The battery on the ND looks “exposed” and really needed a cover, so today I cut down a piece of acrylic sheet (3mm) that was matt on one side and high gloss on the other. I thought matt finish would look better.
The attached photo is Experiment 3 (Experiment 1 was cardboard, Experiment 2 was hardboard). The cardboard fixing point looked like an ear and I was concerned about stress, so made the hardboard one and the acrylic one with a long slant around the fixing hole.
Unfortunately, the blade on my jigsaw did not have the correct number of teeth for cutting acrylic, so the edging is not as I would like. I had to use a couple of plastic sleeve nuts as I had no stainless ones in my toolbox. There is a scratch on the cover in the picture - note this is still Experimental. The left hole was 1mm out so is also slightly bigger than planned. Final version will have polished edges and a sharper cut.
This mounts on the existing battery restraining bolts and no new fixings are required.
Funny that, I’ve never had a car that’s had a battery cover. Several Fords, Peugeots, Hondas and a couple of “5’s”, not one. Not a bad idea though!
The home-cut version wasn’t as good looking as I had thought, so I had it laser cut and the extra cost was worth it (although I had to order a few to cover the set-up costs).
Here is the finished article. There are a couple of felt pads on the reverse to stop the negative battery terminal touching.
They couldn’t laser cut japanese characters unfortunately.
Good Idea …I made my own as well sheet of 2mm carbon fibre cut to size and backed in foam rubber edged in split rubber and raised 1cm above the battery terminals  you need somewhere to put you tea mug when cleaning the engine lol
A couple of people have asked if I have any of these. I don’t but if you want to make one yourself, here is the template. If you print it, then “Print to Scale” and “100%” and try the paper version before cutting anything. Every printer is different and some try and size the image automatically. Setting above worked on my Epson.
