Fenders

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Fenders

Postby KA » Mon Jul 10, 2006 7:47 pm

Hi All,
I'm building a Benroy profile trailer and am saying a financial "ouch" at the prices of the fiberglass ones that I admire.
I'm wondering if anyone has made their own. It seems like I remember someone making some sort of door or fenders from fiberglass where they created their own molds.


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Postby madjack » Mon Jul 10, 2006 8:33 pm

Kris, the two who come to mind right off are "Gaston" who did his whole tear outta FG and whose fenders were done in replication of a PT Cruiser and "Pedall" who did a fairly conventional looking FG fender...if you look on the West Systems or RAKA websites, I believe they have howto sections that descibe one off FG over foam fabrication methods....
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Postby asianflava » Mon Jul 10, 2006 10:50 pm

When people ask me how much money I have wrapped up in my tear, I mention that the fenders are most expensive single item on the whole project.

Andrew posted some profiles of a fender similar to mine. They are "slices" of my fender that you cut out of wood. After cutting out the slices you stack them and glue them together. When they are dry, You sand them smooth to take the steps put of them.

Cheaper yes, but definitely labor intensive. When I get a few projects out of the way, I may makeup a pair for S&Gs.
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Postby KA » Mon Jul 10, 2006 11:30 pm

Hi Madjackand Asianflava,
Thanks so much for the ideas. I'll check out both methods and see if I think I'm up to giving them a try. Sounds interesting for sure.
You guys are so helpful. I love this forum and hope to have some pictures up before too long.
:) Kris
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Postby bledsoe3 » Tue Jul 11, 2006 12:55 am

Kris, Because of sticker shock and I'm not too sure the style you're thinking of (just my opinion) looks right with the Benroy, I bought these for $60 for the pair. They're not mounted in this picture.
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Last edited by bledsoe3 on Sun Jul 16, 2006 4:04 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Postby KA » Tue Jul 11, 2006 2:02 am

Hi Jim,
I like the fenders that you are using. I think they look better on the Benroy than the kind often seen on the Kenskills. Where did you get yours?
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Re: fenders

Postby bledsoe3 » Tue Jul 11, 2006 3:39 am

KA wrote:Hi Jim,
I like the fenders that you are using. I think they look better on the Benroy than the kind often seen on the Kenskills. Where did you get yours?
Kris

I bought them at a trailer supply shop just across the Columbia off I-5 called Potter Webster. They are also 11" wide. Since I have a large gap between my tires and side wall I needed the wide fenders. And for $30 each how could I go wrong?
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Postby Ira » Tue Jul 11, 2006 7:16 am

Doesn't Northern Tool sell the exact same fenders online, or are theirs narrower?

The 12" that I got from them and originally intended to use on mine look exactly the same.
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Postby KA » Tue Jul 11, 2006 9:10 am

Thanks Jim and Ira,
I was looking for wide ones for 15 inch wheels so that Portland area source should work great. I'll also check out the Harbor Freight.
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Postby Steve_Cox » Tue Jul 11, 2006 9:22 am

asianflava wrote:When people ask me how much money I have wrapped up in my tear, I mention that the fenders are most expensive single item on the whole project.

Andrew posted some profiles of a fender similar to mine. They are "slices" of my fender that you cut out of wood. After cutting out the slices you stack them and glue them together. When they are dry, You sand them smooth to take the steps put of them.

Cheaper yes, but definitely labor intensive. When I get a few projects out of the way, I may makeup a pair for S&Gs.


Rocky,

Was this the post? Also didn't someone post some pictures of furniture made that way with a clear coat finish. It looked really cool.....

angib wrote:Here is the next chapter of the wood fender novel!

Firstly, the 'bread and butter' method. Here is a cross-section though the highest point of the fender. It doesn't make sense to use bread and butter for the inner 2/3rds of the fender as that is single curvature, except for the flare-out at the back, and so that can be made from a single piece of ply. It's too tight for 1/4" ply so it's made of two layers of (red) 1/8" ply.

The outer 4" of the fender is made by bread and butter. I've shown it in (green) 1/2" ply 'slices' which means more pieces have to be cut than if using 3/4", but there's less fairing to do. The outer slice is replaced with two 1/4" slices, as the outermost slice hangs down quite a way in places.

Image

Each of those slices is sized so that there's 1" overlap with the next slice - it's tempting to reduce this to make the fender lighter and increase the (marginal) tyre clearance, but then the slice becomes quite floppy until it's bonded to the next slice.

To overcome this problem, each slice has four bosses incorporated in it and a hole through each boss connects all the slices together. Here are the shapes of some of the slices, to try to make this clear:

Image

Note that slices 1 and 15 are mostly inset to receive the curved ply skin, but that recess stops before the flare-out at the back, when the fender goes back to bread and butter construction. Slices 2 to 14 are identical and just extend over the flare-out.

After the whole fender has been assembled, those bosses all have to be cut off - not easy inside the curve of the fender but, at worst, they can be sanded off with an angle-grinder-with-sanding-pad ('electric spokeshave').

On that subject, let's not forget the safety warning like Norm gives: Sanding plywood must only be done wearing a industrial-quality facemask - wood dust is not just a nuisance, it is a direct health risk and the dust from some hardwoods is a carcinogen.

Juneaudave asked for the geometry of the Slumbercoach fender and I've sent you and John/micro a PDF, as it's not very legible like this:

Image

Anyone else who wants this material as a PDF, pm or email me - and don't forget to tell me (a) that it's the Slumbercoach fender PDF you want and (b) your email address!

Please note that the fender size is closely related to the tyre size - what I've shown is using a 26.1" diameter 205/75-14 tyre - but if another tyre is used, the fender size may need to be altered.

Switching back to bread and butter to make the flare-out on the back of the fender is a bit of hard work. Here is an alternative fender that just has a straight taper on the back, which I think would look very nice and be simpler:

Image

This fender also does not have the fault that the flared one has - as drawn, it is 49.5" long, so it doesn't quite fit in the width of a sheet of ply. Darn.

Andrew
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Postby asianflava » Tue Jul 11, 2006 1:54 pm

Thanks Steve that is the one. I didn't get around to searching for the thread.
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Postby Roly Nelson » Sat Jul 15, 2006 9:15 pm

Kris, I made my own fenders, out of wood, of course. The inner support has a 1/8" router groove in it and a mirror image groove is in the outer member. The cross-grained 1/8" plywood is glued and bent up and over the tire diameter and flares out at the rear. The whole thing is then strengthened with a bunch of 45 degree angle glue-blocks and then shot with Line-X truck bed lining material. It is still going strong after over 3 years of use and cost practically nothing to build. (Kind of blows people away when I stand on the rear of the fender and jump up and down.......that is where the old license plate bracket is welded to the frame and is super-strong...... :-)

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Postby surveytech » Sun Jul 16, 2006 5:55 am

these fenders were made out of scrap wood........maybe give you an idea or two.........

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Postby Chip » Sun Jul 16, 2006 7:08 am

The fenders dont have to be mounted flush with the body,, that is unless ya want to, I wanted a fender that was more the width of the tire, I bought standart fenders at Tractor Supply, and made three brackets that are welded to the fender and then bolted to the trailer side,, they were about 50 bucks a pair,, just the way I did it

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Postby KA » Sun Jul 16, 2006 12:27 pm

Thanks for all of the ideas. The pictures are very cool 8) and give me lots of ideas. You guys are great!
Kris :thumbsup:
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