Plastic refurb?

[belercous]

I'm doing a bit of a rehab on our boat. I've got the body off for repainting, the seats sent out for reupholstery and am replacing the carpeting on the front end of our boat. At least the front part of the boat should look like new when it's all put back together.

However, the top of helm (which is 1/8" contoured plastic over fiberglass) has a few cracks in the plastic. The plastic covering has a finish texture (which can go, I'm not married to it). The cracks, while small, will detract from everything else on the front of the boat, they won't look as good as the rest of the front end. I've never dealt with much plastic before, at least not aestheically. Structurally, the helm covering is fine.

Any filler in the cracks will require sanding (which will be a PIA due to the contours and as how the steering wheel will not come off, I can remove the gauges & windscreen), but I can sand it all flat. It will then have to be repainted & I'm not too sure how long the paint will last before it gets scratched. It's a high-use area & will get touched, sunlight, things put on it & beer spillage.

Are there other ways of dealing with this type of problem? Upholstery wouldn't look right & it has lots of contours. Any thoughts?

[GregF]

Is this a part you can buy? Plastic is tough to fix in any permanent way. Usually once the sun gets it, you are done.

[STEVEBRENDA]

We had really good luck with Krylon Fusion paint for some plastic outside flower pots that were getting eaten up by the sun.

[belercous]

There's no way to buy another part, Suntracker doesn't keep parts for older boats. I don't need to repair the plastic (it's a covering for fiberglass underneath, it's not structural) so much as I want to make the cracks disappear.

I'm not sure how good Krylon Fusion paint will hold up to scratches, worth looking into though. Thanks.

[GregF]

Depending on what kind of plastic it is, you might have some luck with epoxy, sand it smooth and shoot on some of that Krylon paint.

[BassFrequency]

glass it, sand it, little bondo, paint it and done is what id do

[belercous]

Bass; I hadn't considered laying a thin coat of fiberglass atop the plastic. I suppose if I drilled holes thru it so that it would bond with the fiberglass underneath I wouldn't have bonding issues with a thin layer. Doing that would obviate the need to repair the cracks & I'm sure that I can find a paint which will be scratch resistant.

Thanks, I think that will be my solution.

[Leisure Kraft]

Bass; I hadn't considered laying a thin coat of fiberglass atop the plastic. I suppose if I drilled holes thru it so that it would bond with the fiberglass underneath I wouldn't have bonding issues with a thin layer. Doing that would obviate the need to repair the cracks & I'm sure that I can find a paint which will be scratch resistant.

Thanks, I think that will be my solution.

I seem to recall that they made a mesh tape that you'd put on a car piece (with a hole) so that Bondo would apply to it better. It's sticky and then allows you to keep the Bondo layer from flaking off.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gMr9aJ-j0NQ

The mesh shows up about 30 seconds into this video.

[BobL]

Krylon Fusion does work but make sure you rough up the surface with sandpaper then go over it with mineral spirits to get it clean, then paint.

As for the cracks, you can go the JB Weld route (for plastic) or other plastic fillers but as you say, that will require some sanding.

They also make cheap and expensive plastic welders.

The cheap ones are simple welding irons ( http://www.harborfreight.com/plastic-we ... 67102.html )

and you can get more expensive ( http://www.harborfreight.com/plastic-we ... 96464.html )

and you can get real expensive ( http://www.usplastic.com/catalog/item.a ... 7Aodv2mmaw )

[belercous]

If I lay a thin layer of FG resin on top of the plastic the need to repar the cracks would be obviated, the cracks aren't structural, just cosmetic.
By drilling a lot (about every 1/2") of holes just deep enough to hit the underlying fiberglass, I'd imagine the top coat would adhere fine & not pop loose in spots. A thin layer is all I can really add to the top since the "windscreen" has to go back on.

I've never used a plastic welder & am not sure of what kind of results I could get with it. Or how I could match the surface texture, but I suppose I could sand it all smooth if I could get a good color match of the filler plastic.