There's a piece steel behind the plastic cover and there are no homes behind the small little plastic thing. Do I need to drill a hole?

 

Judging from the nasty looking rust stain you dont care what it looks like so just use some bailing wire.

 

I had to mount mine. Here in California, you can get a ticket for not having the front plate....ask me how I know.


I had to order the bracket from the dealer. I think it was about $15.00.


Mine is 2001; I don't know about yours....

 

Such a prize winning personality, adding so much value to the thread. Great way to welcome a newer user. We should all be like you. A shining example of the user base over at Pirate.


To OP: You should still be able to order the license plate holder and hardware from Ford.

 

He may be new to FTE but he isn't a child. He can take a little humor to go along with what will surely be a slew of people telling him he can buy a $20 plastic bracket from a host of sellers. And no you shouldn't be like me, you should be like you even if that means being wound up so tight your exhaust pipe squeaks.

 

lighten up buttercup.

 

You can order it from ebay or dealer. Around 20/30 bucks.
It's a plastic holder that fits right on it.

 

Get a sense of humor tumor

 

If bailing wire is t your style and you want OEM without paying dealership prices you can pick up the stock bracket on Amazon for about $20

 

Then add a smiley or three so he knows you're being funny. Otherwise, do like Skip suggested below.

That's a just a tad ironic coming from you, Skip.

Stewart

 

Since my humor seems to be derailing your thread and not getting you all the answers here is a ford diagram that shows how it assembles and gives the part number for the bracket and fasteners. You can use the link posted earlier to get the lowest price on the bracket I could find.

 

Did someone say bailin' wire?

and a little patina

 

Recently bought the car(1-2 weeks ago) and it came like that. I live in Northern Jersey and sadly every single ex I've seen(looked at 10+) had rust. I was able to grab this one for $5.5k and the only thing wrong with it was a misfire which I fixed yesterday(besides the rust). 01 7.3 limited with 230k. I'll be working on cleaning the rust soon. Thinking about buying a totaled/salvage one from TX for body parts.

 

Tim buys 'em up fast.

 

Dont want to give away all my secrets but northern CA is also has a large population of rust free ex's , always plenty of them being parted out or wrecks sold privately. Worth a look if you are already considering TX.