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Originally Posted by and3698
David,
Sounds interesting, pictures would be grouse.
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One Grouse coming up
Parts required:
First, an approx 30 cm piece of 19mm Aluminium Angle. See the small cutoff for a cross section. A M8 bolt, long enough to go through your RA brackets on the Jeep.
A Butterfly nut and Nyloc Nut, so you can decide later which you will use.
Two plastic end-caps (Use 20mm Steeltube Endcaps - they hammerfit fine)
Finally, the mirror - These cost me $4 each new and are standard items, although you can get much bigger ones... I might later.
Now drill two (well, three) holes in the tube, approx 20mm from the end and centred. On one end, drill right through both sides. At the other, and 90 degrees to the first one, drill only through one side. As in the picture.
See ! The bolt is already through. This is the halfway point.
I used a 6.5 mm drill bit for the mirror and a wiggled-around-6.5mm drill bit for the M8 bolt. The car side can be rough, but measure the mirror thread size and keep it tight to make the mirror more secure.
You need to fit the mirror retaining nut inside the tube. The washer is easy to get on - Just push it over the hole you made and insert the mirror bolt.
The nut is harder. Use something to wedge it into a 10mm ring spanner (in this case, the barcode from the M8 bolt) and then it is very easy... Insert into tube and screw in mirror.
I used an 8mm spanner to tighen the mirror from the outside while the bolt stayed still. Make it tight enough that you'll swear about overtightened nuts if you ever have to take it off.
Now both mirrors are complete. If you have a spare barcode from one of the things you bought, put it on the aluminium tube to give it that "Professional" appearance - as if you just bought it from Super Cheap Auto... !!!
Tap in the end caps now to finish the job... (Tap these in last, otherwise retrieving the ring washer is just annoying...)
Done ! Now take of those #^$%!@ heavy doors and mount your new mirrors. You can wear them flipped out (towing trailer etc) or flipped in (Closer to the Jeep). Up or Down. However you like them really.
One other thing I'd do is get a $2 convex stick on mirror for the passenger side. It could use one.
That's it
They fold back and sit along the car, just past the dash and also fold forward. Vibration isn't a problem and the aluminium tube is light and strong. And the silver colour matches the cheap mirrors
I hope this is of use to others, since I hadn't thought of how to do this before I heard new mirrors cost $200 !!!!
But if anyone has an idea on how to improve them, please let me know.
Thanks
David
Homemade CJ7 Side Mirrors (about $20 pair)
