Wing Spats/Fender Chaps

[sevenup]

I just painted my Stalker and wanted to come up with a way to protect the rear fenders from rock/gravel

chips. Came up with these pieces that I made from some naugahyde (sp?) left over from an old mgb project. Will make the next set from black material and continue experimenting with other concepts. After a couple hundred miles the protective chaps have held up well and there are no chips or dents in the paint. They attach through two lower eyelets to two small bolts on a bracket behind the lower part of the fender, and then to a top bracket with Velcro is used at the top. They go on and come off in seconds...takes a couple minutes to remove the top velcro

brackets.

 

http://s1281.photobucket.com/user/foto8mike/library/Stalker%20Wing%20Spats?sort=3&page=1

 

 

 

Edited October 10, 2015 by sevenup

[coffee break]

My 7 has stainless steel screwed to the rear wing. If you are going for something detachable you may think about sandwiching some metal between some soft material. The metal should prevent sharp stone edges from piercing the soft material and dinging your wings.

[scannon]

My Caterham started out with the stainless steel stone guards on the rear fenders. After 1,600 miles the stainless steel was so pitted it wouldn't polish out. I then had the stainless steel coated with bed liner along with the inside of all four fenders. The bed liner still looks very good after 30k miles.

 

The whole car is covered with clear bra since new. Above the coated stainless steel panels the clear bra shows much abuse from stone impact but the paint under it is still in good condition. Below the stainless steel is a small area that didn't get the clear bra. Most of the paint down there is gone.

[Dave W]

Using any polished surface on spats, is next to impossible to keep it in any decent shape. Go with a bushed SS surface. You will still need to remove the spats every couple years, to pound out the small dents and give them a good polish them with a 180 grit wheel. The bushed surface is a lot easier to maintain on a daily bases. It just takes a minute with a [White] scot-bite pad and soft scrub for SS sinks to remove the gopher guts an to clean and polish the surface. Dave W

[sevenup]

The clear adhesive and aluminum/stainless protection do a creditable job, but in the end get dinged up and with the adhesive there is always some indentations in the fiberglass from larger rocks etc. I wanted to experiment with something that would totally eliminate any debris hitting and damaging the wings and that would be easily removable and easily put back on. Surprisingly, the Naugahyde has enough "give" to it that it absorbs heavy hits with no marks at all on the fender. So, if you are simply displaying your car or what have you, with the "protectors" off the wings look just as pristine as new. Bear in mind, this is just a first effort to achieve that goal and there will be modifications in design and material as time progresses.