Matt;
Don't know what's wrong with your local Home Depot not carrying star type lock washers, ours does... make sure you look in the right place (ours has a huge wall full of little bagged and boxed parts... that's the common stuff. The unusual parts (like stainless metric cap screws, star washers, left-hand threads, clevis pins, etc) are in a separate section in little drawers.
Here's a company I've been dealing with for years... not cheap, but they've got a ton of cool stuff. They've got a great catalog, get 'em to send you one... all the neat goodies not available locally are here (like little teflon tubes to route cables under BB's, stainless and titanium metric bolts and cap screws, etc.... a fun book to browse).
<A HREF="http://www.smallparts.com/">Small Parts</A>
Bob Hovey
Columbus, GA