I know this has been done before (
@GlockMeister and
@ohanacreek were the builds that I found while searching), but I wasn't able to find a good "parts list" or detailed instructions, so I tried to keep a record while I was going (back and forth to Menard's to swap fasteners
).
A little background about my goals for the project:
I almost pulled the trigger on a set of Mud Busters over Christmas, but I didn't want quite as much coverage as they offered on the outside (running factory wheels), and I couldn't bring myself to spend $150 dollars on the rear set and then take a Dremel to them. I store a lot of stuff in the foot well of the back seats during longer rides, and it never fails that its soaked or stuffed with mud when I’m done for the weekend. I’ve also noticed that the underside of the bed on the 1000-5 has 100k little nooks and crevices that all hold mud, so I thought a set of mud flaps might prevent a bit of that and speed up the clean up process as well.
That thought process lead my to these three goals:
- Created a decent looking set of rear mudflaps the size I wanted for <50 dollars (sweet spot on mods IMO)
- Cover the front of the wheel-well as to not suck mud in the rear seat foot wells.
- Retain a factor-ish look.
So off to Menards I went with a dream and a 50 dollar budget. The big question mark was the cost of the HDPE. I had to special order this sheet, but I ended up with a 4x8 foot sheet of 1/8th inch HDPE for 27 dollars on sale. You can get smaller chunks, but I had a homemade roof for the front of the Pioneer on my mind (mods < 50 bucks are quickly becoming my preferred form of entertaining myself on the weekends when its too cold to ride), so I went with the bigger chunk. Honestly, wasn't that much more than buying several smaller sheets.
It took several trips back and forth before I landed on this parts list, but I think it will be most helpful to have the complete list in one place, so here it is:
6x #10 sheet metal screws ¾ inch $0.82
6x fender washer for #10 screws (I want to say 7/32 inside diameter is what I settled on but its easy enough to find the correct washer with screw in hand at the store)
$1.60
4x ¼-20 1 ½ inch elevator bolt $2
4x ¼-20 nut $2 (intended to use nylon nut but ended up using standard nut/locktite as nylon nut required to much grip on the elevator bolt to seat)
4x ¼ inch ID fender washer $1.60
6x factory plastic clips $2
1x 4x8 ⅛ inch HDPE sheet $27
2x factory door bushings $0 (thanks again to
@Montecresto,
@OleRed and
@Cuoutdoors)
So I was at
37 dollars in material (probably closer to 20 if you take into account the sheet was mostly left over for my roof project). Note that Menard's charged a 15 dollar "special delivery" fee for the HDPE, but refunded it in full when I returned the two pieces of plywood the HDPE sheet came sandwiched in. Very pleased with this.
Next it was time for a little cardboard mock up:
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Here are the "final" measurements that I came up with.
For the top piece:
View attachment 104153
And for the "front" piece:
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Note that the "top" piece took a little extra trimming to fit properly around the frame once the HDPE was used, so I left out specific measurements up there. I also don't know if the "frame hole" on the front piece was entirely necessary after mounting, but its easy enough to make adjustments with a dremel after mounting. The big measurements to pay attention to are the length and width of the pieces. Of course if you wanted to go wider, you could always go > 10.75 inches.
After I had the mock ups, I measured and made cuts with a jigsaw, a table saw and a dremel. I recommend doing as much work on the table saw as possible: it was by far the easiest and cleanest to work with.
View attachment 104154
Note the sanding block to clean up the edges. A little massaging with the heat torch to put an angle in the "front piece" where the wheel well bends and we were ready for install.
Each piece has 4 mounting points.
The "top" piece mounts in the frame of the bed with 3 #10 metal screws (predrill 1/8th inch pilot holes), and 1 factory clip mounted in the dip where the seat latch drops into when they are down. As others have said, I like the 5/16 drill bit when installing factory clips rather than the recommended 3/8 for a snugger fit.
View attachment 104155
The "front" piece mounted up with 2 of the elevator bolts in the "step", if you will, and then two factory clips up in the fender. Location is hard to describe for these so I tried to take good pictures.
Note I used two pieces of re-purposed factory door bushing as spacers for the elevator bolts. The slightly larger piece goes on the inside (toward the motor) to keep the fender flare oriented properly.
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I think the best way to make sure everything lines up is to mount the bottom two elevator bolts temporarily to set the width and height of the bottom piece, and then have a 2nd person hold the piece straight and tight to the inner fender while drilling pilot holes with a 1/8 inch bit through both the fender and fender flare. 1/8 inch bit is much easier to get through- but watch your fingers as it would be easy to go through both fenders and a hand if you weren't careful.
You can see I played around with painting some of the hardware black. You can't even spot the elevator bolts unless you are RIGHT up on them, and the clips look to be factory from the top. That was another goal I suppose- to be able to remove them if I wanted and not look like a complete cob-job.
I also had to trim a little triangle off the bottom piece to make the two flow together when closed, but very minimal and again, this stuff is super easy to adjust with a dremel tool and couple cutting wheels.
The last thing I did was round a few of the sharp corners to smooth out the look. All in all I'm super happy with how it turned out.
Here's a few of the final product:
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