Don't toss that broken piece of plastic!

[suecanada]

I know, I've been away from our forum for a very long time....I have been waylaid by my two other motorcycles, a '08 Suzuki DR650 and a new to me Honda NX 250 from 1988. It is testament to my '83 R65LS, Little Red Baron's mechanical prowess that I haven't needed help for awhile for him. Anyway the point today is I want to share my latest find: a method to fix cracks and broken tabs on the plastics used on our bikes.
From internet info: mix up some Lego pieces with some acetone! LEGO is made of ABS as are our bikes' plastic bits. Acetone melts the ABS piece and welds the repair. The mix goes through a series of thicknesses from a liquid, through a slurry, pancake mix, putty/clay back to solid. Useful at all stages for some fix! You can cast a broken tab and 'weld' it on or fill a gouge with the liquid stage and it hardens in about 10 minutes or so depending on thickness. On my R65LS I am experimenting with the mix to re-create a broken tab on the back of the "always broken" battery cover. The hardened piece of recreated ABS can be filled for drilled, filled for shape, sanded and painted. One can purchase kits that do the same, maybe a bit better, but these are expensive. This method, if you want ABS in black, takes one trip to the plumbing section for a piece of ABS pipe! For white which I needed for the Honda NX250, I ordered LEGO from the main factory...$.09 per piece.....but I am sure there is something white out there cheap[ that I haven't ID'd yet.
Maybe someone can help here? Anyway, I hope this idea can help someone as those replacement plastics are horrendously expensive! There is probably few LS's that still have all the tabs on the black nacelle of the front 1/4 fairing!

[minitoo]

This is a great tip,  Sue.  Thank you.  I am going to play with this on a side cover tab and likely make a mess but there is hope.

[davidpdx]

That is a great tip. I know I have broken plastic that I can't wait to try and fix.

[suecanada]

Thanks guys....Some plastic I have tried to melt takes forever and even though the acetone did make it tacky...which "they" say is a good sign the 'welding' will work. So not a foolproof method  ....experimenting is fun though!

[BPT]

I've been looking for this thread!  I knew I'd read about somebody using Legos for this.

If you're in the plumbing section Sue, look also for ABS cement.  From what I'm reading it's pretty much liquid ABS.  It may even be easier to make the "slurry" your talking about.  I've heard a lot of people talk about doing that using the cement mixed with small pieces of ABS.  The cement melds with the ABS you're repairing and becomes a solid piece.

As for acetone, I've seen people use that as kind of a thinner, and also to help shape the plastic.  I just got some hard cases that have some small cracks and had been looking into the best ways to repair, so I've been reading a lot about plastic melting lately.   [ch128515]