Teakgate

[martinarcher]

Here's my rev2 board on the mill getting the spots for the through hole parts drilled as well as all the vias. We cut this board out on the mill too. Tomorrow night the etching begins again!

[Bawshogg]

Wow. I am very impressed. Just curious. Are you going to be selling these units? How do you come up with a price point for all this once you are finally done.

I have ventured into projects of this nature before, and it is very hard to charge the trailblazing fee on something like this. No doubt you would have a nice little niche market here, but what is the ultimate goal price wise?

Kudos Martin.

Edited August 13, 2013 by Bobby Bright

[martinarcher]

Thanks! At this point I haven't concentrated too much on selling it commercially. I'm up to my eyeballs in development at this point. I just wanted to help out a few crew members and clean up my own install so it's worked into what you see. I'm sure after I dig out of the development stages I'll start thinking about selling it if there is interest, but I honestly don't think there are as many people out there as you would think that would be willing to drill/cut up their boat and design their own gates. Hopefully I'm wrong, but who knows.

I did design it in hopes it can be useful for more than just a gate controller. It is configurable and could be used for anything that would need actuated when the boat speeds up or slows down. I thought it would be cool to control a skier down flag for states that need one. As soon as the boat slows down an actuator could push the flag up and then pull it back in when returning to speed. I also thought of turning on/off video cameras when the boat reaches a desired speed. Who knows. I just need to concentrate on finishing what I have and knock off the scope creep.

[badluck]

It seems to me you could also mount actuators to a floating wedge and make it a speed controlled power wedge.automated wedge and surfgate here I come.Hurry up I want a controller:)this thread rocks.

[martinarcher]

It seems to me you could also mount actuators to a floating wedge and make it a speed controlled power wedge.automated wedge and surfgate here I come.Hurry up I want a controller:)this thread rocks.

That crossed my mind while looking at my wedge when I was adding my gates.

[morrisdl]

That crossed my mind while looking at my wedge when I was adding my gates.

or Stereo volume control - even if it was just as simple as to kill the 12v trigger power to some of the amps when idling between pulls.

BTW - Put me down as totally willing to drill into my boat (and send you some $$$) for this!!

Edited August 20, 2013 by morrisdl

[martinarcher]

I got rev 2 done late last week and got out to try it yesterday. It works like a champ.

Here's some videos from the day. I sped the boat up to 11.5 and dropped the wedge to the bottom stop. It is a LOT more fun at 11.5 than 10.5. The wave still has a ton of push and one pump gets you heading toward the platform in a hurry. The second video shows a transfer almost gone wrong. I charged the boat a little too aggressively going form goofy back to regular and almost ended up on the teak deck. By the time I got it sorted out I was way back in the wave, but pulled it out. Fun stuff.

Watch in at least 720 for best results.

[shawndoggy]

or Stereo volume control - even if it was just as simple as to kill the 12v trigger power to some of the amps when idling between pulls.

BTW - Put me down as totally willing to drill into my boat (and send you some $$$) for this!!

That you could do with an RPM window switch on many car stereos. Just check to see if you have a mute wire (used for integrating cell phone harnesses). It's usually brown IIRC.

[Malibuzer]

Looks great! Fantastic work.

[brad72]

Brilliant work. I think your grin when crossing the wave is justified and seeing the flawless transition of the gates looks great.

What ballast were you running out of curiosity? Looks like i need to fabricate myself a floating wedge.

[Levi900RR]

Good work dude. I may fly you to VT for a long weekend next spring...

[martinarcher]

Brilliant work. I think your grin when crossing the wave is justified and seeing the flawless transition of the gates looks great.

What ballast were you running out of curiosity? Looks like i need to fabricate myself a floating wedge.

Thanks guys!

I have a 750 on the regular side, 500 on the goofy, and 300 in the locker. 2 people in the bow, one driving, one in the observers seat, and one tending the rope in the back seat. With the gates the left to right distribution of peeps isn't a big deal on our boat, I just prefer to run the regular side a bit heavier with ballast to help it out since the goofy side is so dang good.

[wakeboardin2k4]

Any pics of the display up on the dash after all your hard work?

Amazing work. Super impressed!

[martinarcher]

Here we go...

[Iceberg]

After reading your post and seeing a few other DIY gates I did my own on my boat, an 07 Epic 23V 3 weeks ago. I am the second Epic 23V to do this and our tabs are designed differently. With the different hull and stern shapes you never know how it will end up but I can confirm that it works great on my boat as well. The wave with the boat listed is still probably better with less ballast, but the gain in comfort with no list, 5 second switch time, and manouverability far outweigh the cons of a slightly inferior wave and a bit of froth on the wave crest (still working on minor shape or deployment angle). Of course, with a less steep wall on the port side and a longer pocket, one might argue it is not inferior. Another interesting result on my boat is the push is very good while turning AWAY from the surf side!

