kevsgt

just checked, mine is long too... appears to have penetrated the cardboard, but not the carpet material yet. guess I should Bobbitt it.

The cap and the lug wrench make no difference, the bolt sticks up thru them.

Gravydog316

yeah lame

CtCarl

Just got back from the stealership.

They claim the "cap" doesn't exist, and did the whole dramatic bit of spinning the monitor around to show me that it wasn't on the exploded parts diagram.

I told them it was shown on the jack stowage decal, but they weren't mpressed. I'd like to have it if it helps support the trunk mat. I can probably just make one without too much trouble.

typer0055@gmail.com

Since my newly purchased GT was doing the same thing, I looked online for a solution and found this thread. It made me remember I owned a BMW that had a plastic support piece on the j-bolt that stuck out from the spare tire. I was able to locate that piece at ECS Tuning for under $7. I had to trim the bolt down about 1/2 an inch or so but it fit perfectly on the bolt. The support disc is about the size of a baseball.The part# is 51-47-1-960-706. There is also part # 51-47-1-930-956 which may work as well but I went with the black one. I hope this helps

CtCarl

D'oh! I couldn't wait any longer, the bolt was starting to poke through the trunk liner. Shame, that looks like a very simple and elegant solution!

I ended up bobbing 3/4" off the bolt and instantly discovered why Ford made it so long...it supports the thin fiberboard spare tire cover. Without it, toss anything heavier than a bag of Stay-Puft marshmallows in there, and the cover sags like a wet taco.

I decided to make a more solid cover, so I laid the fiberboard over a sheet of 3/8 plywood, traced it, and cut it out with a jigsaw. There's a styrofoam "shaper" in there that sort of eases the transition at the edge of the cover to the more steeply angled trunk floor, and I didn't want to risk breaking it by trying to remove it, so instead I just glued and screwed the plywood to the fiberboard. Because plywood is harder than fiberboard I added some foam weatherstrip to the bottom of the new cover to keep it from sliding around and scratching the paint.

While I was in there, I picked up some felt carpet padding on eBay. Using the trunk liner as a template, I cut the padding to fit. Then I laid the padding on top of the cover, put the original liner over the padding, and then a trim-to-fit OxGord Weather Shield rubber trunk liner on top. I was getting a headache from the resonance of the GT mufflers and I figured some trunk padding might help with that. Worked out pretty well. Between this mod and yanking out the back seat and covering the floor with Frost King duct insulation (aka "The Poor Man's Dynamat") it made a big difference. Can't hardly feel my teeth rattling at all anymore!