Steel wool and plastic, like peas and carrots!

[Anonymous 42]

I just wanted to share a little of my money saving philosophy in making seemingly impossible repairs to the broken plastic world we live in.

A couple years ago I made a post about my glovebox door with the broken plastic hinge the entire dashboard was constructed around.

Instead of getting a new plastic hinge with the same inherent weaknesses and fault lines, I chose to melt strands of steel wool in the plastic, thereby threading the break by impregnating the plastic with steel wool. The repair is still holding and actually stronger than new. Making that 14 hour job (if nothing else fractures during disassembly) into a 10 minute job at a cost of $0.00 for parts, and no down time on the vehicle!

Which brings me to my fancy space age plastic refrigerator (plastic and cold go together like glass and hammer).

A servo actuated plastic vent door controls the cold in the frig by circulating the air from the freezer, when the door’s socket sheers off the servo the door falls off and the vent remains open, freezing the contents of the fridge.

Service man? Yea right! Who’s gonna pay him?

Parts? Yea right! Who’s gonna buy them?

Anyway, this happened about 10 days ago and I’ve eaten myself into starvation not wanting to put food in the fridge and not addressing the problem sooner! (sandwich shop).

Anyway, I made the repair using a jewelers loop, fine steel-wool, and a soldering iron. The space was tight and the clearances even tighter.

I wrapped the door’s broken servo yoke with strands of steel wool melting them in as if the molten plastic became what fiberglass resin is to fiberglass. The repair is much stronger than original, the strands transmit torque over a much greater area eliminating any tendencies to fracture.

Down time? None, I left it on while I was working on the repair. it only took an hour and most of that was taking it apart and reassembly!

Parts? $0.00

Waiting for the wrong part to come and further starvation is not an option!

This repair would cost a woman hundreds of dollars and possibly take weeks before the right part came.

Here’s some photos of the repair, I would have photographed during the repair but discovered my battery was dead.

The upper right corner of the door is where the repair was made, you can see the matted finish left by the fine steel-wool strands carefully layered into it and going out in structural advantageous directions, whereas the plastic can’t handle the torque in such a small physical space, thereby sheering.

Here’s the door reattached to the servo motor.

Here’s the circulation fan and door mounted in the plenum venting, all sold as a “unit” not just the door that’s needed $$$.

This is the 2nd time I repaired this fancy plastic refrigerator! The last repair involved the motherboard and an overheated relay connection that melted the contact! I added enough solder to act as a HEAT SINK to this FLAWED DESIGN!

My last refrigerator caught fire! TWICE! The second time instead of buying more plastic parts and a new motherboard, not wanting to be burned alive in my sleep I threw the f~~~ing thing down the stairs and got this piece of plastic s~~~!

[It’sallbsParticipant]

Nice work tower.

The closest I ever got to anything like that was fixing a bumper -fibreeglass sheet and resin on the back.

Filler on front -sand down -spray.

Still most people would have paid £1000 for a new bumper to be fitted.

http://www.leavemeansleave.eu

[BernieParticipant 254]

Thats pretty ingenious. Did similar thing with my 75 dodge when the door hinge rusted off. It was left with a gaping whole in panel. I used humble epoxy and a little drying time to build the surface back up and install the hinge. Don’t know how much it would of cot at a body shop. I’m sure more than i wanted to spend.

[Anonymous 42]

It’sallbs wrote:

The closest I ever got to anything like that was fixing a bumper -fibreeglass sheet and resin on the back.

Filler on front -sand down -spray.

Still most people would have paid £1000 for a new bumper to be fitted.

I’ve done my fair share of fiberglass work, it’s dirty and real skills are required to make the repair and the original both flexible to the same degree, too much hardener and it becomes brittle not co-expanding with the original and showing the repair later from temperature change. Sheet metal does the same thing when stresses are not ironed out either by shrinking or stretching the metal where needed. Annealing a welded area is critical to settle the stresses created that will otherwise show up in temperature change. Metal fatigue is another enemy that needs addressing on any restoration, I’ve seen more popped welds and cracks than I care to remember!

Brass will sit there a crack all on its own as it ages, perhaps the hot and cold cycles are what makes it brittle, but that’s just a theory I’ve heard and believe it to be true.

I’m the type of guy that finds entertainment in the way men, any man, solves his problems! We do some pretty amazing things when it comes to repair! Some of the best ingenuity I’ve witnessed is cold mechanical bonding repair work on all sorts of cast iron.

