Tip: Drilling holes in wheel pants

I used glow sticks to help line up drilling holes in wheel pants with the holes in the brackets underneath.

Here's how I drilled the holes that the tow bar goes through.

Take one glow stick. Flex it until the contents are mixing and glowing. Then cut off both ends. The liquids doesn't flow out very fast.



Stand the hex bolt on the threaded end and fill the hole in the top with liquid from the glow stick.



Place scotch tape over the hole to keep the liquid in.



Screw the bolt into the nose wheel fork.



The fuller you can get the hole the better. You see mine isn't quite full. When I drilled the hole I compensated by drilling near the top of the glow circle.

Finally, put the wheel pant on and drill.



Worked pretty well. I figured out other ways to use the glowing liquid for some other holes, like putting it on a piece of paper and then taping the paper to the back of the bracket, so the glow shown through the hole in the bracket.

Michael-

Another way that I learned here on VAF is to aim a laser pointer at the spot with the pant off. Put the pant on and drill where the dot is.

Dave

Wow

Wow , were do people come up with these awesome ideas , I have never seen either of these and I'm sure I will be using one of them soon ,

VERY cool idea!

i tried to feed a short length of rope light up behind the bracket, to shine thru the threaded hole. i found that if the "bright spots" in the rope light are off just a little bit to the side of the hole, the light spot on the wheel pant is off to the opposite side. After the first one didn't come out the way I wanted, I was more careful in locating the rope light ... All the other holes were spot on.

The glo-stick juice is a GREAT idea !!!!!

Very creative Michael. I would never have considered using a glow stick.

I used a "bendalite" on my Sam James wheel pants to locate the nutplates from behind. Snaked up under there beautifully and worked perfectly. Re-usable!

Nice idea Michael, i also like the idea of the lazer. Perhaps I would have been smart using these methods rather then trying to measure a small hole for my Valve stem hole in my main tire wheel pants.

Jack

Michaels idea is great. Some have asked about the laser method. I did a search for laser locating but couldn't find what I wanted. Since this is a TIP, I thought I would post these pics.

Very creative

Nice job Michael. That's awesome. I'm a big fan. Something like this might come in handy in places where lasers or other traditional methods just won't work. Well done sir.

locating hole

also have 2' long level with laser in bottem,that is handy in more ways than one...Tomcat