Yep. After spending an hour in the driveway trying to drill it out again, this is the next thing I'll try, but it will have to wait until tomorrow night when can I take it to my buddy's house. (I don't have a welder.)

 

x2 on welding a nut....

 

It took a little coaxing, but this finally worked.

Now, I just need to retap the threads and figure out where to weld the 2 little tabs for the front of the guard...

 

dacarr! You are a lifesaver! I also received the wrong size bolts, which pisses me off, they need to get their **** together. I just got back from Lowe's and simply tried a pitch change and sure enough it didn't change it either. I doubt Lowe's will have something that specialized, I'll hit Fastenal Monday morning! Once again, thanks for posting this! Because I eventually threw a 17 mm across the yard today out of anger for not getting the bolt to start!

 

That wasn't the correct size, for me anyways