Hairline cracks in side vent assemblies?

[Emjayw]

 ???  Hello, I was out on the highway today giving the '83 a workout and when I returned I noticed one hairline crack in each fairing vent panel about 2 inches below the 2 top rivets right where the panels make their sharpest bend. Anyone else had this happen?  I'm sure it's very recent because I went over the bike before moving south last month and there were no cracks then. I have been riding recently against really strong winds (25-30mph) and this may have added to the stress on the pieces.  Is there a fix? The bike is very clean and I don't want it to look too cobby.  Mike in Texas

[Lucky]

Short of drilling out the rivets & carefully patching & sanding the plastic, whatever repair you do will be visable.

you have to stop the cracks from spreading. to do this you have to drill holes at the ends of the cracks. keep in mind your working with 24 year old plastic.  mine are cracked too.

--Lucky

[Walt_M.]

Mine are cracked too and have been for several years. At least vent levers haven't broken yet.

[Emjayw]

Thanks guys. I was hoping i wasn't alone on this.  I had a brain F*rt when I posted originally, the cracks are 1/2" below the rivets, not 2" as I reported. The left side has gone all the way across and the right side is about 80% across. I'll probably cover the buggers with black electrical tape for the time being to keep any small pieces from migrating to the Texas countryside.  Anyone in the Ft. Worth/Dallas area I will be meeting with a group of motorcyclists at a restaurant this Saturday, 1/7/06 for breakfast and gabfest starting at 6:30am. The place is called Rise & Shine and is in Arlington on rte. 303.  Thanks again for the encouragement. Mike

[kiawrench]

 drilling holes and applying tape will work for a time, but there is a fix

   go down to your nearest bike store and order a hotcha platic repair kit for windjammer fairings. the stuff in the kit, when directions are followed to the letter, will fix anything plastic . Then a bit of sanding and some touch up work and all is  fixed.

    if you cant find it anywhere else, here is the link :
http://craigvetter.com/pages/Online_Store/Replacement_Parts/Details.html#Anchor-Hotcha-60133

  be advised, this is a 45.00 kit, so find ALL fiberglass or abs repairs you want done before you open this kit , (it even fixes broken car plastics,dash trim,kids toys,R/C car bodies and will glue your hands to the nearest work bench)

   i bought one of these kits a while back, for use on a vindicator fairing we put onto a cb-750 for guy down the road, fixed a lot of cracks before we ran out of stuff to work with , and even after hitting his garage door guide, the fixes are intact,,, may be worth the investment . Now if we just teach him to ride with that big fairing on ,LOL

[Emjayw]

 ???The cracks are in the plastic vent assemblies, not the fiberglass fairing.  I need a plastic repair kit of some sort.

[Walt_M.]

He did say the kit is for fiberglas and ABS, which is what the duct vent is made of. However, I wonder if PVC glue would work and I might try that. It would need to be sanded and painted and one of the Krylon or Rustoleum Plastic paints would probably work for that.

[kiawrench]

if the kit seems to be a bit expensive, there is one other option- the pvc glue will work, but you will have to have a thin seciotn of other material to bond to it. So as a courtesy,  :


Remove vents from the fairing
remove any metal possible,
go to home supply store, buy cleaner and glue for pvc pipe(smallest possible cans )
dump milk out of the jug in fridge, cut sections to fit inside the vent body
apply cleaner/accelerator to each piece
apply the glue very thin with a decent brush
put sections together,
  clamp as well as possible overnight
clean up excess and paint to match
put it back on the bike .

  unfortunately, this is a dicey fix, too much glue and the vent door will be toast, it has to be very very thin coat

bad part is , sometimes ,the fixes that work do cost a bit more than the patches . hope it works out .

[Paul_Jungnitsch]

This stuff might work for you, I was considering it for my cracked side panel. The price is right, especially if you are ordering other stuff from aerostich.

http://www.aerostich.com/catalog/US/Plastex-Repair-Kit-p-17109.html