see pic attached). What is the recommended way to fix this? I'm not sure how to get on the other side of that bolt to replace it. TIA!

 

Been there, done that. Pull up your carpet, drill a hole, put the bolt through. I think this happens to the heat shield because Toyota uses too small a washer against the shield. I used a fender washer as big as the shields' recess.

 

I've replaced most of the heat shield connections on my 09 with washers as they corrode.

For the couple that broke I used a metal drywall spring anchor. Much easier than drilling a hole through the floor.

 

Wow, awesome idea to use a drywall spring anchor for this!

 

How can you secure the shield with the above w/o putting a hole in the floor ??

 

I haven't tried this yet, but the hole is already there in the undercarriage, so you should be able to stick the spring anchor through it just like you would do to hang a picture.

 

That's correct. All I had to do was clear out the hole completely and use a shorter length bolt. If you don't have one I suppose you could simply hack it down. The only issue using these is they are not stainless so they will rust. I'm fine with that if they can last a good 2-3 years before replacing.

 

What size drywall anchors did you use? Did you have to widen the hole to fit the anchor through? I picked up some of these from the hardware store but the anchor is too big to fit.

 

Not sure but there are pretty small. I didn't have to widen to hole just clear out all the old bolt and rust.