[bpe]

Small delay in getting the Ninja on the road.

No worries though, I have a plan.

 

[FlipFlop]

Wut eas eat? Off the rear cowl? Sorry, it has been a long time since I have had actual ABS bits on my bike

 

[Clive]

Front fairing judging from the metal plate and cross head screw?

 

[bpe]

It's the tail piece that connects the rear side panels.

 

[bpe]

Specifically the tab that connects the left side panel.

The all-mighty controversial epoxy fix
​

First I make a dry run to see what I need to do to get the parts inline and hold in place on their own.

Area prepped and fist coat of epoxy with fiberglass mesh. I will trim the excess mesh once the epoxy is dry.
The first coat is the trickiest, keeping the parts in line.

A bonus for this particular application is I can reinforce both sides as nothing is going to show. So this is the flip side. First coat, only difference because I now have some stability, I have epoxy, mesh, then more epoxy on the first coat. The second coat of epoxy has been applied to the first side at this time.

I think I've got it pretty straight. We'll know more at the time of truth.

One more coat of epoxy on both sides tomorrow and I believe I will be good to go.

On a side note:
I'm also at the same time taking care of another but much more simple small crack on a rear fairing.

 

[ridervfr]

It is kinda par for the course riding older bikes like these, I get stress cracks, when I address them, I take the part off, get a small dremel tool, V out the crack and use my concoction of MEK and Legos, (either white of black.) I am around fibre glass all day long, we have the resin which is three part prepared by weight, then applied to part then baked in oven at 80 - 95 celsius, when it dries (2-3 hours) its hard as a rock. Never used it for bike panel repairs but have been thinking about some things. I have painted some things with our Epoxy paints and they come out killer. I plan on doing a set of EX wheels with black epoxy paint, then oven bake them at a lower heat so I don't waste the wheel bearings. Peace

 

[bpe]

Here it is after sanding the repair area just prior to an acetone wipe (to remove sanding dust) and the final epoxy coat. Can't really see it due to the camera flash. But that's not important 😄. Make a note of the peg indicated by the arrow. You can see in this pic the damage on the opposite side.

Here you can see the peg missing. It's been gone for years now. It broke off out on the road somewhere, so I don't have the broken piece to make a repair. Although I'm sure something else could be improvised.

With the peg missing it makes the gaps look something like this when assembled. The widened gap at the rear, no big deal. Any extra water that may be getting in, no big deal. But what it does do is put extra stress on the part that was just repaired. A hairline crack had already started developing over a year ago. I had forgotten about that (not reinforcing it before it completely broke off was my first mistake). It came all the way off when I was doing a wheel alignment and snagged a work light cord underneath it.

 

[ridervfr]

My side panel got a hole (busted off) in it from a stress crack from the slip/joint or peg in slot set up for the centre cowl and side cover. I had a replacement and guess what, same thing started to happen. I took the side panel off and used the dremel tool like I described above, I used my method and so far so good, repair was done 2 years ago maybe.

I remember back in the days of the Honda F2 Hurricane as they got some age on the body panels, they would develop a crack in the centre cowl where a piece would break off. Looked like it was missing a front tooth LOL.

 

[[email protected]]

Plastics get way more fragile as they age (sort of like us, now that I think about it, lol). What used to flex without issue eventually becomes as brittle as glass; if you even think about taking it apart it breaks. How many thousands of miles did you say you've got on that motorcycle? Problems like this come with the territory. But it looks like you've figured out a good fix.

Back when I was doing car repairs, I used to dread pulling off door panels or disassembling a dash to R&R a heater core for this very reason. That stuff is designed to snap together once at the factory with no thought given to disassembly at a later date.

 

[FlipFlop]

Say what was the verdict on using ABS glue and fiberglass? I remember that topic coming up years ago. do you remember? I am guessing it was never a thing, as I do not see people using it, but the method you did here.

