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My quick release mud flaps.

XJ_Otto

NAXJA Forum User
Location
Nashville, TN
I want mud flaps on all four corners to keep s*** off the side of my rig, rocks from pummeling the rocker paint, and mud out of my dogs face and the rear windows (when down). Im making my own quick release style, from stuff I have laying around, and a pair of 24" x 12" tractor trailor mud flaps (each cut in half giving me four).

Ok, got some work done on the rear brackets for the mudflaps today. Pics:

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Bottom piece with 2 holes in it is one of the arms that will hold the flap. These two holes will mount to an L-bracket with detent pins, eventually. For right now, since I dont want to drop $25 on pins, Im going to more permanently mount them with some nuts and bolts. Still removable, just with a 7/16" wrench.

0322091453a.jpg

The arms are 1/2" C-channel aluminum. So to reinforce the mounting points, I used some 1/4" thick x 3/4" wide aluminum flat stock and made two 3" pieces, and hammered them into the C-channel, then drilled the mounting holes. This should help with some extra support. The aluminum arms are 16" long each for the rear.

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This is just a view of the 1/4" x 3/4" flat stock in the C-channel.

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Ok, this was the toughest part for the rear. The drob bracket was a piece of 1 1/4" x 1/4" flat stock that was 6" long to start with. The hard part was just figuring the angle and amount of drop, etc, to keep it far enough from the leaf spring, but low enough to allow for the downward angle of the arm holding the mud flap. I used L-brackets that were 2"x2" with holes that were 1 1/8" apart on each arm. Im using 1/4" diameter bolts with lock nuts holding the L-brackets to the drop brackets, self tapping screws for the drop brackets to the frames, and eventually 1/4" detent pins for the quick releases. From the front of the rear shackle box to the trailing edge of the L-bracket is 6 1/4".

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View of the clearance b/w the arm and the leaf spring, which is like 2 1/4" at the lowest point or so, which near the rear of the leaf spring is plenty.

0322091551.jpg

Heres sort of what it will look like when installed. Thats an 11"x17" piece of copy paper hanging from the bracket. The flaps will be 12"x18".
As of now, the parts are disassembled and primed ready for black paint. The drop brackets have been trimmed of excess aluminum for esthetics. The downward angle of the rear arms was provided by a hammer, after the drop brackets were attached to the "frame". The front hangers will be much simpler, as they will be L-brackets simply mounted to the "frame" and the arms extending outward...no drop brackets needed. Hope this helps anyone interested.

More to come when the fronts are finished, everything is painted, and the mud flaps come in the mail.
 
OK, got some more work done. The rears are finished, except for adding the mudflaps themselves. They are painted though and Im going to give them a few days to cure before putting them together while I wait on the flaps.

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rear bracket parts finished and painted.

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how they will be assembled.

Here are the front brackets. They were much simpler to make and mount, as there are no drop brackets needed. The front arms, with L-brackets installed, are 17" long altogether. (you can see my note for the front brackets: "Turn wheels all the way and measure." With the wheels at full lock, there will be no contact with the tires and mudflaps.)
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How they are mounted. The mounting points put the arms directly below the very front of the pinch seam, shown below.
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Showing how they look from behind. As you can see, with the flaps installed they will give complete coverage of the tires.

Then next three pictures are mock ups with an 11" x 17" piece of paper, and again, the flaps will be 12" x 18".
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Front brackets primed and ready for paint tomorrow. Ill update when I get more done.
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A side note: If the flaps happen to put too much stress on the arms, etc, I have figured out a way that I will add one more L-bracket to each out towards the edges. The L will face forward, but I will bend up the tip to make sort of a J facing forward, like a bucket or something, that will support the weight of the flaps. A small slot cut into the flaps at this point will allow them to be slipped over the upright of the J and into place. If you have no idea what Im talking about, Ill show you with pictures later...ha.
 
FIN!
Finally got them done. I dont have any pics of the last part of the process. It was basically just me attaching the flaps to the brackets and cutting the flaps to size, etc. Simple, but time consuming.

I freakin LOVE the way it looks, and it makes it a bit more unique to all other XJs out there...so to all you haters...:ar15: ha ha...

Pics...(all cell phone, sorry again. The first two have a dif. filter going on, thats why they are blue.)

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actually, it started raining today as I finished them up!! A little later, I went to a buddy's house and kept sticking my head out the window in the rain to check them out..ha ha. My head got a bit wet, but the flaps deflected the water perfectly. No rooster tails off the tires. If I had stuck my head out the window without them, I would have been pelted with water from the tires. In fact, I took a trip into the mountains abt a week ago without flaps, and I took my dog. He kept his head out the window down a wet gravel road and got quite a face full of mud. Wont happen now. Plus, since it wasnt raining at that time, I had all my windows down and mud flew in the front and back windows onto my trim and seats. Again, with the flaps, its not going to happen anymore. Now, when I go to on OHV park or something, I can still take them off, so no big deal. But they currently have bolts through the holes I want to put detent pins through b/c detent pins are like 3 bucks a piece and I need 8 of them. So Im going to hold off on that for a few...
 
Please re-upload all the pictures. This thread is useless without them.
 
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