Foretravel Owners' Forum

                     Several years ago , I was in the FOT shop . There laying on the floor headed for the trash bin was this stainless steel Foretravel mud flap pieces , all bent to heck and back  . I ask Mark Harvey if it was trash , he said yes . I ask if (I could have it , he said take it . I did , and got it home in my shop and promptly  forgot about for a couple of years . Stumbled across it last month , pulled it out , and said to my self , now what . I have a cheep combination sheer and shape tool from Harbor Freight ,It has rollers on it to shape thin sheet metal , so I adjusted the rollers to allow things to pass straight thru, ran the Foretrtavel sign thru it and it improved it quite a lot . I tightened the rollers much tighter together, turned it over and ran it thru again . Got a lot better still .  I keep on doing this till it looks real good and it can now be used again . Made me feel like I done something special . Now the reason for posting this is simply that you can save and reuse  your mud flap if it gets bent and save a bundle of cash .  Bring it to Virginia and I know a guy that will fix it cheep .  ;D            Brad Metzger

Do you do bent bumpers, as well ?

Carter

Care to auction it off to a good cause, Brad? Maybe "The Mis-Perceived Poodles" could use some fund-raising? I'll open the bidding at $100.00 USD.

Nice post! I can see the process in my little head clearly. Happy New Year!

I ran a fleet shop for a 500  construction vehicle fleet and heavy Equ. The owners made all the facilities managers keep thier respective areas free of misc "stuff", so no junk. However we had a couple hundred jobsite storage trailers, 4 of them never left the yard they had all the good stuff in them ya never know what you need to make something.

Hey Brad, I did that with the one Barry "Beam" and I took of their coach when visiting us. He said it was a pain as it kept getting banged up so we made a new one out of some commercial conveyor belting I have and installed that (minus any metal). I think he said it cost him $600 at FT a couple years earlier. Geoff now has it and plan is to take it to his work and laser cut all the rolled edging off and he use it on their GV. Recycle is the word.
JohnH

Speaking of straightening metal, I have a piece of diamond plate aluminum (maybe about 1/8", depending on how diamond plate thickness is measured). It is about 30" wide and 6' long. Unfortunately, the previous owner folded it in half to put it in his car! It lacks about 12" of folding over on itself, but the bent edge is a serious bend.
 
Is there any hope for straightening this out? If so, how? Or am I better off just cutting it and having two 30" x 36" pieces.
 
On a related subject, it is painted white. Is there a straight forward method of removing the paint on diamond plate?
 
Thanks,
 
Trent

It depends on what you have to work with. If I had it I would pry up one of my steel plates on the ground and slide it under all the way to the bend then lift up and push over until almost straight. Then lay on the steel plate bend side up and drive my front tire over it.
Lacquer thinner or paint remover shouldn't hurt the aluminum finish on diamond plate.

Its amazing what some laser & plasma cutters can do.  I had 4 column base plates burned out of 1.5" thick steel plate each with (eight) 1" holes for a bridge crane I was building.  Figuring $0.05 per pound for the steel itself, the holes cost about $2.00 each. Give them a CAD file, and they can burn about anything for less than $100.00 if your not in a big hurry, and they can batch it with similar items.

Trent, the aluminum is now work hardened at the bend and will crack if you try to straighten it.  As for the paint, try some
"paint remover."

600 dollars is sooo far out of my mud flap budget.  I will be taking the old faded scratched up fiberglass panel and cleaning,re paint the original white.  After all it's just a mud flap. I figure if it looks nice white, it will fit the coach. Maybe even look a little custom ish

Brad, you may have your first customer. I hammered mine out with a rubber mallet and got it a ton better, but nothing like what you have done. Will get in touch next time both of us are home. Nancy and I just got back into Mesa a few minutes ago. What a trek. Another story for another beer sometime.

We thought about you and Phyllis and Barney a lot on the way. Most recent was when we stopped at the rest stop just west of Willcox this morning. We wanted to stay at Fort Willcox like we did with you last year, but could only make it as far as Lordsburg. Here's a photo out the window this morning.


We'll be here until March 1. Not sure what your plans are.

Don

Nice looking VMSpc kit, Don.

                   My plan is to leave Arizona the last week of March . I have a bunch of miles to ride my Maverick  in order to my  get winter fix achieved .  "  Heaven to murgatroyd  Myrtle  " if I come up one mile short . ;D . I will be glade to do my best to roll it flat again .    Brad Metzger

I know a great guy if you're interested ;D !

Don

Like T Man said you will not get it back to original shape. That crease will break.
JohnH

Brad, if you keep on tightening up/reducing your roller spacing you might end up with a piece of SS 12' long x 18 wide x .03 thick!!
Or a busted machine.

                         Yep , your on to me all right . The one I worked on is now 16 feet long and 30 inches wide ., one more pass thru the rollers  and it will be in the kitchen wrapping food for the fridge to keep fresh .  ;D  Now the real deal is this , I all ready said it was a cheep thing from Harbor  Freight  , --nothing changed , It's still cheep .  :P  :P  :P      Brad Metzger

Don,
 
What RV facilities does Fort Willcox have?
 
Thanks,
 
Trent

A few years ago, I found an old SS tabletop, cut it to the proper dimensions for the rear mudflat with a plasma cutter. A local lady welder had a laser table and cut the letters and logo that we wanted. She made two of them for me for about 40 bucks. I then went to a local grain elevator and got some elevator belting to make the backing. Got some SS carriage bolts and put it together. Got by pretty cheap. Poor folks got poor ways.