What kind of backing plates do you use for your tower mounts

mnwakeboarder

Treated wood, Metal, Fiberglass, Plexiglass? I need to add backing plates to my Monster Tower mounts and want to get a good idea what everyone else did and if they were happy with the results. I've also heard of glueing the mounts to the back of the boat, my only question with that is what if for some reason you need to remove the glued on backing plates?

thrasher · Newbie Joined: 24 Jun 2003 Posts: 34 City: northern MN

All we did was fiberglass a piece of 1/2" plywood to the inside of the boat, let it dry overnight, and then drilled the holes and attach the mounts.

jbelson · Guest

Mine was done by gluing 1/2 inch plywood. But I am now having problems with the gelcoat cracking. Not at the mount, but a foot down from it. Not sure how I would solve that one though.

mnwakeboarder · Posted: Jun 24, 2003 9:52 am Post subject: tower mounts

Hey JBelson, What type of tower do u have? Monster? What brand boat do you have it installed on? How thick was the fiberglass when you drilled?

skinautique1985 · Outlaw Joined: 26 Feb 2003 Posts: 140 City: Yuba CIty,CA

We use a Steel plate custom bent to the contours of the boat and between the steel and the fiberglass we use a 1/4" rubber to keep the stress evenly distributed. Weve been doing it for about 3 years, and have yet to see one of out customers come back with issues regarding the gel coat cracking. I think the key is the rubber "gaskets" as you might call them that keep the stress evenly distributed, along with the sheet steel that we bent to fit both surfaces of the boat on both the inside and the outside.

89comp · Posted: Jun 26, 2003 5:45 am Post subject:

I just used a block of wood, a 1x4, and I'm having from cracking issues, but they are coming from the drill holes so I don't know if they are from not reaming the hole enough to clear away the cracks I couldn't see, or the installation as I didn't use any fiberglass, just the block of wood and the mounting plates monster gave me.

mnwakeboarder · Posted: Jun 26, 2003 6:40 am Post subject: cracks?

OK hearing this scares the crap out of me! Is this normal? How is more fiberglass different from using Marine adhesive with a block of wood?

skinautique1985 · Outlaw Joined: 26 Feb 2003 Posts: 140 City: Yuba CIty,CA

Marine adhesive+Wood= not last very long
More Resin/Fiberglass=increase in strength of boat, which will last as long as the boat does if properly applied.

mnwakeboarder · Posted: Jun 26, 2003 1:24 pm Post subject:

how about marine adhesive & steel or aluminum plates

skinautique1985 · Outlaw Joined: 26 Feb 2003 Posts: 140 City: Yuba CIty,CA

Like I said earlier, we use a Steel plate and a rubber "buffer" piece to evenly distribute the load along a larger percentage of the fiberglass. The steel evenly distributes the load, and the rubber keeps high and low spots in the fiberglass from cracking. On the top sheet, we use 3m paper, which is a stick paper to keep the gelcoat from cracking when we drill the holes, then we remove it, and use the rubber on both sides of the fiberglass.

TORI · Newbie Joined: 26 Jun 2003 Posts: 2

Just got our Monster Tower yesterday and am now worried about installing it. Did anyone ever get a Monster installed without problems? Neutral

Nor*Cal · Ladies Man Joined: 12 Jan 2003 Posts: 9479 City: Sac

Most companies factory install isn't as intensive as what you guys are saying. Follow the directions in the install kit. If you want to be anal put some marine-tex betweeen the backing plate and the underside of the fiberglass. This has the same effect as the rubber gaskets on the outside.

mnwakeboarder · Posted: Jun 26, 2003 4:13 pm Post subject: backing plates

I already drilled all of the holes and installed the tower (I haven't ridden behind it yet though) All I need to do is install some type of backing plates and tighten everything down. Make sure you use masking tape and drill the holes in reverse after the initial hole. I had no cracking during the drilling. My front mounts had thick enough fiberglass, but I know for sure my back ones didn't. I'll probably go with aluminum plates

Nor*Cal · Ladies Man Joined: 12 Jan 2003 Posts: 9479 City: Sac

mnwakeboarder, The back mounts have downforce so the top plate is doing most of the support.

I'd use aluminum plates and put a thin layer of marine tex on it to fill any inconsistancies.

Fishmaster · Posted: Jun 26, 2003 8:13 pm Post subject:

The main reason for adding extra fiberglass is so any force that is there is spread out over a larger area and their is more "stuff", namely fiberglass to spread it out over.

89comp, can you say what boat this was on, what tower it was and if there was any "event" that may have caused the cracking? It seems like in every case I have been able to find it was a "fixed mount" where a plate was welded onto a tube that was bolted to the boat - and there was an "event" that caused the problem. All towers will flex a little and with welded mounts the only thing that can give is the fiberglass.

