bike fender

[sherwoodchoppers]

I was wondering if anyone had any had any suggestions on how to make a 1 3/4 wide and 30'' around tire curve, fender for a bike, i made 1 out of 14 guage aluminum and i had to make tons of relief cuts since i dont have a shrinker-stretcher because they leave to many marks since i want to polish it, i had to weld a lot and fill all the cuts. any suggestions would be great.

Thanks, Patrick

[Tony Sanchez]

---Hi Patrick,
Welcome to metal meet.
Sounds like you are trying to make a fender for a bicycle. What material do you want to make the fender out of? What tools do you have?
If you have read todays previous posts go back to" learn to make a fender" and follow that procedure. If you follow that procedure you should not have any problems. It's a little harder to make a fender 1 3/4 inches wide. You should not have to make relief cuts in making your fender.
If you have any more questions or need more help, just ask.
---Tony.

[Gene_Olson]

Try a hammerform.
http://www.metalmeet.com/photopost/data/3415/320Hammerform.jpg

clamp it to the edge of the bench, hammer down part of the fender, feed some more out, hammer that down . . . etc.

G.

[anders nørgaard]

Great idea, Gene.

I was thinking of something similar, only just a press form. 2 Pieces of hardwood, representing the shape. Lock them in a vise and "screw away" :!: :lol:

Anders DK

[sherwoodchoppers]

i am making it out of 14- 12 guage aluminum and the wooden block sounds good, where is the "how to make a fender" i have a henrob torch, full set of mallets and body hammers, i also have an old press that i make tooling for.

[Tisdelski]

hi patrick, how to make a fender is in the section for motorcycle sheetmetal written by blazedbowtie. gary

[sherwoodchoppers]

the wooden block didnt work since the whole thing is only 1 3/4 wide and the sides wrinkled. I made a really skinny 1 that has almost no curve so any more ideas???

Thanks, Patrick

[Boogiemanz1]

You are going to have to learn how to tuck shrink. Those little ruffles you were talking about have to be hammered into themselves, not overlappped, not cut and welded, just shrunk.

You can see a photo sequence on the post by blazedbowtie of how the tucks are laid out. Go to the gallery of John Norton for a series of pictures which show the making od a fender. Do a search for tucking and get hundersed odf posts to check out......It's a very common discussion on this list...........good luck......john

[tdoty]

And, if tuck shrinking isn't your thing, stretch everything else. :shock: :lol: 8)

Tim D.

[blazedbowtie]

Here is a link to the thread mentioned a few times above: http://www.metalmeet.com/forum/showthread.php?t=2511

And here is the thread where Norton made a fender as well:
http://www.metalmeet.com/forum/showthread.php?t=2392

I was unable to get the right arch I wanted lengthwise. I got the correct crown, but could not get enough arch lengthwise. I am not sure what I was doign wrong, but my time was cut short, and I did not have enough time to play with the metal to achieve the results I wanted. I only de-arched the fender more, while shrinking the edges, and then found that deeper tucks shrunk the ednges more to give a small arch. But nothing close enough to the tires radius.

Seth

[Kerry Pinkerton]

Seth, without photos it's difficult to be precise but your problem was definitly lack of shrink on the sides. Additional tuck shrinking will bring the radius down as will additional stretching in the center.

[blazedbowtie]

I figured this much, but I did not have enough time to play with the results I was getting, to figure out what I was doing wrong. I worked with it for about an hour, and had no luck, so I made the fender as long as the arch matched the tire.
http://www.twistedminis.com/AfterContest/FrontLeft.jpg
http://www.twistedminis.com/AfterContest/SideView.jpg
This is all I cam up with. In all reality, I wouldn't have made the whole fender much longer than it is.

[Kevbo]

Sorry to be a safety nazi, but that setup is just waiting to suck in a shirt tail or jacket.

[blazedbowtie]

Your shirt just happens to rest a bit above it, and my sweatshirts are planted safely between my bum and the fender. Never had a problem, and I've probably ridden it several miles... It wasn't built to be safe anyways, it has a 'suicide brake.'

[Edward Hull]

I have used a fork tool .it has three fingers the center finger is on top of sheet .the other two are below .,you would hit the top finger to make the shrink . only on the out side of the fender. then useing a round malit beat the center in on the bag . to the contur.this is my first post so i did what I could . so were is the spell check ? :-)

[John Kelly]

Hi Seth,

You seem to have it figured out but, I've attached a picture of a little fender demo...just kept tuck shrinking, stretching, and smoothing. If it were a real fender, I would have made it wider to fit over more of the tire. It just takes time. It is common to stop when you think you have enough curve in one direction and wonder why it does not fit in the other. You need to keep going until it has the right amount of curve in both directions. Do not worry about getting too much curve in either direction until you are close to having enough in both directions. Be sure to manipulate the panel by hand. Over a flat surface, push down on the edges from inside to make the front to back curve tighter, and the side to side more shallow, or squeeze the sides together to change the form of the panel the other direction...making more curve side to side, and less front to back. Hope this makes sense.

John www.ghiaspecialties.com

[John Kelly]

Hi again Seth,

Cool chopper by the way! You can have the small sample fender I made if you want it. Not sure if it will fit. Email me with measurements if you are interested. I've attached a picture of another experimental fender that I'm working on. It is wrapped around a car wheel and tire since I don't have a motorcycle. Still needs more work.

John www.ghiaspecialties.com

[blazedbowtie]

My tire is 6 inches wide, and has an 8.75" radius at the top of the sidewall. I was going to attempt making a new fender for it sometime soon, but hadn't found the time. I was actually going to add some sheetmetal to the sides, like a skirt, that would come to hover by the wheel. The add some reinforcements so that it could hold the weight of another person, even if my motor can't handle the extra weight... LOL...

Thanks for the compliments John. If the fender is anywhere near the size I'd need, I'd be glad to take it off your hands.

Seth

[John Kelly]

Hi Seth,

Unfortunately the fender is only 4" wide. My arm is pretty sore from pounding out over a hundred tucks at the moment, but maybe we could do a parallel fender excercise in a month or so? We could start out with the same size blanks, and go step by step. Let me know.

John www.ghiaspecialties.com

[blazedbowtie]

I'd definitely be up for that John, sounds like a plan.

Seth