Cracks and scratches on your ATV plastics are bound to happen sooner or later. You could maintain and clean your ATV after every use, and still, you’ll end up with faded or scratched up plastic eventually.
To some people, scuffed up plastic on their quad is not a big deal. I mean, it’s not like it affects performance, handling, or anything important anyways. But there’s just something about the way it makes the machine look that I don’t like. So I went ahead and found the best ways to fix some of the most common ATV plastic damage you’ll encounter.
It’s a good idea to know why plastic fades to help you understand why the methods here work for restoring faded plastic. Basically, plastic starts to look faded because the oils in the plastic evaporate over time. The evaporation of oils in the plastic is sped up when the plastic sits in the sun for long periods of time.
Plastic is made from refined oil, and as the oil in the top layer of the plastic evaporates, the plastic is weakened and looks faded. Your plastics become more prone to cracks too the more you let it fade and weaken.
You could simply sand down the top layer of plastic, until you get to the part where the oil hasn’t evaporated yet. Then buff it out until it looks nice and new. But with this approach, you’re still weakening the plastic because you are actually removing layers of the plastic each time you do this.
Another method I’ve tried, is using a heat gun to help bring the oil in the plastic to the surface. This does work pretty good and makes the plastic look nice. But again, you’re not actually restoring oil to the plastic so over time, the plastic is getting weaker and weaker.
My preferred method, and what I recommend you try first. Is to get this Premium Plastic Restorer From Car Guys found here on Amazon. This way you’re not removing plastic, oil, or anything else from your ATV parts. In fact, this stuff is actually adding additives to the plastic to help get them to the condition they were in when they were brand new.
This particular plastic restorer also has some nice UV protection to help keep the plastic from drying out and fading in the future.
Keep in mind, this is not to repair scratches or anything like that. It is specifically to restore dry faded plastic. There are some other brands out there that will do the same thing, I’ve just had the most luck with this one. To be honest, this is way easier than sanding or using a heat gun anyway, and I don’t have to worry about the structural integrity of the plastic being compromised.
There are two types of scratches you’ll encounter most often, light scratches or deep scratches. Light scratches are the ones caused by branches or bushes hitting the plastics and leaving little visible marks. A lot of people don’t even bother with these types of scratches, and just chalk it up to wear and tear. But for someone spending a lot of money on a quad or ATV, I can understand wanting to remove even the littlest of scratches.
The best way I’ve found for removing light scratches is to go with some 1500 Grit Wet Sandpaper. Just use the sand paper over the areas with scratches and buff it out when you’re done. You could finish up with a coat of the plastic restorer I talked about above to make it look brand new.
Using wet sand paper could even work for medium to deep scratches, but I don’t like removing that much plastic from my ATV parts. For the deeper scratches you end up having to start with 400 grit or worse, and work your way up to 1500 grit to get a smooth surface. For me, it’s not worth all the time and energy sanding to just end up compromising the integrity of the plastics. Don’t forget, the more plastic you sand away, the easier they will crack.
So for deeper scratches I’ll use a plastic bonder/filler. My go-to is this JB Weld Plastic Bonder Gap Filler found here on Amazon. I’ll use this to actually just fill the scratches. It’s pretty easy to use, you push out some of the goop from each tube.
It’s a 1 to 1 ratio and comes out at the same time. Mix it together and fill the deep scratches with it. The stuff sets in about 15 – 20 mins and you can sand it down after a half hour.
If you use a putty knife to clean off the excess after filling the scratch, it makes the sanding after much easier. This does set in a black color, so if you don’t want to have to paint afterwards, don’t use this method. I don’t paint after, and I don’t mind having the black filler here and there on the plastics. It’s better than having deep gouges in your plastics just asking to be cracked.
If you haven’t taken care of your ATV plastics, they could dry out over time and eventually crack and break. Or the more likely option, you hit something didn’t you? That’s ok, cracked plastics can usually be fixed without too much trouble. If you don’t want to spend the money buying new plastic parts, you’ll need to do it yourself.
For small little cracks you could try using the JB Weld I talked about above, but that only really works for cracks less than a few inches.
But, you probably really messed your toy up bad, and for that, you’re gonna need something better.
