I've been away for a few days but a package was waiting for me from "Fastaxle" (www.fastaxle.com). Although a bit expensive at $21 each, I received two aluminum rings with grommets and a precut hole 0.75" diameter. Amazingly, the grommets fit my ugly firewall holes exactly and the 7/8" hose fits snugly through the hole in the rubber grommet. They cut the holes for me to fit the hose that I have. The slight disadvantage is that the aluminum rings (anodized "clear") require four small holes and the small bolts through the firewall but I can get some nice stainless bolts for that from the local ACE Hardware store. Still the OD of the aluminum rings just fits the available space on the edge of the firewal without overlap of the edge of the engine indent. Thanks for the on-line search that found these grommets. Relative to the split grommet idea I had to use some grooved fender welt around the bottom of the steering column in a similar way to the '32 solution above.

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder