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Location:
Castle Hill NSW
Registered:
March 2003
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 Welding together a wake tower
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Fri, 11 March 2005 05:24
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Hi all, i want to weld together a wakeboard tower, kinda like this one:
http://www.fluidcore.com.au/images/1photos/600x450 /wishbone.jpg
Just wanted to start a bit of a discussion going about it.
Say, if i was going to use 5cm diameter aluminium tubing, get it bent to shape, how hard would it be to weld caps onto the ends, and screw in some rod-end bearings like these into the caps:
These bearings would connect onto round flanges which would be on the deck of the boat, which would look like this (circled in red):
Any suggestions/ideas ? Would the welding be difficult, or should i use a different bearing? My main difficulty is i can't imagine how i'd make the flange/hat things.
[Updated on: Fri, 11 March 2005 05:51]
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Location:
On your mum!
Registered:
May 2002
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Re: Welding together a wake tower
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Fri, 11 March 2005 05:45
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Welding the tubes together will be easy if you know how to weld aluminum and if you scallop the ends of the tubes where they meet the next section (so as to butt up neatly). I recommend using no less than 3mm wall thickness (thicker if available due to the repeated stress) and using a 6060 construction grade alloy and suitable filler wire when welding. Scaffold tube is suitable and comes as 48.4 x 4.47mm wall thickness.
I cannot understand why you would want to make a hat with so many of them available from the cancer council and other specialty hat shops at competitive prices.
To fit the spherical bearing ends into the ends of your tube is easy to manufacture a shouldered plug. I imagine the plug to be tapped with the appropriate tap and turned with a shoulder to act as a stop when it is inserted in the tube a small fillet weld to fix it forever.
After your alloy work is all done it should be treated by a powder coater who understands that it is to be used outdoors (this is pre-treated differently and uses a different powder).
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Location:
Castle Hill NSW
Registered:
March 2003
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Re: Welding together a wake tower
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Fri, 11 March 2005 05:54
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Sounds great.
Any ideas where to buy the scaffold tube from? I've called around and its hard to find. Oh yeah I'm in the hills/blacktown/windsor area.
I still don't know how i'll make the flange things (the thing circled in red)... any ideas?
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Location:
On your mum!
Registered:
May 2002
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Re: Welding together a wake tower
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Fri, 11 March 2005 05:57
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Scaffold tube is readily available by the tonne from Capral.
The flange thing would be easily made from 316 grade stainless and tig welded together. Before doing so I would go to Bias boating, Whitworths or contact Ronstan to see what over the counter items are available.
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Location:
S.E suberbs, Vic
Registered:
December 2003
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Re: Welding together a wake tower
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Fri, 11 March 2005 06:11
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sorry for the amature question but WTF does this metal spider do???
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Location:
On your mum!
Registered:
May 2002
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Re: Welding together a wake tower
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Fri, 11 March 2005 06:13
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gets fitted to a boat and gives a much higher point with which to hook a ski rope (allowing hektik air when wake boarding).
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Location:
S.E suberbs, Vic
Registered:
December 2003
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Re: Welding together a wake tower
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Fri, 11 March 2005 06:17
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oh right thanks, that explains why I no idea, I avoid water as much as I can! I was wondering why it wasnt made of Cro-mo but now its pretty obvious. Good luck with it!
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Location:
On your mum!
Registered:
May 2002
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Re: Welding together a wake tower
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Fri, 11 March 2005 06:18
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you could make it outta Cro-Mo but will cost a packet.
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Location:
S.E suberbs, Vic
Registered:
December 2003
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Re: Welding together a wake tower
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Fri, 11 March 2005 06:28
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I was thinking more about the rust..
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I supported Toymods
Location:
Northern Beaches
Registered:
May 2002
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Re: Welding together a wake tower
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Fri, 11 March 2005 08:26
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yea I thought about making one, never really got around to any more than, yea that would be cool 
I love wakebording and really wondered how much higher you get with a high pole  (might stop the landing on head during flips)
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Location:
Kilsyth, Melbourne
Registered:
September 2004
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Re: Welding together a wake tower
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Fri, 11 March 2005 08:57
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u would be amazed how much difference a high pole makes to how much air you get. it just pops u up. still prefer slalom tho 
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Registered:
August 2002
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Re: Welding together a wake tower
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Fri, 11 March 2005 12:47
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check out these links... these guys seem to do a mounting arrangement similar to the one you're planning...
http://www.wakeair.com/index/menu.asp
{url}http://www.wakeair.com/index/meas_inst2.htm[/url]
they seem to taper the tube at the end... just make sure you've got a decent length of thread to screw the heim joint into.
might be unrealistic, but it would be sweet if you could find some of the sort of mounting hardware a lot of the tower builders use, as in the link in your first post, and like this;
check out the gallery on this page for some other nice pics;
http://www.wakeside.com/page/W/PROD/boss_wakeboard _towers/boss_knight_wakeboard_towers
and here for a bunch of different tower designs;
http://www.wakeside.com/miva/merchant.mvc?Screen=C TGY&Category_Code=wakeboard_towers
are you planning on the front posts converging on the centre, like the tower in your first post? for ease of construction, i reckon a tower using 2 hoops would be the go, like this;
... as long as you have plenty of room for the shpeaker podz...
| hokey wrote on Fri, 11 March 2005 19:57 |
u would be amazed how much difference a high pole makes to how much air you get. it just pops u up. still prefer slalom tho
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high pole + fatsacks = gooooood time
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Location:
Castle Hill NSW
Registered:
March 2003
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Re: Welding together a wake tower
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Sun, 13 March 2005 23:23
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I'll have to give capral a call !
And thanks for the links norm, i've given wakeair an email.
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