Projects Anyone making front "motorcycle" fenders for the Hi-boy?

Awesome. you bobbed the rear fender in the front of them? My front tires are about 7" wide. would the 36 band work on those? i worry about width.....

 

Here some I did with spare tire covers as well

 

hurlbird I cut the front of the rear fenders even with the body and took about 5 3/4" out of the rears. To me the stock ones look too long hanging down in back. If you are running a skinny tire in the rear you might be able to get away with a thinner fender but if your like most of us who run larger and wider in the rear then I think a bobbed stock fender is a better look. Just my opinion. Here is a pic of where I shortened the rears. The one on the right has the 5 3/4" done. The one on the left shows where it was cut out along with an area I needed to repair in side the blue tape.

 

By the way my front tires are Coker Classics which are about 5 3/4" wide. The fender is 5 1/2' wide. It doesn't cover the whole tire but I mounted it so it was in the middle of the tread, which is all you really need. I would think it would be easy enough to split the tire ring length wise down the middle and add a strip to it to widen it without loosing too much of the look of a stock ring.

 

great... you did what I will do. Looks perfect. thank you

 

nice.. do you know the tire width

 

Gordon, are you still using the factory fender brace now that it is shorter? thanks

 

No braces. The fenders are just hung using bolts through the inside of the rear fender well.

 

36 spare tire rim, cut in half. Finally got a bracket designed strong enough.
Neat is school look

 

Dino 64 can you shoot a pic of how they are mounted on the caliper? Mine are off just because I went to disc brakes and now I need to figure out how to mount them with the new brake stuff.

 

Sure, that is the weakest spot and so I used a piece of 5” X 1/4” pipe cut into quarter sections with a straight piece to bolt into the caliper mounting bolt. I’ll find some pics so hopefully it will make sense

 

Couple of more

 

I don't see how the above let's the brake calipers work.

The calipers slide in and out on those bolts/pins and with the bracket bolted on there the caliper can't slide so your only using one brake pad and that's the inner one because of the piston, the outer pad doesn't do anything because the caliper can't slide to equalize even pressure between both inner and outer pads...
..

 

Thanks for your reply,@lostone. Let me ask you this, do you think an 1/8” washer on the caliper mounting bolt would have the same effect as you describe ? Because that’s all the bracket mount does. If I’m wrong, I want to know, but brakes work fine

 

@Dino 64 not trying to criticize your design just want to make sure your safe!

To be sure as I can't be 100 % without seeing the whole caliper BUT it appears to be a standard GM 1 piston caliper.

If it is then what I would do is remove the bracket you made and the brake pads and reinstall caliper, if it's the design I think it is you will be able to move the caliper back and forth (which it should as is proper) on the bolt/pin. As you do you will see the caliper cover the bolt/pin head.

It has to work like this to work properly. As you apply brakes the caliper actually floats back and forth on the bolt/pin and as it does it allows equal pressure to be applied to both the inner and the outer pads. If you limit the calipers movement you will only be applying pressure to the pad that has the piston against it.

Also as it's travel is limited or solid as you apply brake pressure as the piston pushes against the brake pad, the brake pad pushes against the rotor you will be trying to flex the rotor away from the pressure of the brake pad which will probably cause fluctuations in the brake pedal, warped rotors, excessive wear to the piston side brake pad and weird braking...

....

 

@Dino 64

Here I went out and took pics of mine, notice the bolt/pin position in both pics in relationship to the caliper.

The pic with the head totally exposed would represent the caliper location with new brake pads, but as pads wear and get thinner the caliper also changes position to compensate for that wear, the other pic with the head of the bolt/pin covered would represent rhe caliper position when your at maximum brake pad wear and time for new pads.

Again the caliper must float during operation to allow equalized pressure to both pads during standard operation.

 

No offense taken, no worries. Appreciate the info. The caliper is a GM P- metric. I never imagined the bolt head itself would move as the pads wear. I’ll take them off and see if there’s a difference in the brakes. Guess I won’t notice it until the pads wear
Thanks

 

https://www.speedwaymotors.com/Longacre-52-50870-Tire-Tape-1-4-in-x-10-ft-,282441.html
https://www.speedwaymotors.com/Tire-Stagger-Tape-10-Feet,2664.html

 

That’s bad ass

 

Thanks@nochop, I think the pads got out of position when I was test fitting the fenders over and over again. Gonna pull them tomorrow cause the pads hardly move when my wife pushed on the pedal.

 

Dude! That’s rusty as hell! You live by the ocean….don’t be offended I’m trying (feebly) to be funny
Cheers Nochop

 

Back to the drawing board?

 

How about this as a start?if you have the skills it csn be trimmed and massage

 

Harley Davidson Front Fenders... A perect fit for open front wheels

Hello,

If you are still looking around for a nice styled front fender for your build, check out the nearest Harley Davidson dealer’s parts department. We had a fairly wide front fender that had a great smooth finished design and the tire fit nicely inside. when a friend saw the bike, he wanted the fender for his hot rod front wheels. He was tired of “stuff” being kicked up from the street surface and if he went off the main streets and some rougher roads were a part of the picture, then the flying objects doubled in their attack.

We had taken off the front fender to make it look like a drag bike in the original re-design of our Harley. We liked the look of a low rear and clean front end without a fender. But, two trips down Coast Highway to our favorite beach town diner and the other to a small bakery near a pier, was all it took for the front fender to be put back in place. Our (my face and my wife’s) faces were getting plastered with road grit, so it was the front fender back on again.

6 inches wide and the lower tip is below the 50% arch to keep things from flying up and back.


Jnaki

There are different style of front fenders as per model of motorcycle. From these 6 inch wide units to much wider fenders for any application. YRMV

 

@nochop, that’s not my rusty front end, it’s @lostone’s front end. Drawing board ? If in fact in it is the bracket, there really is no where else to mount them. So I have to start over or forget it

 

Update ! Pulled the calipers, made sure they are fixing properly. This pic is the back side of the caliper mounting bracket. You can see it’s solid with just the threads for the pin (bolt). There’s no way it can slide. The pads are riding on the pins as they should. The fender bracket is bolted on the outside of the caliper body, second pic. I put the grandees back on. Maybe @lostone’s calipers work differently. thanks for the feedback

 

No, yours is just the same as mine, the pin screws into bracket, caliper floats back and forth on pin.

Prove my point, pull caliper off and take off outer brake pad, reinstall caliper then pull caliper all the way inward and watch caliper hide the pin.

..

 

Thanks lostone, I’ll try that

 

The head of the pin is mounted in two rigid ends, one open and one threaded. These two points cannot come any closer to each other. The pad mount floats between these two points and is basically self adjusting by the depth of the piston. The only thing that has happened here is that the threaded end does not go in as far. If the end of the pin is flush or protruding, you are OK. If in doubt, try the pin with and without the fender. I would put lock-tite on those pins.
Warren

 

@wugs, the pins are in the unthreaded hole. The bracket pushes it out by 1/8th inch. The bolt hole on the bracket is counter sunk so the pin is only loosing 1/8” total