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canopy chip repair using rod

egp8111

Active Member
Patron
Hello All,
My new used RV6 has a chip on the inside of the canopy(looks like someone threw a clipboard or something on the glare shield) I've heard of a technique to drill out the chip then glue in a piece of plastic rod and polish out. Anyone have any experience with this ? I'm not finding much when I search.

Thanks
Skip
NC
RV-4 loved and sold
RV-6 learning to love
 
I have no experience with this..but, I have worked with an acrylic supplier that could bond acrylic together and it was completely invisible when done. So I know what you propose can be done. Acrylic can be machined, sanded, and polished to look water clear, so repairs can be whittled into something you can live with. Although, a bad repair could be worse that the original problem or so I reckon.

A quick google brings up these solvent based bonding agents which are probably the way to go if chosen and used right. Shooting from the hip here a bit, sorry.

https://www.eplastics.com/accessories/plastic-adhesives/acrylic-glue
 
Plastifix

Hi Skip,
There have been previous posts on VAF about using Plastifix to repair cracked canopies. I haven't personally used it but their results looked good.

https://www.polyvance.com/pfxcanopy.php-1

You may well find that the scratch will become less noticeable after you've owned the plane for a while...
 
Refer to AC 43.13-1B, para 3-24 and the PolyVance Plastifix kit.
I recently performed this repair, but have not yet gone through the polishing steps. I have a Micro-Mesh kit to use for the polishing. The 1/8" dia rod can be found easily via online search.
 
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