car fixin's, part II, or how epoxy and duct tape fix anything

sad, sad duct tape day

So Rusty McRustbucket came back from the auto body shop today. The broken mirror was dangling limply from it's duct tape sling, and I discerned two things:

1. Epoxy doesn't like wet and cold.

2. Duct tape hates direct sun light. [Well, so do I for that matter]

 The weather being considerably nicer today than it was a week ago, I decided to give this whole epoxy thing another shot. And learned that squirtable epoxy, sitting on the mixing palate, sets up in .3 seconds when left in the sun. This, despite the wasted epoxy, was an excellent sign. My mirror was  broken in what I thought initially was three places. But no!

The fourth broken place is hiding out under the foam insert - which is what aparently held the mirror to the car in the first place. This also explains why the mirror dangled limply off the side of the car even after I glued the mirror back together

At this point, I was chock out of squirt epoxy - since about 75% of it had hardened in the sun before I could apply it to my car. But wait! It's our good friend and close cousin, maleable epoxy! Waterweld! At the auto parts store, I hesitated getting the maleable epoxy, but now, I'm really glad I had it on hand. The fail came in when I didn't duct tape the mirror in place while the maleable epoxy set up. The good news is, now I have a contact point for another round of glue, since it's been dry all day and pretty warm.

I know what you're thinking. Wow, that looks like crap. Yeah, yeah it does. Consider the following; your mechanic and the auto body guy tell you the car won't be worth reinspecting in a year. And a new mirror is about $100 used, and that doesn't count labor. And you are under-employed. I am suddenly not above doing it myself.

car fixin's

I know nothing about car repair.

So when my mechanic said I had some rust holes in my car, I gamely said, no problem, I'll fix them myself... with the help of a friend. Trouble was, neither one of us could figure out where the problems were listed on the work order, and the real gaping hole that was plainly visible was apparently not a problem [?!]. Well, we put a patch over the obvious hole, scraped off the rust we could find, laid down some rust inhibitor, and I was on my way - except that, backing out of the remarkably narrow driveway, my passenger mirror got caught on a chain link fence and snapped into 3 pieces. Yeah, I have one of those cars - specifically, a 98 Ford Taurus. No hatchback, and no breakaway mirrors :'( . Now what do I do?! The inspection being up... uhm, today... I still haven't found the holes the mechanic was talking about, and my mirror is dangling limply off the side of my car. Christe Eleison...

I don't like pulling the Damsel In Distress card. I can fix this because I can fix [almost] anything. Let's put a plug in for the friendly folk at the chain auto parts store that I frequent, a packet of adhesive Bondo patches, two different kinds of marine grade adhesive and a spackling tool. [I forgot the rust inhibiting primer and a wire brush... oops]. All this for about $16. Thanks guys, you rock. Now to go home and fix this thing!

Oh, did we mention it's barely 40 degrees Fahrenheit outside? I have no garage? Not ideal conditions to try to fix a problem like this, but the weather isn't going to get any warmer any time soon. In fact, they're calling for snow this afternoon. >:(

I do my best to mix the epoxy to it's proper uniform light blue consistence, watching as my hands turn a similar color.  Since I'm in no position to take the door of my car apart at all, and certainly not outdoors in temperatures around 38 degrees, the best approach to this problem seemed to involve gluing the three pieces of the mirror casing back together first, and then see what could be done about adhering it back to the car, if necessary. The biggest challenge in this is that the casing containing the mirror unit separated completely from the two other casing pieces. How then to keep that very heavy object stabilized - still attatched to the car - while the glue sets up on it's fracture, and the fracture between the other casing parts? Our good friend, Duct tape. I ended up ripping off a long piece of tape and adhered it to the passenger window and a less conspicuous place on the windshield, forming a fairly effective sling as it were to cradle the mirror unit in place, as well as adding strips of tape to the other pieces to keep them in place. I don't know how well this is going to work, and I also don't know where to find a junk yard in pittsburgh to buy a second hand mirror, since I'd rather not buy a new one. It's been half an hour since I mixed the glue and applied it to the car. The package said it would set up in an hour at temperatures in the low seventies... yes, thank you for laughing with me, since it's late March in Southwestern Pennsylvania, currently a balmy 38 degrees Fahrenheit. So I've got another hour and a half to go waiting for the glue to set. Hopefully, I'll have regained feeling in my hands by then.