My tower was built before lighted rope savers were a thing. I'm trying to convert mine into one. Does anyone have a pic of how the wiring runs through the rope saver to the tower?
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You'll get your chance, smart guy. -
Nickypoo
The tower I just put on mine has it. They changed the mounting point to a hollow tube vs a bolted style so wires could pass thru it. It would be pretty easy to drill tru a bolt for the small wires. Then tap a few holes in your current tow point top cap for the light to screw to.
Nav light 1.jpgnav light2.jpgnav light3.jpg -
Thanks Ruger
Ya, tapping the holes would be the easy part. It's the whole drilling a hole through the mounting bolt that has me scratching my head. I've never come across that situation. I'm concerned about the integrity of the bolt itself. Yours appears to be a threaded "sleeve" if you will. Mine has two sleeves, one for the top and one for the bottom. Bottom one is welded to the tower and the other is welded to the top cap. The only threads are on the inside. The billet rings just float on the sleeves and the bolt runs all the way through and holds the whole assembly together.
Ideas?You'll get your chance, smart guy.Comment
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The lights dont pull very many amps so even a hole big enough for 24g wire would be enough, then step up to a 18-20 once into the tower itself. What size bolt holds the top and bottom sleeves together, and is the assembly AL or steel or stainless steel? If its steel on the bolt and bigger than 1/2" should still be strong enough with a small hole thru the center of it without loosing the strenght of the bolt. Is it a socket head cap screw or a standard hex head bolt? It can be tricky to drill thru a bolt though. Drill press will be the key in drilling it.Comment
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The bolt is a 2 1/4 x 3/8 stainless.You'll get your chance, smart guy.Comment
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Well cr*p. Doesnt look like a very easy way of doing it. The 3/8" is too small to drill with the way its getting loaded. So you have 4 options. 1 leave it as is, 2 get a light that clamps to your tower next to the tow point on its own short pole, 3 see below, or 4 cut the tow point off and rework it with a tube style mounting point. It all comes down to how far you want to take it and how much you use your nav light. I use lights maybe 1-2 times a year so option 1 would be mine. My tower came with it so when wiring the speaks up I just ran the wires for the lights at the same time.
Option 3
drill the threads out of the bottom one and tap it to 1/2"-13 threads, then drill the top cap/sleeve out for the 1/2" bolt clearance, then drill a 1/8" hole all the way thru the bolt. My only one concern with this option is how thin the lower threaded portion gets. If the lower part is fully solid (which looks to be) and I would drill all the way into the white part(into the base), counter bore the top portion for clearance, and tap lower down into the lower mount. Then just get a 2-1/2 or 3" long bolt. If you have access to a lathe makes drilling thru a bolt a breezeComment
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I think what I'm going to do is use one of my speaker clamps. That will make it real easy. I don't run tower speakers any more so I've got two clamps doing nothing. Just though I'd see if anybody had an easy fix. Nothing easy about altering this particular tow point though. I'll have to think about going as far as you described. Thanks Ruger.You'll get your chance, smart guy.Comment
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Id agree clamp be a lot easier to do and will still look good with full functionalityComment
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Well, just used the clamp. I also ran power for the other clamp in case I want to add another one or perhaps a red & blue flasher. I'm seriously considering putting a horn up there.
When BOSS did the towers they used these funky plugs for the speaker wires. I got rid of most of them but I reused the deck plug and just drilled it out so I could just run the wires straight through. I also took some time to "re-black" it. It's been on the boat for nearly 10yrs now and it was looking a little faded.You'll get your chance, smart guy.Comment
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Looks very good. I think horn up there would make it where people could actually hear it vs the one under the helm that only the driver can hear. I've never understood why they put it there. My old boat had it mounted on the deck in front of the windshield and everyone could hear it. A tower mounted one would be even betterComment
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