Number Plate Carrier / Plinth Removal How To

[amv8jd]

I know it's been covered in the forums many times and continues to be asked so thought I'd knock up a how to this morning as sometimes it's daunting to take your tool set to your pride and joy and this easy mod makes such a good difference.

Time Taken 5-10 Minutes

Tools required
Philips Head
Torx T30 head
13MM socket
Some HD Velcro (3M Dual lock is expensive but the mac daddy of velcro's) or other adhesive strips such as number plate pads, optionally neither if you intend to use the existing holes.
Some cleaning solution


Starting here remove the two screws on the edge of the number plate with a phillips head


This is whats underneath


In the top holes are two bolts that require the Torx T30 head, in the bottom pair are both phillips heads


With the bolts removed the plastic carrier should come away freely revealing the aluminium plate behind, the 4 screws here again require the Torx T30


Once they are removed it unveils some rather hefy looking struts behind, remove these with the 13mm socket and dont worry they aren't holding anything else in they are just over engineered


Fixing with Velcro / Pads
Once it has all been removed wipe the area down with a cleaning agent, the idea is to get a good surface for the velcro /pads etc to stick to, cut your velceo strips to size and apply them to the bumper, a good tip is then to cut matching strips for the plate but but place them over the bumper velcro before peeling off the backing tape, this way you can line up the plate and then just offer it into place firmly and it will stick.

Fixing with screws
You could also as use the existing holes in the bumper and drill two holes in the plate as suggested by Quinny in post 6, this can be made easy by using the aluminium mounting bracket as a template and using its outter holes as guides to drill the plate with.

The end result should look something like this


I have a new plate on my shopping list to remove the unsightly screw holes and would reccomend the same.
And before anyone says anything yes she does need a good clean and I'll be doing that later

Edited by amv8jd on Friday 22 April 18:09

Edited by amv8jd on Tuesday 23 April 18:10

[amv8jd]

Cheers chaps, happy to help.

Mako V12V said:

James, that's a great write up thanks. Am thinking of removing mine but my plate is stuck to the plinth not screwed so would need another plate.
Also, is it advisable to use number plate pads to stick the plate directly to the painted bumper instead of using Velcro?

Thanks, I rekon you could probably get your plate off the carrier with a bit of force, you'd need to clean it up again but as you can see in my pictures at some point my plate was stuck to the plinth

I'd not thought of number plate pads to be honest, thanks for the suggestion I've updated the first post, I fall to using dual lock as I work in motorsport / tv and we use dual lock to stick external bullet cameras all over the place and its solid, even used it on F3's, well that and it's what I had laying arround

Quinny said:

The only thing I did different, was to use the original holes in the front bumper and screwed my plate rather than stick it

Thanks Quinny I've updated the first post with this bit too.