So I bought a Kuda mount for my new Garmin 760 a few weeks back. It is a really good looking and solid mount, but I really wanted something that I could pull off easily and throw in the glove box or under the seat (the Mini has a great dashboard line, and I don't want anything messing it up when I don't have to - plus I don't want to advertise that I have a GPS in the car).

The Kuda didn't really fit that bill, plus it fit really tight and left dents in the dashboard. I also tried a friend's Garmin friction mount, but I liked the location of the Kuda mount better, and wanted something a little more stable than the friction mount.

I had some free time last weekend and, after reading through these forums and being greatly inspired by some of the awesome custom work going on around here, I decided to see if I could make a mount that is more to my needs.

This is really just a proof of concept type thing mind you - I did not take the time to make it look pretty, I just wanted to see if it would work.

So, I went down to my local true-value and bought a piece of 1/8" by 1 1/2" aluminium flat bar and a couple of tubes of epoxy putty.

The aluminium bar was actually very easy to bend to the shape of the dash board and is very sturdy once bent into shape.




You can see in the second picture that I put two screws up through the bottom of the aluminium bar. I did this to anchor the epoxy putty, but I don't really think this is necessary. That stuff isn't going anywhere!

The next step was to make a base for the GPS mount out of the epoxy putty:



Here it is after a little sanding:


I was going to glue some leather over the top, but couldn't find the scraps that I thought I had, so I just painted it black (proof of concept remember) and attached the Kuda Garmin mount:



I also stuck a little green felt on the bottom to keep it from maring the dashboard and attached a short bungee cord to keep it in place:

Here's what it looks like mounted:





Overall, I am very happy with it. The next one will be much prettier, of course!

The one thing I could really use some help with is figuring out a different way of attaching it to the dash though. The bungee cord is effective and easy to use, but very ugly.

Any ideas on a replacement for the bungee cord - or any other ideas for that matter - would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks!
Chris

 

Nice first post, nice work too! I'm a tinkerer as well, (read cheap) I'll
see what I can do to help with the bungee cord issue.

 

Found a cool website,
http://www.strapworks.com/

Elastic strap:
http://www.strapworks.com/Elastic_p/e.htm

Metal hooks; can get vinyl coated ones:(drop down)
http://www.strapworks.com/Flat_Hook_p/fh.htm

 

It is not very often I get to see something which I have mentally built! This is exactly what I was thinking. Where you have shock cords, I was thinking of something like what my RC sailboat has for shrouds - a combination of stuff from the RC airplane control wire section of the hobby shop and bits and pieces from the fishing supply store. I had not identified where on the dash I would hook to or how, nor how to make it "quick-release".

 

Miniconcarne - thanks for the links! The black elastic and hooks look like they would work well and be much more professional looking than bungee cords!

Davavd - I did some searching, but I don't think I really know what you're talking about with regards to the shroud - do you have any links that would show me?

Thanks!
Chris

 

Glad to help. Post pics of final product when all sorted out.