flight clips extention

[speck]

ok Rhode, here you go. i took 5/16 stainless 3.5 inch bolts, drilled out the tower, clips and ext. piece to 5/16, chamffered (sp?) all holes, angled the bottom hole a bit on the clip to get the bolt to fit from the inside of the clip itself. i cut about 3/8 off of the thread to make it cleaner on the inside. i wanted the bolt to face in because i knew you talked about the nut and protruding thread gouging boards when you use the inner rack. to help this also i ground the head of the bolt of and rounded it a bit. i recommend using shanked bolts, not threaded ones so that you don't see thread in the arch of the spacer. get nylon nuts to prevent untightening. use stainless. i though the standard countersunk 1/4 inch from the inside would be to small.

[speck]

out

[speck]

out

[radmaster]

Yere, i think some custom spacers might be the way to go.

[Rhode]

Working with what you had, Speck, this is as good of an install job as possible. It may even work from a functional persepctive, but I am reserving judgement here, especially given that one end of each oval CC-provided spacer appears to be almost totally NOT touching the tower. Yikes.

As I anticipated, this looks like complete junk. Fred Sanford could have rumaged through his yard and found something for you to use that would have worked better than half an '05 Flight Clip bracket; and Fred would have surely sent his son Lamont, friend Grady or Aunt Esther to the hardward store and gotten you the correct bolts and lock nuts to use. Maybe after a couple of bottles of ripple and a cheap cigar this fix by CC will not look like the engineering brainchild of an inner city junk dealer.

As I kindly and then not-so kindly told CC four months ago, they should go to local Orlando, FL metal fabricator and pay to have milled out of solid aluminum a rectangular block that is a few RCH's less wide than a Flight Clip (to create a subtle reveal) and then no longer than is necessary to drill two holes at either end of the aluminum block. Moreover, a more complete band aid would be to campher the inside holes of the Flight Clips and not the inside of the tower, then run flat head bolts outside to inside (like you did, Speck).

So, what does everybody else think? Now is the time to beat me down if I am making too big of a deal about these junky looking spacers, which CC didn't even provide with the correct hardware. This isn't the gold standard of the tow boat industry; it's the dirt standard...

Rhode

[speck]

the clips are very solid now that they are tight. they only "don't touch" in some very small spots where the billet is machined away, most does touch.
the best solution and the cheapest is to bend the clips themselves in more and then out again so that no spacer is required, and the clip where the board sits is still further away. the clip would have to be redesigned of course. this is the least of my probs right now as many of you know, and i think that when i am out on the water with boards in the racks that i won't be able to see the spacer and i really won't care about it.

[Rhode]

I see we all agree about how this Flight Clip/spacer/FCT combo looks.

Nobody should be taking Speck's advice and bending anything on their Flight Clips. Also, I don't think anybody should be drilling their towers to beef up the mounting hardware, no matter how poorly designed the equipment CC provided. All of this sounds like a big fat product liability lawsuit for CC if someone gets hurt for whatever reason when trying to fix or use this botched stuff.

For the record, note that the *real* mistake CC made was in welding the billet on the tower. This is quite obvious, just go look at pictures of the 220 tower, where the billet is welded on the outside of the tower tubing. On all the new 210s I've seen, including one my dealer just received, the billet is welded in the middle of the tubing. Any member of the plaintiff attorney's bar should note that I have retained e-mail correspondance from a CC company officer acknowledging that a welding mistake had been made.

Unless and until CC starts providing something better than halves of leftover Flight Clip brackets to use in a "Sanford and Son" style application to pad out Flight Clips on the new 210, anyone with a 210 on order should put their markers down now and tell their dealers they will not accept this junk.

Rhode

[OldFart]

flight clip extention

Guys, I don't mean to step on the toes of whomever gave you that part, but it is not a "spacer". Find a pic of the 206 or 216 f.clips & you'll see that the part is 1/2 of the mounting bracket (OR 1/2 of the speaker bracket). Found a photo on White Lake Ma & Candlewood East. I am sure there are more somewhere. ALSO, check out PN's link to the '05 owner's manual, 216/210/etc & look @ page 4-43,44.

Abu, do you confirm?

