onsdag 19. juni 2013

Rear mudflap for Bessie

The last few days prior to our departure for the castle run was hectic, to say the least.
In the evening the day before I was to strap on my luggage on o`l Bessie I realized I hadn`t yet made a mudflap for her rear! This had been on my plan for a long time, but when there is no time, and yeah you know.
OK, no time to loose.
I had been looking for stainless leather trim letters, as those once sold by Harley, Buco and more (to personalize a kidney belt with your name and such) on e-bay for quite a while, no success so far.
So what to do to get stainless letters, uhhm?

The laptop was the first tool required and of course Word. Then I found the correct style letters, wrote BESSIE in the biggest size available, printed and scanned the print to increase the letters to the desired 1" height.
Used glue stick (or whatever at hand) to ensure the letters stuck to a stainless steel plate of ,5 mm thickness (and do not forget to add two tabs to each letter, they will come handy when its time to stick them to the flap).
Then I drilled holes as close to the letters and as many as I dared, opened the pouch where my Nicholson needle files are kept.
And then I started to file, a lot of filing and better be steady on your hand!
Just 4-5 hours later I had 6 letters, BESSIE.
Made the mudflap template, ran off to the local saddle maker to get him to roll out a piece of 1/4" thick leather of the best quality, cut according to template. Ran back home and found some old Buco dots and jewels (from Easy Russ they are), carefully cut holes for the lot, mounted and bent the tabs and voila I had put a lot of personality to the o`l Pan when finished at ten past 3 in the morning.






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