Cracked Water Tank

[campdaddy]

Well..........
Neither really. I went to our local Harbor Freight store and the plastic welder was $39.95 instead of the $29.95 advertized on the internet site. They would have honored the internet site price if I had printed it out, but I didn't. So I examined it real good and decided that an extremely small heat gun would probably work and I just happended to have one from my instrumentation technician days. So I figured I give it try. I did buy a pack of "plastic welding rods" from them though but it turned out that it contained everything but polyethylene. The trick I found out from reading a lot of web sites about repairing boats and kyaks is to get the surface to be welded hot enough to become soft but not so hot that it melts. At the same time you want your welding rod to melt. I was unable to get any of the rods I bought from HF to melt at the right temp. That's when i tried the plastic ring from a 6 pack. It felt like the same material and it worked like a charm. Still was tricky getting the temps to work out but it did eventually work. I checked the tank afterwards and no leak. I decided to also put a patch over the area as an added precaution. I had read on another boat repair web site that you need to flame condition the polyethylene surface before anything will stick to it. It's where you take a propane torch and very gingerly run the flame across the surface. Not enough to melt it really but enough to kind of slightly gloss the surface. I did that and then applied a roof patch called "Eternabond" It stuck beautifully to the area I flame conditioned and only soso to an area I didn't. So that technique does have some merit. I also added some steel reinforcments brackets to that area of the camper to help control the flexing before putting the tank back in. She's good to go now and hopefully stays that way. I still won't tow with water in the tank again but I think it would take it now that i've added the additional bracing.

[wavery]

Well..........
Neither really. I went to our local Harbor Freight store and the plastic welder was $39.95 instead of the $29.95 advertized on the internet site. They would have honored the internet site price if I had printed it out, but I didn't. So I examined it real good and decided that an extremely small heat gun would probably work and I just happended to have one from my instrumentation technician days. So I figured I give it try. I did buy a pack of "plastic welding rods" from them though but it turned out that it contained everything but polyethylene. The trick I found out from reading a lot of web sites about repairing boats and kyaks is to get the surface to be welded hot enough to become soft but not so hot that it melts. At the same time you want your welding rod to melt. I was unable to get any of the rods I bought from HF to melt at the right temp. That's when i tried the plastic ring from a 6 pack. It felt like the same material and it worked like a charm. Still was tricky getting the temps to work out but it did eventually work. I checked the tank afterwards and no leak. I decided to also put a patch over the area as an added precaution. I had read on another boat repair web site that you need to flame condition the polyethylene surface before anything will stick to it. It's where you take a propane torch and very gingerly run the flame across the surface. Not enough to melt it really but enough to kind of slightly gloss the surface. I did that and then applied a roof patch called "Eternabond" It stuck beautifully to the area I flame conditioned and only soso to an area I didn't. So that technique does have some merit. I also added some steel reinforcments brackets to that area of the camper to help control the flexing before putting the tank back in. She's good to go now and hopefully stays that way. I still won't tow with water in the tank again but I think it would take it now that i've added the additional bracing.

Thanks for sharing that. :!

[campdaddy]

Thanks to you wavery and all who gave me the ideas that this polyethylene stuff need some special tactics to effect repairs. I'd would have been messing with epoxy and getting real frustrated when it didn't work. Thanks all, this forum is great.