New mirrors for the 1025R

nikdfish · May 8, 2020

I decided to put a new set of mirrors on the 1025R. I mow the developement road side out to the county road & mirrors help let me know if something is coming up behind me. The old round mirrors were a pain to use, being attached off to the side on the grab handles via metal strap mounts & I wanted something more forward placed (& better looking).

I bought some 60 lb. pull round magnets & used the 3D printer to do some mounts. The mirrors are cheap golf cart mirrors ($12 for a set, delivered). The material used for the print was semi-flex TPU, which is very similar to tire rubber after printing. It has good resistance to environmental heat & chemicals. Both the magnets & the mirrors attach via screws into portions of the print that are printed solid rather than with an infill pattern.

I attached them to the rear face of the FEL tower. I leave the FEL on when mowing as I use a 3pt finish mower & the extra weight gives the front wheel assist more grip when mowing on slopes. (BTW, in the pic below, the mirror is mounted 180° different from the pic above)

I guess I could have used a block of wood or metal tube, but TPU was already loaded on the machine, so why not use it. I think it made for a clean product.

jonsstihl · May 8, 2020

nice work and if you knock them on a tree the mount will hinge back or the magnets will pop off before ruining the mirror, unless sixty lbs of force is too much for the cheap mirrors

LS Tractor Owner · May 8, 2020

Nice job on the mounts! The mirrors look great too!

nikdfish · May 9, 2020

I did a slightly different version for the 3038e as the tower has a different profile.

Later I may try to match that curve, but for now this was quicker. No noticeable vibration with the engine running.

nikdfish · May 10, 2020

I thought about it a while & figured a way to get the curve I needed to match the back side of the 305 FEL tower on the 3038e so I could do a simpler mount.

Basically using some cardboard, string & a pen I drew some arc's and cut them out & did test fits. 3.5" radius was too sharp, 4" radius too flat, so I did a curve based on a 3.75" radius. After a bit of fiddling with tinkercad, I came up with a mechanism to accurately place the magnet faces where they needed to be on a properly shaped base & roughed out a new mount.

So now I have two versions & the most recent allows the mirror to be a few more inches outboard.

two_bit_score · May 11, 2020

Patent it and make a Million$$!

Looks very handy and I'm sure others would probably buy them. I probably would.

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nikdfish · May 11, 2020

Got a chance to test the 1025R mirrors while mowing. Big improvement in usability over the old round ones clamped to the grab bars.

jonsstihl · May 12, 2020

paint them green and license them to JD and collect royalties. Nice attention to details.

nikdfish · May 16, 2020

Finally did mirror mounts for the wife's CX gator. This was actually the original reason for buying a set of golf cart mirrors, but was the last to actually get some (the 1025R & 3038e got theirs on first).

Just wedges with pockets for the mounting screws. The wedge is screwed to the gator & the mirror then is screwed onto the wedge. This way the mirror's mount isn't so far off vertical & is a bit farther outboard.

The wedge is printed from the same semi-flex TPU (shore 95a), as the magnet mirror mounts done for the 1025R & 3038e.

nikdfish · Oct 9, 2020

I found another use for the magnet mount mirrors on the 1025R. I have a 3 point adapter for the FEL that includes a 2" receiver & use it with a tri-ball mount for trailer moving. I found I could use the the left side mirror to get a view of the ball when doing trailer hookups. Just stick it to the 3 point adapter & adjust it properly.