I recommend using what’s called a hot staple gun. Like this Astro 7600 Hot Staple Gun Kit found here on Amazon. This thing is amazing and I’ve used it on more than just my ATV. It works by heating up these specially designed staples it comes with. The staples get set into the plastic making a nice strong bond, but still allowing the plastic to be flexible.
You just line up the pieces you want joined, and use the staple gun to staple them together. The staple is heated to it can sink into the plastic a bit, making a super strong bond. I always do the stapling on the underside of the plastic, that way you don’t see the staples. If you use this method, you will still see the crack on the upper side of the plastics. You can then use the JB Weld to fill in the crack, and then sand away any excess making a nice smooth surface.
Sometimes a piece of plastic from an ATV gets bent but doesn’t crack.
That’s good, you don’t have to repair any cracked plastics now. But it can leave a discolored looking area on the plastic that doesn’t look right.
For fixes like this, I like to use a heat gun. It’s really kinda cool how well it works, you can watch the plastic change color as you hold the heat gun to it. Be careful though, too much heat can melt the plastics and there’s no coming back from that. Hold the heat gun a few inches away from the plastic and keep it moving side to side the whole time.
Any old heat gun will work for something like this. Heck, I’ve seen people use a propane torch with success. If you’re unsure what type of heat gun to use, check this Heat Gun from Amazon for starters.
That’s all there is to it. If you want to paint your ATV plastics a new color, check out this article: How To Prep And Paint ATV Plastics.
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Since ATVs invest the majority of their time outdoors, their plastic body ends up being discolored from the sunlight's rays, as well as surging around in dirt, mud, snow, and also water does not help.
Plastics get messed up by boots or passing particles, and also splits can appear in the body or windshield.
There are a few choices for restoring your ATV's faded plastic so it appears like a showroom model once more. These alternatives differ in price as well as problem.
In this guide, we clarify exactly how to make your ATV resemble new. We provide you with some suggestions on exactly how to restore ATV plastic.
Table of Contents
Now that you understand what creates your ATV plastic to fade allow's take a look at the various ways you can recover your vehicle to its previous glory.
When it concerns restoring your ATV, there are many methods that can be made use of to take on discolored plastic, with everyone delivering different outcomes. So to help you at the same time, we have actually detailed the various techniques down below.
Before you restore your ATV plastic, you should keep your ATV clear.
Wash the ATV completely using Dawn dishwashing fluid. Dawn helps get rid of oils and grease from the surface area. And afterward, completely dry the maker totally. If there are scratches, you will also require to sand its plastic surface.
Linseed oil can recover discolored plastic, however, it takes ages to dry. You need boiled linseed oil, rather. Note-- this does not imply you steam the linseed oil on your own! It implies that the linseed oil has actually been pre-treated to completely dry faster.
To speed up points along, choose boiled linseed oil and mix it with paint thinner. We advise a 40/60 proportion of linseed oil as well as paint thinner.
Begin by cleaning your ATV extensively. For best results, you'll intend to eliminate the rack as well as any other parts of the device that are covering the plastics.
Apply the mix to your plastics using a completely dry cloth.
You'll discover the linseed oil will remove the oxidization that's causing fading. After you have actually used the blend to all the plastic, allow it a full day to dry.
If you maintain your ATV covered and do not use it on a daily basis, this restore will certainly last for a couple of months. If you continuously use your ATV outdoors, this treatment might be called for to be done again in 4-6 weeks.
The following video shows you how to restore ATV plastic with boiled linseed oil.
There are plenty of products in stores that declare to recover plastic. One of the most preferred is Solution Finish and CAR GUYS Plastic Restorer.
A look through customer testimonials shows that they work. How much time the remediation lasts differs from item to item, and just how well you protect your ATV. Yet most appear to last for a number of months.
When using a certain restorer, inspect the instructions of the application on the label. Also, the majority of these items are likewise helpful for plastic. If your ATV seat has a plastic cover, you can make use of these restorers to reverse fading.
First, you should remove the skid plates and racks. If they are drastically damaged whatsoever, you might intend to replace them totally. To enhance your better-looking new plastics, you may intend to strip or sand your racks and repaint them with a spray-on bed liner.
Next up, offer the ATV a good clean overall. Now, it's time to prepare the plastic for waxing. This means fining sand the plastic with fine sandpaper, working your way up from the lowest amount of sandpaper to the highest. You can also use an oscillating device to quicken the process. Make certain you're wearing risk-free gloves, and finish up by fining sand with steel wool.