 

[bpe]

Without a doubt plastic gets more and more brittle as it ages. We've seen it in many areas of life. As far as the EX though, I was getting more cracks in the early years and crack repairs are tapering down. I've figured out why . Once the repair is made, it's not just "good enough", the repaired areas are now stronger than they ever were, even stronger than factory new.

I'm not really up to speed on ABS glue.

 

[yorkie]

not sure of the exact date sometime in the late 60's early 70's a new specification was introduced on all plastic products to make them biodegradable, the aging of plastic panels is direct result of this. if you ever got hold of some product that predates the change you would find it has not degraded at all.

 

[e10_muppet]

Here you can see the peg missing. It's been gone for years now. It broke off out on the road somewhere, so I don't have the broken piece to make a repair. Although I'm sure something else could be improvised.


With the peg missing it makes the gaps look something like this when assembled.

Same on my E10 but on the opposite side, the amount of the tab that's missing is tiny in the grand scheme of things. Plastex would probably do the trick but i can't get a good cast from the other side (or it's beyond the limit of my imagination anyway).

 

[bpe]

Same on my E10 but on the opposite side, the amount of the tab that's missing is tiny in the grand scheme of things. Plastex would probably do the trick but i can't get a good cast from the other side (or it's beyond the limit of my imagination anyway).

If I were ever to fix that, I was thinking a completely different design. Something along the lines of drilling a hole in both parts and connecting them with a metal tube. With a nut and bolt and protective washers holding them to the metal tube.

 

[bpe]

Preparing for the moment of truth.

For the last(?) piece of fun.

I can figure out how these seat staples came loose while sitting inside for the last few months.

I will have to get out the Guerilla tape to limp the seat through the rest of the year before doing a reupholster next winter.

 

[Ex500D-Can]

You can use a soldering iron to tack the parts together...as in/ OR a slot-head screwdriver... pushed in ACROSS the crack. There are "hot staple" toolkits too...(tempting...but I'd need a lot of repairs to justify trying it)
I used the solder iron method + JBWELD on fine metal screen to repair a tab that's needed for headlight mount on my gen2 fairing and it's strong enough...however, I repaired on both sides of the crack. I'm not sure if you're intending to do this per cosmetic appearance...if there's a lot of stress on this place on yours, I'd want repair on both sides...the solder-tack alone, even, albeit ugly.

You can also melt in abs black-pipe- I just found JBWELD easier with the steel screen but do experiment including the bit of screen or without.... ABS cement can work but it takes quite awhile to fully harden.I think it's really meant to be 'anoerobic" inside a joint. You can also make ABS glue by mixing shavings in acetone....

 

[yorkie]

yep all good repair methods personally I prefer the stitching method using fine zinc mesh used on back side only, at the front plastic welding with a Lego brick or tie band cut offs then filled with a flexible filler plastic padding (elastic) smooth down and paint. had huge crack in the front fairing where if fell over in the garage, repaired using said method never moved since and no sign of cracking.

 

[NOTHING]

Interesting methods I have learned reading here. My upper fairing tank area tabs were both snapped off already when I grabbed the bike last year. I was thinking my only good choice would be fiber glass cloth and rebuilding tabs from the back side somehow snd hoping for the best. But I will certainly be experimenting with the ideas I've picked up from yous.

 

[ridervfr]

Those are metal tabs correct? Probably some sort of two part epoxy with metal tabs to replace your broken/missing ones.

 

[NOTHING]

Sorry should have been slightly more specific. It's on the upper fairing side thats actually broken. All of my panels are currently at my paint guy or I would send a picture of what ill have to work with. But it's on the fairing where it actually connects near or to the gas tank. Can't remember off top of my heads. But pretty sure it bolts to frame just under the tank. Which to make things slightly more complicated I'm also hopefully finishing an aftermarket lower fairing that is supposed to secure to the upper fairing as well. This power is fiberglass and fills the gap between lower and upper that the stock one doesn't cover. In the mean time my paint dude has my stock lower while I do the bodywork for aftermarket one. So if i get it done before everything gets sprayed then i can get it sprayed with everything else.