More secure rear license plate mounting

New member in Ga. here.
I just put the tag on my two week old SR5 and noticed the bolts screw into soft plastic only. A kid with a dull butter knife could unscrew them. Security bolts wouldn't be of much good either if they can't be snugged down. Anyone have a tip on how to mount the tag to help prevent theft? I've had one taken before and it's no fun.
Thanks in advance!

 

Welcome to TW.
This may help: http://www.trucksecurity.com/TScom Purchase Toyota.htm

 

Do people steal plates? Man, I probably sold 1500 cars over the years and used nothing but plain old phillips screws haha. Never thought about it.

How about some torx bolts?

Welcome!

 

Had one stolen off our element. Florida - anything here gets stolen.

 

I had a car plate stolen while parked at my former apartment. While working part time at a local mom & pop m/c repair shop, I heard of several motorcycle plates being stolen. So, I took to pop riveting my bike plates and using security bolts like the ones DustStorm4x4 recommended above on my car or truck. The rivets worked great because I could get at the backs of the plates on the bikes. That's crucial for putting the rivet washers on and for being able to grip that end when drilling out the rivets come tag time or when I sold a bike. An alternative (which would only stop a target of opportunity thief) is to use regular bolts with nylon-insert nuts on the backs. Access to the back of the mounting area is again a must. I'm going to have a look again more closely and see what the 16's bumper's like is like.

 

I drilled out the screw holes in the plastic ever so slightly and ran some 4mm hex drive, M6X1.0 button-head bolts through the tag, plastic and the existing hole in the steel behind the plastic. The black plastic rests about 5-6mm off the support steel in those spots. So, I made some spacers out of a stack of washers. To secure the bolts, I used ordinary M6X1.0 nuts with nylon inserts. It was a bit of a yoga move to hold them in place while running the tag bolts through. The tag's now nice and secure, though. Heck, short of destroying the tag, I'd wager a thief would be baffled as to how to get the bolts out.

Once they are turned maybe 1/2 a turn, the whole thing's going to just spin in place unless a wrench is put on the nuts back there and it ain't going to be easy! LOL

 

Dremel a flat slot when it needs to be removed? Cool!

 

Get plastic screws and glue them in?

I have the opposite concern. The crap metal screws will rust and look like crap and then be hard to remove. In my other vehicles I always use plastic screws but since these are metal into plastic I am less concerned. Anyway, what size are the screws? I need to get some plastic screws before they rust anyway.

 

One could glue the plastic screws in place. But, they really don't have a lot of material to grab onto. The plastic bumper cover's is maybe 3/16" thick.
That only amounts to about 2-3 threads' worth. It'd be really easy to strip 'em out.

The M6X1.0 bolts I used are stainless steel ones I had leftover from a Yamaha project where I ordered more than I needed, luckily. =)

 

bleh, if they want it they can have it. the easier it is to steal it, the less damage they cause.

not like it costs anything for replacement plate $5 up here

 

The ones here are $20, unfortunately. $40 for me because I registered for two years.

 

Pricey but nice...had them on my old vehicle

http://www.griotsgarage.com/product/license+plate+security+caps.do

 

You are living in the wrong part of the state.

 

I had the plastic ones-they suck. Sure you could find some stainless bolts on Ebay or local hardware store if you concerned about rust?

 

They looked great up until I watched the video in the first review. The customer challenged a friend to remove them (without telling him the caps had LH threads). The guy had the wrench that came with the caps and tried unscrewing them as if they were RH threaded. The cap stayed put and the tag bolt backed out. Oops.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7taJKCRiEIc
Maybe if one had bolts that didn't fit tightly inside the steel caps, they'd be okay, though. That way the cap would rotate on the bolt vs. having enough grip to unscrew it.

It reminded me of the elaborate faucet locks my old landlord put on the outside water spigots. The handy man was not supposed to lock mine, just the ones on the unoccupied apartments. The caps had a clever magnetic key that pulled inner and outer caps together - allowing them to be removed. Without it, the outer shell was supposed to just spin. I used the awl from my Swiss Army knife to wedge in between the parts and had mine removed in seconds. I went ahead and took the other three off as well.
The landlord's eyes went big as saucers when I handed them over the next morning. "I guess I wasted $$, huh? " Nope. Just foiled by an Eagle Scout that'd seen every episode of MacGyver. LOL

 

The steel tag bolts on the 2016 Tacomas are really just big wood screws that only go into a plastic bumper cover that's maybe 3/16" thick.
The plastic is soft and only gives a couple of threads' worth of grip.
Lock a bolt in place (If thread locking agent will even hold on this type of plastic) and it would be really easy to tear out the threads anyway.
I know on ABS, even a small amount of thread locker can turn it brittle as a potato chip. A motorcycle shop customer of mine found that out the hard way when his Gold Wing's luggage rack punched through the trunk lid after he loctited the bolts.

 

I'm thankful I live in a part of the country where license plates are not a hot item for crack heads to steal. Wonder what they do with them? Make birdhouses to sell at the local swap meet?

 

Wut.....Two years? I have been registering cars in GA since 1992 (including two new 2016's this year) and have never been offered the "two year" renewal? One of mine was $20, the other was $40 but only due to the fact that I have a special tag on it (sons of confederate veterans). Both expire on my birthday, this year.... Just like always. Might want to verify your "two year" status.

 

OP, total off topic, but I notice that you are in west GA and drive a '16 2WD SR5... I have my 4 Factory TRD Off Road 4x4 wheels and tires for sale if you are interested in upgrading. 265/70/16. Goodyear Adventurer with Kevlar. I am in west GA also.