Hey Guys,

I recently got a moonroof for my first gen from the USA as we never got the moonroof as an option here in Australia.

Unfortunately 2 of the bolts that hold one of the tabs on were looking pretty ordinary and when I tried to unscrew them I found they are badly corroded away and irrepairable.

I had a look on Black dragon Auto, but they don't seem to make the replacement nuts for the moonroof.

Does anyone know of where I can find some or if anyone has a spare pair lying around???

Or if another outer nut of another car's sunroof will match??

Any help would be great as like I said we never got the moonroof over here, so when I go to my Mazda parts dealer, the guy just looks at me like i'm tarded.

Here's some pictures of the good set, I'm chasing the round smooth nut that goes on the outside of the glass panel and can be seen on the outside of the car...here they are silver, they may have been black originally...sorry for the fuzzy pics, it's a camera phone.

Cheers
Cam...

 

My understanding, although unconfirmed, has always been that the metal and glass rooof panels have the same hardware. Maybe that applies to the fasteners as well.

 

The metal sunroof does not use an external blind nut, no.

And yes, they are supposed to be black.

They are kind of similar to the blind nuts used to hold the gas tubes on the rear hatch, are they not? Maybe not the same size, though.

 

Well I spent the whole day driving around a million different stores and finally found some replacement nuts at a windscreen repair shop.

The guy had a box out the back that had a ton of junk in it and in there I found two old nuts of a similar style that I can modify to fit, so i'm sorted.

Thanks Guys!
Cam...

 

If anyone else has a similar problem, I have replaced them with the fasteners used on the glass hatch struts, which should be readily available from salvage. They have a larger head, but otherwise look just fine.

 

Someone might also be able to get a barrel nut/bolt available from Fastenal or McMaster to match the sunroof bolts well enough for a replacement. They run about $6 a set.

 

There is a difference between the hardware used as hinges on the sunroof vs the moonroof...the glass panel top uses some kind of composite plastic material and the regular steel tops use a metal piece that has a thick rubberized coating. The bolts may be the same, I tossed the old ones when I broke the composite pieces, so I don't know for sure.

In a pinch, you can use the metal hinge piece but it's not a bolt-on affair since the metal piece lacks the "pedestals" to go through the glass to hold it in place. I had to have one of BD's buddies, Matt from LEMCO Motorsports in Cedar Hill, TX, custom cut some sheetmetal patterns, weld pedestals on them and then tap them so I could use the standard metal hinge piece and the associated bolts that go with it. I had all the bits powdercoated by Brian of BPC to get the following results.








The top fits perfectly, as you can see. I always thought this was the sunroof option, though.

 

^^^nice!!!