[OldFart]

RE: flight clip extention

Check out these pics (didn't paste it so well). from "Show us your Nautique", CEASTWEB
http://www.planetnautique.com/index....ewtopic&t=4573

[AbunDiga909]

Re: flight clip extention

Guys, I don't mean to step on the toes of whomever gave you that part, but it is not a "spacer". Find a pic of the 206 or 216 f.clips & you'll see that the part is 1/2 of the mounting bracket (OR 1/2 of the speaker bracket). Found a photo on White Lake Ma & Candlewood East. I am sure there are more somewhere. ALSO, check out PN's link to the '05 owner's manual, 216/210/etc & look @ page 4-43,44.

Abu, do you confirm?

OF, if I get what you're saying, yes, I do confirm. I honestly didn't read the whole thread until know, and didn't get what the spacer was that people were talking about b/c to me, that did look like part of the bracket. I have 2 pics at home of the f. clips on one of CEAST's former 216s. Those pics will show that this "spacer" really is 1/2 of the bracket.

[OldFart]

RE: Re: flight clip extention

I am 100% confident that this 1/2 bracket is not the CC "spacer". Money says it has not come out yet vs this fix. Someone made a boo-boo.

[Rhode]

OF and Diga,

I'm very glad that this Flight Clip "spacer" issue has caught the attention of such prominent and respected members of this board as you two.

In case you missed this on the "Build Quality" thread, Speck posted a picture of a whole '00-'05 FCT billet bracket and informed us that,

"as for the mystery flight clip spacers, here they are. they give you clamps from the 05 racks, and want you to use the half with the four holes to "space" out the clip from the tower. countersunk bolts long enough to reach were not supplied, so off to home depot i go, although my dealer did offer to send some."

On an earlier thread, Speck had told us that his dealer was specifically shown these Flight Clip "spacers" at the big CC dealer meeting. Here, anyway, I am assuming that the dealer was shown a bracket (and not something else) because that is what he ultimately gave Speck. I mean, why would he give Speck something he had not been shown at the dealer meeting... Now that I think about it, why did Speck's dealer not install the Flight Clips with the bracket/spacer when delivering a new boat? Maybe I am on to something here.

OF, you say that you are 100% confident that this half bracket is not the much ballyhooed CC "spacer" and that someone made a "boo-boo." The bottom line question at hand is whose purported "fix" was it to use a half bracket as a spacer, CC's or Speck's dealer? If the former, are you suggesting that CC will be trying again going forward and is likely to put out something that does not look like Sanford and Son junk? If the latter, are you suggesting that Speck's dealer did something under CC's name and now deserves punishment greater than a beating with a wet noodle but less than being burned at the stake?

Diga, please weigh-in wherever you can shed light on this situation.

It's a shame to think that Speck may have wasted time and money drilling out his tower to install a bunch of junk on his brand new boat when either CC has changed its mind and is now saying the half bracket ain't the real "fix" or the dealer misled him greatly with a really lame brain, home grown idea that purportedly came straight from the engineer's drafting tables at CC HQ.

As always, maybe I am missing something here. Please enlighten.

Rhode

[NautiqueJeff]

I am not able to find reference to the spacer that Speck used ANYWHERE in anything that has been put out by CC. I don't think the bracket that Speck's dealer provided to him was the part that CC has designed or is designing to fix this problem. I am not even sure that the CC spacer has been released to the dealers yet.

[Rhode]

...and I'm even less sure that CC has designed or is designing anything to fix this problem, but I've been saying that for months now. At least there seems to be some measure of recognition that there is a "problem," as Jeff says.

Rhode

[OldFart]

Ok Rhode & speck, I'll try to help but I am not one who carries on these anger conversations about CC that seem to be your specialty. With any more of these angry accusations, you two can carry whatever "cause" burns inside you.
I don't "assume" anything, u know what someone will say if I ***-U-ME. "Presume" doesn't get thrown in my face. I am more of a list kind of guy, so here we go:

The dealers do not report a fix via a CC s/bulletin.
Jeff C has nothing from his "industry contacts".
It is a 1/2 bracket, which CC would know. I doubt they shipped it but we are all human & make mistakes (tho some aren't as forgiving)
I wonder if someone @ the dealershihp just made a simple mistake or temporary suggestion
In my line of work I don't chase blame, but discern a fix/get it going/trace back to the cause for resolutioin @ "gemba". Sometimes you have to tramp thru a lot of kaka to make it happen