What color should the 3 strut top acorn nuts be?

[HB Chris]

The threads are way too long to do that though, spacer is 1/2.”

 

[jjs2800cs]

I zinc plated my strut dome nuts and then used yellow chromate to give cadmium look and it kind of seals the zinc coating as the raw zinc tends to disappear in time as was noted.
Yes not original but they look nice at least to my eyes, as most of the other visible engine and suspension hardware got the same treatment

Jjs2800cs

 

[Gransin]

Anyone seen these plastic caps on top of hex m8 nuts on an e3 before?

 

[sfdon]

The ETK says..... Cap nuts and shims...

10	Cap nut	M8	6			07119924417			ENDED
10	Cap nut	M8	6			61332306787	$11.87		ENDED
11	Shim		6	12/1968	11/1975	13418009766			ENDED

 

[sfdon]

originally only on two models

07119924417​

Cap nut​

M8​

From:09/08/1968To:06/20/1991 (ENDED)

Superseded by:​

61332306787

• 1500-2000CS   (09/1965 — 02/1970)
• 2.5CS-3.0CSL   (12/1968 — 11/1975)

 

[sfdon]

I tried all the flavors- from blue/clear zinc to nickel to yellow zinc to chrome.

I liked the chrome best.

 

[rsporsche]

i like @Stevehose idea of satin stainless. seems like it will look the most like the original without the issue of discoloration. now if i was doing a black coupe - bling is the answer. chrome would be the second best, as long as you replace them each time you remove them ... the chrome is likely going to be damaged by wrenches / sockets with a few uses.

 

[Stevehose]

my guess is that people put thick washers on when they removed the USA spacers and the bolts stuck up too high - so they put thick washers on so the cap nuts would work

Yes, or like me, they cut the studs to fit the old setup.

 

[boonies]

I have a set of shortened studs that I think I purchased from @sfdon some time ago. I am planning to install them as part of a larger winter project. I added the stainless acorn nuts to my Belmetric order.

 

[bavbob]

I mentioned this before, I took the appropriate die and put it on each stud, then cut the stud flush with the die and then backed the die off. Shortened studs with perfect threads.

 

[Stevehose]

Installed the satin stainless nuts today. I like.

 

[eriknetherlands]

As I was busy in this part today I just took a look at my car; it's Swiss delivered, and my 6 acorn nuts on the strut towers all are chromed brass. The chrome is still shiny, however the mirror like reflection like on a bumper doesn't occur as the surface is too rough.
As my car has been restored once before I can't vouch for their correctness.

As I was thinking they were made from stainless steel or chromed brass, I tested them with a magnet.
As expected, they were non-magnetic. So I sanded the chrome layer of the back of the nut.
Turns out it is brass.

Interestingly, if you look closely at them, you can see the brass material was turned on a lathe. 3 of my 6 acorn nuts were turned soo quickly/roughly that the lines are still visible.




Also the 3 pictures from @HB Chris of the European cars, one can see that at least some of these acorn nuts clearly have the milling lines still on them, with a distinctive point in the center:

In my pictures on my wooden table are also 2 stainless domed nuts, these are clearly a bit more grey. Also 1 simple zinced nut and a zinced domed nut ( with it's cap smashed in) for color reference - these are clearly more dull. These other parts are distinctly different in color vs the 6 domed nuts on my car.

 

[Breiti]

Not touched car.
Silver zinc plated with high washer.

Breiti

 

[Bert Poliakoff]

Nice chrome metric acorn nuts. at Ace hardware