It would be nice to have a controller like Martin has, but manual deployment is fairly simple. One thing I did happen was Perfect Pass (Stargazer) would suffer occasional interference when deploying the actuator. I had to route the power and ground a long way from the PP wires to prevent uncontrolable power advances (the screen would show 0-4 mph).

First Cut and installation

New shape. Just cut the polycarbonate yesterday to match the plywood shape.

You gotta love the level boat!

It is not a Bu, but it floats!

Thanks for the inspiration.

[martinarcher]

Looks good! That hinge looks like a solid one. Any idea where you sourced it from? One thing I wish I did with mine was use a hinge that you could "pull the pin" and remove the gate. i think it would be fun to make a few different gate designs and be able to change them easily on the water to see what shapes and sizes do to the wake. Are you controlling the Lenco's directly with a rocker?

I can totally sympathize with the noise issues you are seeing. Like you found, routing power and signal cables away form each other is paramount. With the controller I'm developing, I was forced to go to shielded cable for anything that interfaces with the board at the logic level. It's good to see the light at the end of the tunnel after dealing with noise issues. It can certainly be hard to kill!

[Iceberg]

New 12"x9" 12 ga SS tabs from eBay $45+30SH; way cheaper than good hinges and one piece. I was really tempted to just deploy these tabs at a larger angle, somewhere betweeen surfgate and NSS, but that would have meant potentially remounting the actuators if it didn't work. I guess I could have made a temporary bracket to hold it in position to test it before pulling out the drill for the actuators, but from most of the other DIY examples, I had a good idea that the longer less aggressive angle would work. I still need to try listing the boat if I get a crew that is all one side to recompare.

We went out today, water was 64*, air 65* and a 30 mph wind. We only stayed out 2 hours. The spray from the bow of the boat blowing back wasn't much fun going into wind, and that was for the surfer! Also, the conditions certainly impact the overall condition of the wave. I hooked up a power/ground run directly from the batteries to the Lenco rocker switch; there are no noise issues any more. One other thing I did get to see today was the angled cut keeps the tab about and inch or more out of the water at wakeboard speed with 4,000 lbs of ballast, not that anyone I take out would appreciate that size of wake.

Edited September 23, 2013 by Iceberg

[shawndoggy]

Martinarcher has met his match: http://www.wakeworld.com/forum/showthread.php?t=800079

[TrickyNicky]

Martinarcher has met his match: http://www.wakeworld.com/forum/showthread.php?t=800079

Wow, match met indeed. You two should just start your own boat company!

[WakeGirl]

Sorry no, gotta defend my bro martinarcher here & say that it's not on the same level. That guy did some fantastic fab work & he gets major kudos for that. But he didn't build his own controller card & write his own code for it. So no, it's not on the same level. Martinarcher is the Mod-King, hands down.

[Levi900RR]

Sorry no, gotta defend my bro martinarcher here & say that it's not on the same level. That guy did some fantastic fab work & he gets major kudos for that. But he didn't build his own controller card & write his own code for it. So no, it's not on the same level. Martinarcher is the Mod-King, hands down.

MA = next level

[Ozfabs]

Martinarcher has met his match: http://www.wakeworld.com/forum/showthread.php?t=800079

This is my buddy's boat here in Brisbane and dont worry, the controller is coming......... First on water test is tomorrow (Saturday) and I'm positive it will be a success. End of the day it's still not a Bu

Edited September 27, 2013 by Ozfabs

[martinarcher]

Thanks guys. Ozfabs....I had two guys contact me about controllers for their gate projects. I'm not sure if he's one of them, but hopefully I'll have them both one during our off season. I've got a couple prototypes completed and waiting for a couple cables to ship them. I've got a couple crew members who volunteered to test them out before the ice comes since they already have gates and actuators mounted. I'm pumped.....if it goes well I'll order the legit boards and start making boxes in the beginning of the off season.

[old skool malibu]

Gents just wondering now that Malibu has there patent is there any concerns with people making their own. I heard some rumors Malibu may go after those fabricating their own... I don't believe it though. I think Malibu has better things to do but just curious if they would get anywhere?

[badluck]

I would think if malibu went after people they would lose alot of repeat customers.They would have alot of people to go after also.