Anybody make their own splash guards ?

[minkman]

Anybody do the above ? If so, did it work out ? Any suggestions ? thanks

[Jimmy Jig]

Suggestion: Buy White Caps.

[eyecatcher01]

Originally Posted by Jimmy Jig

Suggestion: Buy White Caps.

Agreed!
I did have a set of wave wackers on a tiller Lund Alaskan and they worked well. You will find lexon is not cheap so don't bother trying to create ur own...and this is coming from a guy that loves to fab things up.

[T Mac]

We used to back in the 60s and 70s.
But Wave-Wackers work so nice....

[Wall-i-Lama]

Minkman, I bought pieces of 1/4 lexan on ebay. Easy to cut, file, sand and drill holes. Once I cut the shape I wanted, I took it to a metal shop and they bent 45 degree angles in the top. I used rubber to fill the gaps around the motors.

Look great and I have about $75 bucks into them. Everyone asks, were did you get the wave wackers?

Here is a 12" x 36" piece on ebay for $17.

http://cgi.ebay.com/Polycarbonate-le...item2c5455a2ed

[dirtman44]

Do you have to heat the lexan up to bend it , or can I just put it in my brake and not worry about snapping it?

[REW]

Dirtman,
PUt it in your brake without heating it and it will snap.
You need to heat the lexan before bending it.

You can easily do this with the use of one or more heat guns.
I don't recommend using any sort of torch, because you will end up schorching and or blistering the lexan.

When my buddy and I made the wave wackers for his boat, we cut the lexan to size, then put a solid sheet of metal in his kitchen oven so that there would not be any exposed grates to melt into the surface of the lexan.

We had everything set with respect to the brake so we knew where and how much we needed to bend the lexan. We heated the lexan in a constant oven, until we could just start to easily bend a corner of the material.

We slid the lexan out of the oven, slid it into the brake and bent the lexan.

Simple and it worked very well.

In his case, he make the wave wackers rather short. He only made them out of about a foot of material. He bent the top 5 inches at close to 90 degrees.
That way, when waves came back up on the wave wackers, the water would be deflected straight back and they worked very well.

Take care
REW

[S.Larson]

Why must they be made out of plastic??

Couldn't they be made out of aluminum??

I have thought about making a set, Just haven't got around to it,....

[toolboy]

Originally Posted by REW

Dirtman,
PUt it in your brake without heating it and it will snap.
You need to heat the lexan before bending it.

You can easily do this with the use of one or more heat guns.
I don't recommend using any sort of torch, because you will end up schorching and or blistering the lexan.

When my buddy and I made the wave wackers for his boat, we cut the lexan to size, then put a solid sheet of metal in his kitchen oven so that there would not be any exposed grates to melt into the surface of the lexan.

We had everything set with respect to the brake so we knew where and how much we needed to bend the lexan. We heated the lexan in a constant oven, until we could just start to easily bend a corner of the material.

We slid the lexan out of the oven, slid it into the brake and bent the lexan.

Simple and it worked very well.

In his case, he make the wave wackers rather short. He only made them out of about a foot of material. He bent the top 5 inches at close to 90 degrees.
That way, when waves came back up on the wave wackers, the water would be deflected straight back and they worked very well.

Take care
REW

You can very easily bend Lexan without heat. I have made several sets of splash guards and never use heat to bend them. We use a mechanical hydraulic break and they turn out fine. The product does have a little memory so true 90 degree bends are difficult. I just made a set for my dad's boat. They come up and out on top, but also have a return bend on each end to close the outside corners. I have about three hours and $55.00 into them.

[Wall-i-Lama]

We used a hydraulic brake, not a sheet metal brake. I covered both sides at the point where we bent them with masking tape so that the brake would not scar the surface. We bent 45 degree angles, 90 might be a little tight. No cracking, no breaking. Just a little gray haze where it was bent, nothing you would notice, especially if you use smoke or dark smoke colored lexan.

I tried the heating route and encountered all kinds of problems including bubbles, melting and the surface turning wavy.

Good luck.