Hail Shield Build Help

[Dan Robinson]

A few notes to share after two Plains expeditions using the hail shields (roughly 5000 miles so far). One, the MPG hit is worse on the Great Plains than in my initial tests, thanks to the strong crosswinds and headwinds of surface flow commonly seen during chase setups. I averaged 26mpg on days with a strong crosswind, and a low of 20mpg on a day where I was heading south into a 15-20mph headwind. For this reason, I have made modifications to the setup to make it easier to stow the guards inside the car and faster to install/take down. Essentially, the guards will be stowed by default and not be mounted until the last gas stop before a storm intercept. It turns out that the numerous bolt connections I initially used was a gross overbuilding. Not one bolt or nut budged during the entire trips. Therefore, I have reduced the number of bolt connections on the front guards from eight to four, with the safety redundancy now accomplished using steel links to secure the grids together as one unit (previously, the three front grids were all mounted to the rails independently). The four connections make for a fast attachment/takedown process, and the steel links allow the grids to be folded up for stowing.

I have yet to subject the setup to an actual large hail encounter. The only time I deployed the fold-down side guards was to backtrack through the core of the supercell on May 8 near Throckmorton, TX, but I did not see any hail larger than quarters that day.

The guards also produce a loud whistling sound at highway speeds. Not as annoying as I expected from inside, but very loud when the windows are rolled down. It is probably fairly conspicuous to someone outside hearing the vehicle pass by.

 

[James Hammett]

I've been able to completely squelch whistling roof-mounted steel tubing by sliding foam pipe insulation over it.

 

[David Williams]

Like Dan, I have also decided to build a hail shield for my car. I have a 2007 Toyota Camry. I have decided to post my design and progress on the project on ST to help others in their designs and builds. I have a friend that will be helping me, and I imagine the entire project will take a couple months. We will be designing and building a roof rack for the vehicle in addition to designing and building a tri-fold hail guard that protects the front and rear windows. Also, we will be building lexan side window protection. We are still in the design and plan phase, and we are going to nail down all the materials for the project before we get to work on anything. Therefore, I will be posting materials and plans for the next two months until my friend comes to visit in the middle of October and we assemble everything during his 2 week visit. I created two juvenile schematics in Word to give you a general idea of the layout. Not sure if they will translate well into this page.

So... I'm finding that I can't attach Word documents. Anyone have any ideas of how I might put my generic schematics from Word onto ST?

 

[David Williams]

So far we have the frame for the hail cage welded together and bent at the corners. In the image you will see a large rectangular frame with two bars running along the inside. Those will be the mounting bars which we will attach to a customized roof rack. The smaller rectangles off to the left will be the front and rear window fold down shields. They will be hinged to the main hail frame later. While I Drive, they will be folded on to the top. When I need them, I will deploy them by folding them down. At this point I think we will use a strong magnet to hold them to the hood and trunk respectively. We have ordered the sheets of Lexan which will be hinged on the sides of the main frame and will fold down on the side winds when needed. We used 1 1/2 inch aluminized steel, bent and welded by a professional but purchased and cut by us. That helped cut down some costs. I will post more as we get additional materials. And I might do some videos when we start to build it.

 

[James Hilger]

Bumping your head can be a real concern, or at least I never seem to learn. I just have the guard for the windshield but have Diamon-Fusion coatings on all the glass. Everything is tinted. I also built a wall that is even with the back seat made out of 1/4 lexan. I face my back into the inflow and as you know it sometimes picks up rocks and what not. Have never lost a window, but wanted that extra safety net. I took a hit on mpg but I love hail probably more than tornadoes, so it's worth it to me. I've taken a slingshot with those steel balls and it bounces right off the vehicle. Of course I've thrown baseballs but ît doesn't compare to the real thing. I've ran this setup for two years. I added the bracing to the windshield guard just because I want to be 100% sure it didn't fly off and hurt someone.

 

[David Williams]

Hey James, what's Diamon-Fusion coating?

I thought about having my camry's windows replaced with lexan sheets. There's a guy I found in IL that will cut and shape lexan windows for $1000. He usually just works on race cars... custom windshields, etc. That's a bit pricey, so I'm going with fold down lexan windows.

 

[James Hilger]

Hey James, what's Diamon-Fusion coating?

I thought about having my camry's windows replaced with lexan sheets. There's a guy I found in IL that will cut and shape lexan windows for $1000. He usually just works on race cars... custom windshields, etc. That's a bit pricey, so I'm going with fold down lexan windows.

http://www.surfaceshield.com/windshields.htm

http://www.shopdfi.com/product_p/DFULTRA_StormChasers.html

 

[David Williams]

Hey everyone,

I finally finished my hail shield build. I did a video series on YouTube describing the design and the building process. If your interested, I'm posting the YouTube Video below. The playlist has a bunch of additional videos for your viewing pleasure.

 

[David Williams]

*you're

Sorry, but I can't stand blatant grammatical and syntactical errors; especially when they are mine. Thanks for understanding.

 

[Dan Robinson]

After 3 seasons of using my first-generation guard design, I'm thinking of modifying the rig to do two things:

- Combine the stage 1 and stage 2 side guards into a shorter single unit. This would stay horizontal normally (or even folded onto the roof), then pivot down to cover the windows when needed. This would reduce the mass and weight of the rig considerably.

- Either remove the front guard entirely or convert it to a hinged or slide-back part that is deployed only when needed. The front guards get in the way of photography and video too much, particularly the dashcam, and I've already had one hailstone sneak under the guards while driving and crack the bottom of the windshield. The front guards produce the most drag and take up a lot of room when stowed inside on ferry trips.

 

[B. Dean Berry]

At the risk of sounding like a broken record or a fanboy, check out Daniel Shaw's hail guard. There used to be a page online that detailed it's building and mounting. I'll see if I can find it.

 

[B. Dean Berry]

Hmm. Completely gone now.

Basically, it works on a 4-point ladder-style rack mounted to the roof with no intrusions at all into the lengthwise-running bars. This is because the front hail shield that overhangs the windshield has two long mounting bars that slide into the front of the rack, and run inside the tubes for about half the length of the rack. There's welded nuts on each side with a thumbscrew to tighten it down. When it's not in use, it's fully in the rearward position, when in use it's out over the glass.

 

[James Hammett]

This the one? https://www.flickr.com/photos/123911259@N03/24909695801/

Looks like a stone may have slipped around and cracked the bottom of his windshield https://www.flickr.com/photos/123911259@N03/35348022330/

 

[Dan Robinson]

This the one? https://www.flickr.com/photos/123911259@N03/24909695801/

Looks like a stone may have slipped around and cracked the bottom of his windshield https://www.flickr.com/photos/123911259@N03/35348022330/

Could have been a hailstone - if you are driving faster than 30-40mph, a golfball can easily come in under the guard and impact the bottom of the window. It happened to me on the McLean day last year. To its credit, the hail guard did keep my windshield from getting obliterated that day as it surely would have with no protection.

 

[B. Dean Berry]

That is the one. It's one of the better-designed ones I've seen. Very slick, very pro.