Use a vinyl flooring liquid wax to the plastic using a car and truck wax applicator. Using thin layers, you can service one area of the plastic while one more section dries. You will need to apply a number of coats, and polish the plastic after each application.
After the last layer is full and also bone dry, end up with an automotive wax for an added layer of luster.
This process is more complex than linseed oil and paints thinner restoration, but it usually has longer-lasting results.
This is the debatable one that we don't advise. It works such as this: you set the heat gun to the lowest setting and blow it a few inches away from the plastic, moving slowly over the discolored areas.
This approach generates instant outcomes. The faded plastic instantly appears new and also glossy.
While it functions, how it works is the issue. The heat partially thaws the top layer of the plastic, making it show up new.
Comparable to various other plastic restore methods, the heat gun method does not last forever. Oxidation as well as fading will certainly return after a number of weeks or months. So you need to duplicate the treatment.
The trouble is that every time you use a heat gun, the plastic gets more brittle as well as more probable to crack as you set about your riding.
So we do not suggest making use of a heat gun. Use linseed oil or a plastic restorer. If you want long-term remediation, see the last method below. You can watch the following video to learn how to restore ATV plastic with the heat gun.
For the last approach, we are going to go over; we have selected an option that is arguably one of the most efficient when it comes to restoring ATV plastic. If you see that your ATV has actually begun to discolor, you can constantly battle the issue by repainting it.
You can do this by using spray paints ideal for ATV plastic, although you will need to apply a primer coat and a safety top layer for the best outcomes.
Like the majority of recovering approaches, paint is not permanent as well as will certainly start to fade with time. Nevertheless, it can last much longer than various other repair choices and can be quickly reapplied whenever the plastic begins to discolor.
If you want to learn more about paint, you can click here to get a guide for painting your ATV step-by-step.
Broken plastic is a little bit a lot more challenging to fix. If a piece of the plastic has come off, not simply a basic fracture, you may be much better off changing the whole plastic part.
However, if it's just a crack, there's hope. We discovered numerous feasible means to repair broken ATV plastic. Nonetheless, most of them, such as using epoxy or superglue do not work well. As quickly as you go out with the ATV once again, the sealed cracks are then loosened
The solution that appears to work ideal is melting the plastic.
You can use a plastic welder, heat gun, soldering iron, or some other source of heat to melt the plastic along the crack. You'll require to apply stress on both sides of the plastic up until the melted plastic remedies and holds.
For larger fractures, you may need to thaw an exterior plastic to fill the fracture. You can also get plastic welding rods or reinforcement plastic mesh.
When it comes to the windshield, because it is likely acrylic, an acrylic solvent concrete or an acrylic adhesive is the best option.
Adhere to the directions on the label. Keep in mind to clean the windshield before using any item.
Plastic burs very easy as well as wet fining sand will prevent that. With the 180 grit just sand the actually bad areas as well as get the deep scratches, nothing even more. After they have gone away, Use 220 on the overall vehicle.
Sand up until the shade is also all over and the scratches are gone.
Brightening with Toothpaste or Sodium Bicarbonate Toothpaste and baking soda are both light abrasives that you can make use of to brighten plastic. For deeply etched or blemished plastic, capture non-gel toothpaste straight onto the surface and also buff it in a circular movement with a microfiber or cotton cloth.
WD-40 Multi-use product is excellent for most plastic surfaces that have actually had a great deal of exterior direct exposure, so it's great for garden furniture. It is very important to note that Polycarbonate and clear polystyrene plastics are among the very few surfaces where WD-40 multi-purpose products can be avoided.
The very best method I have actually located for removing light scrapes is to choose some 1500 Grit Wet Sandpaper.
Just utilize the sandpaper over the locations with scrapes and also enthusiast it out when you're done. You can end up with a coat of the plastic restorer I discussed above to make it look new.
To restore the shine, apply a small amount of plastic or metal polish just enough to cover the dull areas, then apply it in a circular motion with a clean, dry cloth. You may need to repeat the process a few times, but eventually, the plastic will shine like new again.
