Bow EyeHere's another piece of vital hardware for trailering. After surveying the available bow eyes on the market the ones I found were fairly wanting in terms of the strength and cross section of metal. Also they were not long enough to extend through the stem. So I decided to make my own. | ||
I start by bending this piece of 3/8" silicon bronze rod into a U shape. It was fairly difficult to bend but it did without any cracking. |
Here I drill holes to accept the piece. These go all the way through the stem or about 12". |
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I used my tap set to cut the threads. |
Here's the finished U bolt. I rough sanded the prongs. When I install it the roughness will help the epoxy stick to it better and help secure it. |
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I decided to fabricate my own nuts since I didn't want to pay for 50 nuts to use only two. I cut these out of copper stock I had on hand. I then drilled holes of the specified size for tapping. |
My tap kit and a bit of cutting oil did the trick in a few minutes. |
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Here are the finished nuts. |
Here they are installed. The holes turned out a bit off center but not bad enough to warrant correction. I had to countersink these holes about an inch because the wood is so thick. I then liberally applied epoxy inside the holes, inserted the U bolt, then tightened down the nuts. |
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Here is the finished piece. After the epoxy set I used the winch to pull the entire boat a couple of inches forward on the trailer. It gave no complaint whatsoever during this process. From start to finish I spent maybe two hours. |