Repair ideas?

[Jordan]

So I swapped hatches finally with my old SPG and realized the whale tail wasn't really attached very well. All of the mounting holes are blown out on the ribs and wondered how you guys would repair it. I don't really want to drill more holes in the hatch in case I want to switch to a normal spoiler again. Soo... what would you do? Could I use some sort of filler and retap with some rivnuts? I'm not even sure what material the thing is made out of.

[Geoff]

I think I've just used JB Weld to fill and then re-drilled the mounting holes in the epoxy before putting screws in. I seem to remember the ribs not lining up well with the holes in the hatch so I used the JB Weld to build up the sides of the ribs. Just clean and sand well before applying.

If you want to go bananas you could probably put some threaded inserts in which would take some drilling and gluing but should be good and robust.

[Jordan]

Cool, I guess the question is what will stick fairly well as filler. I'll try out the JB weld. I'm going to mount the back of it with some 3m VHB stuff which will probably hold it just fine, but I felt like I wanted some sort of mechanical backup just in case and not one of the holes were still good

[Crazyswede]

You might look into the "Gorilla" glue product line. There might be something there that will work well for fixing inserts in place.

[burnsside42]

I recall a story of a friend who "had" a whale tail on their c900 turbo once - he just double sticked it on I think. He always tells of how he recalls watching it flip up off the car and coming to a panic stop and watching it go slidding under his car ending in a shattered pile of spoiler sadness.... lol Bolt it on! (somehow)

[DeLorean]

haha, yep, know that story.

[Jordan]

This is the stuff I was talking about.

http://solutions.3m.com/wps/portal/3M/e ... /VHB-Tape/

It's not your ordinary double sided tape, but I agree, I like a little extra security.

[spgeebee88]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zyWz6Uz0nmg

[Jordan]

I think VTAK kicked in.

[DrewP]

The VHB series structural tape is what pane-less glass windows in some big buildings are installed with now, our new engineering center had one of those solid glass facades that's become popular, no framework or anything holding the glass.

[squaab99t]

The VHB series structural tape is what pane-less glass windows in some big buildings are installed with now, our new engineering center had one of those solid glass facades that's become popular, no framework or anything holding the glass.

VHB is only as good as the substrate it is attached to. My guess is the spoiler is made from high density Urethane foam. Mix 2 part measured components, pour it in a 2 piece mold, clamp shut and let it expand and kick off. The problem is if surface is not sealed it will sluff off and VHB will only cling to the Urethane dust. Thus the flying spoiler...
The Gorilla glue might do the trick nicely in both bonding in T nuts or bolts and the broken pieces of rib. Be careful to tape the piece in place since the glue foams with the spritz of water on the two surfaces. I would suggest painting the inside after you have it all set. This will seal it and prevent oxidation of the foam and water absorption.
Fun with 25+ year old cars...

[DrewP]

And, the VHB would probably be about impossible to get back off the painted surface of the hatch.

You're completely right of course about the outer skin of foam tearing off, especially with how cracked it looks like the bottom of yours is.

[KPAero]

Might be a bit more than you want to spend for this project, but West Systems epoxy makes some fillers that you mix into their epoxy for different applications. I've had good luck using this http://www.westsystem.com/ss/406-colloidal-silica/ and it does seem to bond well with high density foam. It also dries very dense, and hard, and will hold a screw. Again, maybe not for this, but they have some cool products. http://www.westsystem.com

[Jordan]

The VHB series structural tape is what pane-less glass windows in some big buildings are installed with now, our new engineering center had one of those solid glass facades that's become popular, no framework or anything holding the glass.

VHB is only as good as the substrate it is attached to. My guess is the spoiler is made from high density Urethane foam. Mix 2 part measured components, pour it in a 2 piece mold, clamp shut and let it expand and kick off. The problem is if surface is not sealed it will sluff off and VHB will only cling to the Urethane dust. Thus the flying spoiler...
The Gorilla glue might do the trick nicely in both bonding in T nuts or bolts and the broken pieces of rib. Be careful to tape the piece in place since the glue foams with the spritz of water on the two surfaces. I would suggest painting the inside after you have it all set. This will seal it and prevent oxidation of the foam and water absorption.
Fun with 25+ year old cars...

Yes I was definitely going to reseal it. Except for the one piece show that has that crack in it, everything else has to be totally refilled. There are no broken pieces to glue. Just big missing chunks. I have some good body filler left over which seems to get pretty hard, and it sticks really well, but it's probably too brittle?

[Geoff]

Body fillers I've worked with won't hold a screw very well. The screw would tear away.

I haven't used anything to hold the rear of whale tails down, I've always just mounted using the front screws. I may have tried double sided foam tape the first time but it didn't work. I put a bead of RTV on the underside of the tail to keep the rear from vibrating too much, but dirt still got stuck and scratched the paint (if that's a concern to you).

One day my friend and I chased down some old Greek lady that we kept seeing driving a 900 with whale tail. She said she'd sell it to us if we replaced it with something else because it kept falling off. She had brought it to some shop that told her they couldn't fix it so she put some big lag bolts up through the hatch and through the drain holes. I never did figure out how she managed to put a hole through the sheet metal.