Cracked AFT roof! Disaster!

[dreamwarrioruk]

they use that stuff from lazyness of putting the windows in correctly imo.it might work but a big patch of several layers of fibreglass matting has worked well for us.
mikeonb4c has mentioned a product before that would help on the outer skin of the roof but i cant remember the name of it.

[PixieAndTheMoon]

The beauty of the foam would be that if it did adhere to the plastic that the roof is made of, there would be no visible sign of the repair
Chris

[dreamwarrioruk]

it would be great if it did work to fill the crack but that point is where all the stress of the roof is taken so i would be a little worried that a thin strip of glue would add enough strength to the roof. to be honest with ours you have to crane your neck to look on the inside to see the fibreglass repair.
so ideal world i would patch the inside of the roof with fibreglass cause that does stick well then fill the outside with expanding foam (in the yellow goo format) then top coat it. there are a few people that have resprayed the aft so any cracks could be filled up.
think i will have a go with the foam myself when i get chance.fingers crossed it works.

[PixieAndTheMoon]

We have an old house, slate roof, no felt, I went into the attic, foamed every slate to the next one and to all the joists, before that we lost 3 to 4 slates a year in the winds, since foam, not lost one.
Chris
PS try sticking 2 bricks together with the foam, hit them with a hammer, the bricks will break but the joint won't !!!
Chris

[Rhod]

I too have a cracked roof (due to operator error & a wayward piece of roof-rack!). An engineer friend with a lot of experience in repairing fibreglass boats looked at the roof. His conclusion is that the roof construction is an injection moulding with a fibreglass impregnated resin core sandwiched between inner & outer gel-coats. His recommendation was to glass a patch onto the inside of the roof to strengthen the cracked area & then to ream out the outside of the crack before filling it with gel-coat. I've sourced the materials from a local marina & plan on finally getting around to doing the repair next weekend. Will let you know how I get on....
Rhod

[mikeonb4c]

mikeonb4c has mentioned a product before that would help on the outer skin of the roof but i cant remember the name of it.

Trying to think what that would be but probably Stabilit Express, which Graupner (top German model kit maker and the Krauts know their stuff when it comes to glues and material - look at the glider / sailplane pedigree) include in their kits for gluing ABS plastic to wood etc. The challenge will be finding it in quantities suitable for Bongo roofs without paying the earth (or finding it at all - Its not common)

[helen&tony]

Hi
mike is right...Stabilit Express is a fantastic adhesive, and I have used it in bonding ABS to wood, and even fixed a friends false teeth as an emergency repair, which lasted for ages. If you wish, I can give you a blow -by-blow account of how to repair it by laminating carbon fibre fabric on either side to produce an almost un- bustable repair which should be invisible, and probably stronger than the original. Rhod is right, the roof has a fibre core, and an inner and outer coat, which could POSSIBLY be vacuum- bagged . The fortunate thing is that the roof has a mould- line towards the top of the side, which will help to hide the repair, and it will only need feathering out at the front and rear. You won't need to take the roof off, and you could reinforce the whole thing in a weekend...maybe costing just less than 100 quid. PM me if you want details.
Cheers
Helen

[fredasurf]

Thanks for your help! Managed to source a scrap roof, garage are fitting it as we speak. As it's a bit scratched they're going to spray it for us match the freda. As far as we know Lifesure are paying minus excess of course. Didn't fancy doing a repair job ourselves as we'll want to upgrade our freda in a year or so and we thought we would have difficulty selling one with a patched-up roof.
Still stuck with the punto though...

[Rhod]

I spent today patching my roof. Although the crack ran through the fibreglass it didn't affect the structural stability of the roof, & wasn't worth the cost of a new AFT, so I was happy enough with a strengthening fibreglass patch on the inside. Thera are still a good few hours to be spent sanding down the gel-coat filled areas on the outside, but at least it'll keep the water out & prevent any delamination. The main problem I had was trying to get the right mix of pigment in the gel-coat. First mix was too dark & second too light. You only get 10 mins to apply the gel-coat, so I've ended up with a patchy tail end It'll look a bit better once it's sanded down I suppose, but think I'll be hunting out some suitable stickers to camoflage it. Or end up repainting the whole roof
Rhod