[DocParticipant]

I am a big fan of ‘make do and mend’ thinking.
It’s one thing I can thank a crazy maternal grandmother for.

She and my Grandfather were of that mindset because of the hardships of WW2.

I disdain on today’s throwaway mentality.

Seeing this tip Tower reminds me of a simple way to repair plastic panels on cars etc. If you have a plastic panel that’s cracked/split it can be ‘stitched’ by drilling small holes adjecent to each other on either side of the crack/split then inserting zip ties to pull the gap together. Also drill a hole at the end of the crack/split which disrupts the travel of the crack/split preventing it travelling further along the panel.

I prefer rice and peas personally Tower.
Raw carrots are nice but cooked are a bit bland.

The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape, finding oneself in the ranks of the insane. Marcus Aurelius

[Anonymous 42]

Doc wrote:

I prefer rice and peas personally Tower.

Rice and peas, yea, I do that too! Made in China, re-manufactured and improved by Tower! But I can only do so much, like using LED bulbs so the China light fixtures don’t burn up!

I have a 1920s’ porcelain outdoor light fixture I restored, the bulb socket is stamped copper about half the thickness of a penny! Same with the center contact, thick solid copper! I wasn’t about to refit it with modern zinc plated tin can thin that you can jump threads with the bulb! I hate Chinese garbage with a passion! I think they’re all on Oxycontin!

[BernieParticipant 254]

yep, Offshore some of the dinosaurs would give up and crack a block. We would metal lock and run until we could acquire a block from inshore. Then once we got the block we would strip it down and pull the crankshaft. Then we would have to 6 part the crane block to lift it and put on the boat . There is alot more to it than that . Short version…8-)

[DocParticipant]

Anonymous wrote:

Doc wrote:

I prefer rice and peas personally Tower.

Rice and peas, yea, I do that too! Made in China, re-manufactured and improved by Tower! But I can only do so much, like using LED bulbs so the China light fixtures don’t burn up!

I have a 1920s’ porcelain outdoor light fixture I restored, the bulb socket is stamped copper about half the thickness of a penny! Same with the center contact, thick solid copper! I wasn’t about to refit it with modern zinc plated tin can thin that you can jump threads with the bulb! I hate Chinese garbage with a passion! I think they’re all on Oxycontin!

Rice is about as far as I go.
Keep their goods.
Anything of quality and built to last that was made 50+ years ago will have either Made in England or Made in USA on it.
Sad days indeed when everything is made south of the equator.
Well with the exception of some Jap cars which I do have a weak spot for. And anything Australian which is western anyway so all cool. Got to love a 1973 Ford Falcon XBGT. In original factory fit.

The object of life is not to be on the side of the majority, but to escape, finding oneself in the ranks of the insane. Marcus Aurelius

[Anonymous 1]

Tower, you’re a genius. I will be sure to use this technique in the future. I work in a fake plastic industry where everything is breaking and failing all day.

Anonymous wrote:

I hate Chinese garbage with a passion! I think they’re all on Oxycontin!

You and me both. This stuff is literally garbage. It is not designed to be repaired or serviced. It is meant to be thrown away when it fails…and it doesn’t take long. It is designed to be a piece of trash in the Garbage Dump and it spends 99.999999% of its life cycle as exactly that.

[iMickey503Participant 12465]

I have to admit, I like Chinese stuff. But only due to it being easy to modify to make better.

THe solar lights have been my thing for a while now.

You are all alone. If you have been falsely accused of RAPE, DV, PLEASE let all men know about the people who did this. http://register-her.net/web/guest/home

[Anonymous 42]

iMickey503 wrote:

I have to admit, I like Chinese stuff. But only due to it being easy to modify to make better.

THe solar lights have been my thing for a while now.

I have to admit, when I returned a cartridge ball bearing with the center race reamed about 1/2″ off center I realized I could install it with the “meaty side” under the load bearing surface and the “skimpy side” not, but I could see that with a little wear and tear the bearings would start falling out of the offset race. I don’t need to think about these things and ponder these questions that are physics in nature, so I returned it and got the Japanese version.

If it were a high speed application balance and vibration would be an issue. Absolute f~~~ing garbage!

I just tossed out two China clocks that both failed as the hour indicator would drift all over the place, indicating it was 6:00 PM when actually it was 1:00 AM.

China can shove their junk up their asses! I’m all done BUYING!

[Author]

Posts