Nearly all of us have who build towers have moved to rod end bearings (Hiem joints to sound cool) becuase this stressing is eliminated, the tower can now only push up or down on the fiberglass. Also using the rubber pads that we include (Monster Paw's) moves virtually all the stress away from the drilled hole, back far enough so any force on the fiberglass is where it is thick and not right next to the hole. There really is not much reason to be stressing.

If any Monster Tower customers are worried about installation, you need to give us a call at 877-77-Tower. We probably have a customer with the same boat as you and we will try to hook you up with them so you can discuss what they did and how it has worked out. Naturally we'll help any way we can as well.

Bill

MackDaddyWake1 · Posted: Jun 28, 2003 7:00 pm Post subject:

I have a Boss Billet on my VLX. It came with the rubber gaskets, and machined backing plates. I didn't use glass or anything.. We punished it for three months and have had no cracks whatsoever. Like Bill said, the Hiem joints (that does sound cool) really absorb alot of the flex. It doesn't matter if the tower flexes a tad when your riding...better than stress cracking the crap out of your new boat..

Hillbilly · Newbie Joined: 30 Jan 2003 Posts: 5 City: Lake Lavon

Hey Bill,
I never got my shirts (2) for threading that tower leg !

Seriously, that monster tower is a great deal for the price. No cracks yet but my glass was only 3/8" thick. I saw somewhere that you actually recommend 1/2" so I'm going to go back and glass in another 1/4" or 3/8" piece of shaped wood. It should be easy since the holes are all properly marked.

Carey

Jeffro · Addict Joined: 17 Jan 2003 Posts: 659 City: Austin, Texas

here's my mounts from www.samsonsports.com

i also epoxied in between the glass and the mounts. lock tight on the bolts.

89comp · Posted: Jun 30, 2003 8:04 am Post subject:

hey bill! The monster tower was put onb my 89 Supra Comp. The reason I think the cracks were from the holes was because on one hole, I accidently had the drill in forward mode. I only drilled for a split second, but it ripped into the fiberglass pretty well. I tried reaming the hole out, but I didn't see any cracks, but I can see it now. I'll try to attached a pic later if I can capture it. The crack is small, but growing. Any suggestions on getting it stopped?

Just a note: I do not believe in anyway that the MONSTER tower caused the crack. I'm sure it was the install screwup with the split second drill running in the wrong direction.

89comp · Posted: Jun 30, 2003 8:32 am Post subject:

here is a pic of the crack. It is really small so I had to do some Photoshop work to bring it out. It is just a hairline crack that runs from the screw hole towards the front of the boat for about 2.5".

mnwakeboarder · Posted: Jun 30, 2003 9:57 am Post subject: Here's what I did

I had 4 aluminum plates made, 2 4x6 pieces for the fronts and 2 3x6 pieces for the back mounts. I then used 3M 5200 Marine adhesive and glued the aluminum to the finerglass (I added allot of Glue so all the gaps were filled) I then used the monster paw and original backing plate and bolted it tight and let it cure for 3 days before I used the tower.

Matteo · Newbie Joined: 02 May 2003 Posts: 17 City: San Diego

the larger the plate, the stronger the mount (with out going overboard Rolling Eyes

).

28.85 square inches of non-flex, non-cracking strength! (.25" thk aluminum plate)

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jbelson · Guest

mnwakeboarder, Mine is a big air tower that i bought in 2000. I had a guy from the dealer install it for me at his house. He said it was a bitch, hardest one he's ever done. I'll try to post a more detailed pic tomorrow. Not crazy about the set-up Sad

Slaytwebeling · Addict Joined: 05 Feb 2003 Posts: 892 City: Houston

I was wondering if anyone has had there fiberglass around the tower start to crack and what they did about it. PM with answers

jbelson · Guest

here's my set-up, w/ cracking gel coat. Dont like how it fastens to the outside, always snags the rope, isn't tight enough, and is a pain when you tie up to other boats cause it will ding the crap out of their hull.

Fishmaster · Posted: Jul 01, 2003 9:46 am Post subject:

89Comp,

Give us a call or/and send pictures so I can get a better perspective of where everything is at. The reality of gel coat is it is like glass, a crack will keep going so it needs to be repaired. It's a matter of grinding out the crack and replacing the gelcoat and anybody that does glass work should have no problem doing it, and make it hard to even find.

My 1995 SeaRay Ski Ray has cracking around one of the rear cleats real bad and I can only wonder how it started by a previous owner. My early days was go fast boats and for some strange reason I always got gel coat cracking on the bottom around the stringers (jumping waves could not have had anything to do with this I'm sure Very Happy

)

The more fiberglass and wood you put underneat the better for strenght, but most towers are on boats without reinforcement and have no problems. Weather you have our tower or someone elses if you have problems give me a call at 877-77-Tower and I'll be happy to share what I know.

Bill