Cracked plastic connector: repair possible?

[frilaens]

I've re-assembled the heads and the connector for the outlet (had to be this of course!) has been cracked from over-tightening. I'm sorting out a replacement but I wondered if there was a way to repair this kind of stress fracture in hard plastic? I've thought about heating it or perhaps aralditing it after opening up the crack with a dremel.

Andy

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[chippie]

I have done a similar temporary repair on plastic by wrapping fibreglass tape around the platstic pipe and then applying epoxy resin (araldite would do),results can be a bit hit and miss though..

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[oldsaltoz]

G'dy Andy,

You could try the old soldering iron trick, start by angling down to get some heat to the other side of the crack, then smooth off as you come up, you can use strips of ice cream containers like welding rods if you need a bit here and there.

The above has gotten me out of trouble a few times in the past, should last till you get a new bit.

Hope this helps. . . . . .



<hr width=100% size=1> Old Salt Oz /forums/images/icons/cool.gif Growing old is unavoidable. However, growing up is still optional.

 

[tcm]

I would say don't bother on a screwed item. Unstressed items ok. The overtightening bust the thing in the areas of highest stress, where you need to also apply high (but not quite so high) stresses too - but on a glued repair.

Put another way, if you wanted to break open a recently-glued repair, putting it under stress by having a screw thread on the outside to gradually open up the crack again would be the ideal way to do it. You need a new component, imho,.

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[30boat]

You can make a strong repair even permanent if you first sand the area and then apply epoxy(araldite will do) with some light woven roving.As long as you take the care to extend the fiberglass to the lug where the screw goes so as to make it take the load ,the repair will probably(if done right) be as strong if not stronger than the original piece.I've done it several times ,in fact the lid of the washing machine at home once broke in two and having been repaired in this way has lasted for 4 years now.

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