Jeep Liberty KJ (and other Jeep) Skid Plate Frame Rivnuts

I purchased a (third! 😆) 2006 Jeep Liberty KJ CRD that must have started life as a base model, because it only has the forward-most skid plates.  It's missing the skids for the transmission pan, the transfer case, and the gas tank.  Luckily I have a donor CRD that I could pull the missing skid plates from, but when I went to install them, I found that the frame rails where the skid plates attach do not have threaded holes for the M10 skid plate bolts.  There are simply hex shaped holes where the bolts should thread in.

What I found is that these locations need a M10 1.5 10.9 steel hexagonal rivnut (also called a rivet nut or nutsert).

I checked with my local Jeep Dealer parts dept. and they had none in stock when using a 2006 Jeep Liberty for the search (part #6506644AA).  They searched nationwide and were only able to locate two at a dealer in TX and one at a dealer in IL.  Those were literally the only factory rivnuts my dealer could locate for a 2006 Liberty.  

I should have just purchased from eBay, which is where I ended up purchasing them later.

When I widened my search for a Jeep M10 rivnut, I found another M10 nutsert for the 18-25 Jeep Wrangler JL & Gladiator JT (with no mention of the 2006 Jeep Liberty KJ CRD).

The Mopar part number for this M10 1.5 10.9 Steel frame rivet nut found in the search above is 06511076AA.  Various Mopar and Jeep dealer sites on line stated that this would absolutely NOT work for a 2006 Liberty.

When I called my local dealer back and used the parts number for the rivet nut for a 2025 Jeep Wrangler, they had plenty in stock at $8.20 each (pretty high price, but I decided to pay the premium for the 10.9 steel over the zinc coated "medium steel" non-factory versions I was able to locate online).

As you can see from the two photos, the rivnuts do look different.  What I found was that the Wrangler/Gladiator rivnut will work in SOME places.  I can verify that the rivnut that works with the Wrangler and Gladiator can be used for KJ frame rails, but NOT the cross member that runs under the back of the transmission pan (the cross member that holds the back of the oil/tranny plate as well as one side of the transfer case plate).  This beefier looking rivnut definitely fits in the hexagonal holes of the frame rails running down each side of the vehicle.  In a couple places it was a tight fit, but slid in when I wiggled it.

So I ended up using the Wrangler (slightly larger) rivnut for the two locations in the frame rail, and the Liberty (slightly smaller) rivnut in the cross-member locations. 

For the record, I could find mild steel zinc coated M10 rivnuts online, but I decided I wanted to use the original 10.9 steel rivnuts originally spec'd for our vehicles.