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Rodney L Herron
Rodney L is a technical writer and product consultant with over a decade of experience in the motor industry. Rodney is a fan of performance machines that run fast and loud and an expert in all things custom. His numerous articles and write-ups are available at our knowledge base. Whether it’s something wrong with your motorcycle or you are building a custom bike, you can trust Rodney’s experience.
Recently, motorcycle plastic is often brought to us for repairs after the so-called "cheap" repair.
The original motorcycle plastic is quite resistant to minor falls. Often, with mild falls, it does not shatter into a cloud of small fragments. During the subsequent repair of the plastic of a motorcycle or ATV, the main task is not just to restore the overall integrity of the product, but to preserve the structure of the material at the fracture site, the uniformity of the entire product. When repairing, it is necessary to pay attention to the most important technological characteristics of the plastic (melting and boiling points, filler properties, etc.). d.). You should not try to solder plastic with an ordinary soldering iron, solder metal mesh, brackets and other "reinforcing" objects into it. Motorcycle plastic from this will only become more fragile.
Why? nine0004
When welding plastic with a soldering iron or without observing the required temperature, the weld overheats, boils. At this point, the plastic loses its elasticity and becomes brittle. The seam is uneven. The same applies to the "reinforcing" elements. Since metals and plastics have different physical characteristics (temperature coefficients, adhesion, etc.), they will also behave completely differently in the composition of the product. Also, foreign elements, in the event of an accident, will not allow the plastic to “beautifully” break (instead of an even crack, a ragged hole may turn out). nine0004
Another method of repairing the plastic of an ATV or a snowmobile, beloved by many "kulibins", is two-component putties. What they just don’t invent, starting from “poxipol” and ending with special repair compounds for repairing car bumpers. As a rule, broken fasteners are repaired in this way. The result of such “creativity” is a significant increase in the weight of the repaired part (in order for the fasteners to somehow hold on, you have to “heap” a lot of such putty), the terrible appearance of the “repaired” area (albeit from the inside), the lack of rigidity in the repaired area , a very short-term effect (as a rule, all this "economy" falls off in a month or two, or after a slight physical impact).
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Since damage to the fasteners is accompanied by damage to the paintwork, then, accordingly, after repairing the fasteners, the part is painted. Since there is no rigidity at the repair site, the entire load falls on the paintwork, which simply simply bursts in the future. It turns out the repair according to the principle: "the main thing is that the client leaves the gates of the service."
Also, such repairs are extremely labor intensive for subsequent repairs. You have to clean up all these pieces of putty, re-cut the mounting brackets, etc. Naturally, the cost of repairs increases, and all these labor costs fall on the shoulders of the customer. nine0004
Hence the conclusion: do not repair motorcycle plastic without following the repair technology! By saving on quality repairs, you will get a terrible aesthetic appearance and increase the cost of subsequent repairs (and you will definitely need it).
AutoMotoCentre.
Engine repair Gepard 800 650 850 Plastic is a durable material. But not enough to withstand the blows. Especially in the event of a collision or a fall of motor vehicles. Scratches, cracks, chips - such minor, at first glance, defects can cause serious problems. We do not recommend repairing damage yourself - with a soldering iron, brackets or metal mesh. And the point here is not at all the aesthetics of the work done, which can change the appearance of the restored element like this:
The strength of the plastic decreases, it becomes brittle and inelastic. This means that soon you will have to change the part to a new one.
Need to know the correct welding temperature. It is impossible to adjust it on an ordinary soldering iron. If the seam is overheated, it will be inhomogeneous and the plastic will become brittle.
Metal fasteners - staples and nets - are components with different physical characteristics. Not the same as polymers. Therefore, upon impact, they provoke more severe damage to the plastic, for example, ragged holes instead of cracks. These are:
This is a favorite of ATV and snowmobile owners. Broken off elements are glued with Poxipol or the same compound that is used to repair car bumpers. But in order to achieve adhesion, the damaged area must be literally filled with putty. As a result, the weight of the part increases, and the rigidity disappears. And after a maximum of 2 months, the repaired structure falls off. If not by itself, then at the slightest blow for sure. nine0004
The paintwork in this area will inevitably crack. Due to the lack of rigidity, the load is transferred to the painted layer, which is not able to withstand it.
If your vehicle has already gone through such repairs, but you are not ready to change the part, we will help you fix it.
