impromptu windscreen

[cheeterpasteen]

I was transporting one of those translucent office chair mats on top of my other sweet ride (a 2000 rav-4 booyah) today when it decided to break from the wind bending it. I learned not to go 88 miles per hour with such a thing attached to your roof. But after picking up the pieces from the roadside like a responsible person I got an idea. One of the pieces was perfectly shaped to be retro-fitted into a windscreen. "Egad!!!!" i exclaimed but not really. I then rushed home to grab a heat gun. And then THIS.

This is kinda how I want it to go around my headlight.


The preliminary shaping was done using a heat gun, a kitchen bowl, and very, very unused textbooks.


I moved on to the oven to do some aggressive melting/bending/shaping. I wanted it to come out looking kind of like the purrty national cycle F-15 screen I'm too cheap to pay for.


I then finished up the shaping with the heat gun. It came out pretty spiffy.


I've sanded the front to buff out the road rash from its conception. Also, the frosted look will go great after i coat the back with a dark spray tint.


So thats where i stop tonight. Tomorrow I plan on spray tinting the back and some finer sanding on the front and edges. I also need to fabricate some quick detach mounts to clip into the old gauge cluster mounts. That way I can use this less than beautiful screen to make my commute to work more comfortable, and around town or on the weekend i can stroll around naked in the breeze!!

[cbrfxr67]

GREAT shot,...that last one I mean.  Where's Steez to comment on photo depth when you need him,....

[cheeterpasteen]

So this is how it turned out. Still need to trim the bottom corners and tint the back. Its also a bit crooked but I can solve that with a few washers to raise the left mounting bracket. It also helps a TON and is rock steady at 90+ so far. The washers I used on the hardware was neoprene so hopefully that will stop the road vibrations from loosening the nuts and bolts.



And all together it only took 19ish bucks for the mounting hardware. I already had the tools and the broken office chair mat.