|
Aluminum: $270
Stainless Steel: $0
Bolts/Nuts/Locking Washers: $10
Hours spent: 20 hours
Elevation: Priceless!!
Water test @ 6AM tomorrow!
|
|
That is nice. Good job and nice craftsmenship. I am about to finish my fiberglass speaker boxes. Well over 20 hrs of work!
|
|
Thanks for the compliments, but i'd have to lend most of the craftsmanship to math, haha. If I had screwed up anywhere during building it, I do believe I would have given up hope. Everything just fell into place, with little to no problems.
Well, I take that back. We had to cut the original aluminum structure down, as it was too wide and shaped funny. After we had put the tower back together from bending and cutting it, we realized that we had managed to enclose the wooden ladder we were using to hold the tower legs up while we put it back together. In a nutshell, I learned how to take apart, mold, put together, take apart, and put back together real well.
|
|
What bender did you use to bend the aluminum? Those are some tight radius bends that appear to not be kinked, which is hard to do with aluminum. The upper part looks great. Did the front legs move up/down on your test drive?
|
|
I drew out how I wanted the tower bent, and had it down to exactly where I wanted it. I had a friend of mine, who worked for Pilott's metal shop in Greenback, TN bend it for me. I'm not exactly sure HOW he did it. He had some experience bending the aluminum for towers, as he had built towers for a pontoon boat company a few years back.
The tower test today was immaculate. No movement! No noise! The bar that the main part of the tower mounts into is stainless steel. We welded the stainless tube to some larger stainless steel plates. I went through a drill bit on my dad's drill press before I remembered oil on the drill piece would prevent burning up the bit. Stainless is tough stuff.
So, we have the tower mounted in the stainless tube mounts, then the stainless tube is welded to steel plates, and bolted in at 4 points on each of the four plates. I put broad stainless underneath the figerglass to distribute what weight would be put on the tower.
Anyways, the tower is like a rock. It doesn't move anywhere.
I want to get a wakeboard rack for the tower now, but I may just lay some of that pipe cushion on the tower up top and bungee the boards, haha. Any good, cheap ($100 - $200) racks out there that anyone can recommend?
|
|
Also, the tow point is a little higher than I had intended. It's nearly 8.5ft off the floor of the boat, I have to stand in one of the seats to put the rope on, haha. I don't suppose you could have TOO much elevation, could you?
|
|
Anyone have any ideas on racks? Sorry for the persistence, goin shopping tomorrow :P
|
|
Good job taking your ideas and executing on them !
|
|
Nice job, just added this post to diytower.com
|
| By Bob (bob) on Monday, July 25, 2005 - 10:58 am:
| 
|
|
Well it is possible to have too much height, the boat will sway real bad as the rider cuts out. Looks real good though.
|
|
I don't believe we have that problem, anymore than we did with the tow hook atleast. It works really well with the stress we've put on it. However, a guy is riding with us this weekend that weighs about 230lbs, that'll be a real test.
|
|
Hey, I just got my monster tower wakeboard rack today, and I must say it is nice. About the cheapest I found out there and very verstile for mounting on any angle or size tubing. I am very impressed with it, and it looks great on the Moomba Rad A Cage tower. Plus you get a free Monster Girls Calendar. Can't go wrong as far as I can see.
|
|
I should check that out, i'm assuming they'd fit 1 1/2 inch tubing. Hey Bill, hook me up :P
|
|
They have inserts that fit from 1-1/2" to 2-1/2", and then MasterCraft comes out with a 2-3/4" tower 
|
|
You got the man himself here talking to you, so you don't need me to answer any questions about board racks from Monster Tower. I am very pleased with the rack. I may even get a ski rack from him later, not sure about that yet.
|
|
did you make the mounts for the tower to the stainless tubes? If you bought them, where did you get them from? thank you,
James
|
|
there are aluminum mounts in the stainless tube, they were made by the same friend who bent the tubing for me (as I said, he works for Pilotts Machine shop, a little place here in the backwoods of TN). There are probably cheaper alternatives starting from scratch for DIY towers. We had to work with what Aluminum we had, and that meant making mounts to go into some tubing on the stainless bar.
|
|
This is incredible. I was just wondering, I have been considering creating a tower for my boat as well, and i was just wondering if you knew, but does the placement of where the tower is effect it? for example, would it be better if we mounted a tower closer to the front, back or try and get it in the middle of the boat?
|
|
I placed it primarily based on other towers. I didn't want it too far towards the back as it would not only look goofy, it would put unwelcome weight back there (it's already relatively heavy in the backend). I also wanted it more towards the middle to avoid riders being able to turn the boat when they cut out, after all, it's only a 16.5' boat.
|
|
You rule the earth!!!
|
|
Why..thank you 
|
|
looks very good cody.
p.s. - nice Bush banner in the garage. and a pre-sorry of this starts a political war in this thread. lol.
(Message edited by wakeandsnow27 on August 03, 2005)
|
|
Hahaha, good eye. Thanks! And let us not turn this into a political debate.
|
