- Location
- Lake Orion, MI
With the long boring winter here in Michigan, I decided to take on a project. On my Rickter XFS Ninja Comp, I intalled the Rickter Hood Scoop per recommendation to allow more air into the engine bay to allow the motor to breathe. As anyone who has done this knows, this requires you to drill multiple holes into your hood (Not fun when you spend a lot of $$ on a new hull). The Rickter hood is solid (No Liner) so when you drill you go straight into the engine bay. Here are my install pics below for last season....
Last season, I ran the setup like above. This worked great and with riding for many seasons, I tend to land most of my tricks and not allow the ski to take on water. However, it is always in the back of my mind that when water gets in the hood scoop, it goes straight into the engine bay and into the motor. I do know that Rickter (Or someone associated with Rickter makes a scoop that attaches to the underside of the hood and runs the water to the front. I could have also ran tubes attached to the plugs in the pics to divert the water to the bottom of the hull.
My issues:
Step 1: Went to local store and picked up some molding clay and then marked out the dimensions I wanted on a piece of cardboard with a tough smooth finish.
Step 2: Add clay & a lot of smoothing. Along the way and researching videos I found that putting the plug on a plexi-glass like material helps make a great flange. Anyone who followed my rideplate mold saw that I tried to make a flange with the mold and it turned out terrible and would have needed a ton of prep to make clean.
Step 3: Apply multiple coats of wax, then pva, then gelcoat
(The ugly peel/crinkle you see in the corners is actually a film layer on the backside of plexi-glass that I forgot to take off.)
Step 4: Lay glass (about 8 layers in all) Towards the end, i built a wood frame for the mold to sit on. I led the mold sit for 48 hours as temps here are cold to say the least.
Tonight I popped the plexi-glass off and you can see the great smooth finish that it provided if i were to eventually vacuum bag or infuse the part.
As expected, the clay detached from the plexi-glass. So next is to remove the clay and wetsand/polish the mold to a mirror-like finish (as the clay can only be prepped so far and is not perfect) and then hopefully produce a carbon part.
Any tips, learning lessons. Feel free to share below
-Bobby
Last season, I ran the setup like above. This worked great and with riding for many seasons, I tend to land most of my tricks and not allow the ski to take on water. However, it is always in the back of my mind that when water gets in the hood scoop, it goes straight into the engine bay and into the motor. I do know that Rickter (Or someone associated with Rickter makes a scoop that attaches to the underside of the hood and runs the water to the front. I could have also ran tubes attached to the plugs in the pics to divert the water to the bottom of the hull.
My issues:
- Getting the under hood kit can be tough to get / expensive
- Running tubes is annoying/ugly
- I run a normal/front tank which is possibly in the way
Step 1: Went to local store and picked up some molding clay and then marked out the dimensions I wanted on a piece of cardboard with a tough smooth finish.
Step 2: Add clay & a lot of smoothing. Along the way and researching videos I found that putting the plug on a plexi-glass like material helps make a great flange. Anyone who followed my rideplate mold saw that I tried to make a flange with the mold and it turned out terrible and would have needed a ton of prep to make clean.
Step 3: Apply multiple coats of wax, then pva, then gelcoat
(The ugly peel/crinkle you see in the corners is actually a film layer on the backside of plexi-glass that I forgot to take off.)
Step 4: Lay glass (about 8 layers in all) Towards the end, i built a wood frame for the mold to sit on. I led the mold sit for 48 hours as temps here are cold to say the least.
Tonight I popped the plexi-glass off and you can see the great smooth finish that it provided if i were to eventually vacuum bag or infuse the part.
As expected, the clay detached from the plexi-glass. So next is to remove the clay and wetsand/polish the mold to a mirror-like finish (as the clay can only be prepped so far and is not perfect) and then hopefully produce a carbon part.
Any tips, learning lessons. Feel free to share below
-Bobby
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