Ways to juryrig broken plastic fender on kayak trailer?

Rip em off!

pull the fender, remove the tape and get something to use as a backing plate…
Couple rivets and back in action. If its a plastic fender thats the easiest way…
Unless your good at plastic welding.
Or use flashing tape like Vycor. it sticks to anything.

Take it off. Run without it. You ordered a new one. Don’t load a boat directly above it untill the new one comes.

I would agree with just taking them off until the replacements arrive. They’re hardly essential.

I’d also check to see if when the loaded trailer hits a bump that the tires are not hitting the fenders. I’ve seen this before. If that’s the case you might have to drill some new mounting holes and mount the fenders higher or beef up the suspension with heavier springs.

Adding neoprene fender washers will also reduce the shock load on the fender were the mounting bolts are.

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The fenders already have neoprene washers plus the metal ones. The plastic just flexes so much that it eventually cracks.

Roads in CO have a lot of gravel and debris on them, which is why I would rather not remove the fenders. We live on a dirt road, too, but total dirt road distance is less than 1.5 mile and I can drive slowly to minimize risk. The problem is on the highways.

Maybe you need a fabricator to weld up some steel fenders.

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There are a wide selection of metal trailer fenders available on line. Fabricating a mounting bracket, if needed, is a lot cheaper than fabricating a fender and bracket.

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In the long run, this might be the best solution, IF I can find a good fab person here.

Hmmm…we have a neighbor a couple miles away who I think does fab stuff and is really, really into MGs, Nice people, too, so I can at least ask if he would do a job like this or knows someone else who is GOOD. Finding good contractors in this area has been something of a nightmare. You know it’s bad when longtime locals ask the newbie arrival who they hired to build their house!

I also have a Trailex trailer, and those fenders are pretty flimsy. For a jury rig, how about bending up a couple of L-shaped brackets out of metal. Each bracket would bolt to the current mounting bolts, and the “L” could go either above or below the fender to hold it up with a couple of screws or bolts. If you had someone bend up some nice looking brackets, they could serve as reinforcers for your new fenders as well.

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Tractor supply has a pretty wide range of trailer fenders, many in steel or aluminum…

In the meantime, I’d probably patch them up with Gorilla tape from HD or Lowe’s.

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Belongs in the redneck fix videos… :sunglasses:

That’s the best idea yet, I think. Might even allow using generic fenders of the same size.

Sooo…I did wrap strapping tape around each fender and then wrapped Gorilla Tape around the strapping tape.

Y’all can now call me Trailer Trash! (See photos—it actually looks better than the previous hasty fix.) It feels more secure to touch, for sure. The next trip, 125 miles round trip, will let me know. After that, hopefully no more than one more outing before I receive and install the new fenders.

Now I need to see if I can find L brackets with a bolt hole of the same size as the factory bolts that slide down the channels.

By the way, if the L struts shown in the pic look beefier than the OEM ones, they are. One of the original struts broke a few years ago and a trailer repair shop replaced both of them with much bigger ones, after exclaiming how puny the OEM ones were. He even charged a reasonable fee. I sure wish there were such a shop here in Redneckville. Would be easy if it were, say, a livestock trailer or big flatbed utility trailer…

Follow up:

The tape strapping held solidly during today’s 125-mile highway drive. Looking at the fenders in my rear-view mirror, I did not see any flex or movement whatsoever. They feel as secure afterward as they did before the drive.

This is good, because it allows me time to search for L brackets. I remember how much the new, uncracked fenders flexed; these things really should be attached somewhere besides the factory locations!

Some cop may take an interest in you…they dont like trailers with parts falling off…or even stuff not tightly secured to roof racks.

As far as fenders go, I think they are required by some states.

Use to be the Socal hot-rods didn’t need them but on the east coast they did.

The tape looks trashy but the fenders are now on there more solidly than they were when new and uncracked but untaped. They did not budge on the longish highway drive, which includes a lot of 65-70 mph road.

My fender in my K1000 load rite has just begun to crack now…its from the vibration…these things should be mounted on some kind of pliable urethane or epdm rubber shock mount instead of firmly attached to the metal.

I think I might seriously file a report with the NTSA…seeing as failure is so common.

UV kills cheap plastic fenders in short order.

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Guy came to cover / shrink-wrap my boat trailer was ten years old. Stepped on fenders they all cracked. Never said a word just left. I understand it happens but say something. Like my older vehicles plastic breaks so dealer just leaves it busted till I find it. Give me the option to replace, patch, or say F it. Go to take it for storage fenders are wrecked. I could of had new ones ordered and done before the trip.

Later followup:

The taped fenders still feel solid and haven’t flexed, flopped, flapped, or rubbed on anything. Trashy looks with perfect function. The new fenders, which were ridiculously expensive, are still in their package, just in case. But no point in removing what is working great.