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Does any of you learned ladies or gentlemen know the best way to try and minimise a scratch in polycarbonate? I placed my RH door off the gyro against a wall and a gust of wind flipped it over. I was wondering how some fine abrasive like brasso may work but too scared to try it :-
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Max, I probably need to ring you to explain this but you can use most automotive two pack paint polish on polycarbonate as they are a similar make up. This is the polish that I have found that works the best. http://www.juicepolishes.com.au/qcut.htmlI have done a couple of plane windscreens here with it by hand to remove the fine scratches that make it hard to see when heading into the sun. If you have a variable speed polisher you can use that but go slowly and lightly so that you don"t melt the plastic! You can sand out deeper scratches out with fine sand paper (600 - 2000 grit). Much easier to use a machine to polish it than by hand for this.Brasso as it has never worked in the past. Not sure whether it is the solvents or abrasive but it just tends to blend the scratches out rather than polish them so you just end up with a dull spot. You will also be able to polish MOG with this stuff now that she is flying too.Cheers, Matthew
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Matthew thanks for that.I have only recently (2 days ago) learned that brasso has solvents in it which affects some plastics. The last time I used it was during some military service I did-It was good stuff but I never knew why until recently. Thank christ in signals we didn"t take a lot of that bull5hit too seriously - until the sheilas joined after I left. Regards...........Chook.
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G"day max ouch that must of hurt...It"s annoying when your best efforts to look after things come undone in seconds like a gust of wind and now you have an annoying scratch to remind you. I have recently done a lot of 5m polycarbonate plastic work in the shed and it"s really tough but temperamental stuff as well. I went to a plastics supplier and they have a lot of trade tricks for this stuff. The glue is of two types liquid and cement compound. The liquid capillary action dissolves the poly and dries to make a very strong bond. The cement compound is for uneven surface (gap fill dry) and very strong bond. You can make this cement simply with acetone and polycarbonate shavings. So why am i telling you all this, I believe you will find a scratch repair will be a solvent type and best place to go for this will be a plastics supplier as they have a lot of specialized products on the shelf for these applications. Hope that helps a bit mate.Mike.
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Max there is a type of cleaner? basically a very very fine sand paper that will remove scatches from the windows ect, i had a Xenon windscreen recently that was badly scratched from a bingle,
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Max, be extremely careful using acetone on polycarb. It will leave it cloudy in appearance and soft enough if you touch it you will leave
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Just make sure whatever you do, to experiment on a small patch or spare piece of polycarb rather than experimenting on the spot right in front of your mug
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Thanks for all the info. Chaps. Luckly it"s only the drivers RH door which is only generally on to keep the hornets out while sitting on the ground. I will defiantly experiment on some scrap poly. first :P
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I only put that bit in because a mate, not mentioning Sam Polyaks name, removed his rego lable (those old soak in a saucer of water types) label with a pocket knife from the windshield of his car, then he tried to scrub the rest of it off with a green scourer... he ended up with a nice square patch of scratches and damaged glass where the rego label goes
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I ended up hitting it with some 600 carborundum grit on a rubber block with water. The scratches quickly disappeared. I then polished it with a sheep skin polisher over the sanding disc on the variable speed drill using T cut car stuff. It worked well. Will do more polishing when I next leave my Island (peninsular) paradise and go over to the evil dark side and purchase a new sheep skin pad.
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Hey Max glad that worked for you. I would have thought that 600 grit was a bit coarse to start polishing out. Keep your eye on it over the next month or so as alot of polishes contain fillers. These fillers give the appearance that the scratches are gone but after awhile they evaporate with being subjected to the elements. No drama, you would have got most of the "scratch depth" out but may have to just do it again if it looks dull. Matthew
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I just get an angle grinder with a coarse disk in it, go over the whole window, carefully missing any of the scratches, then replace the window
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