Attex Floor repair

[RocketHurricane]

I'm slowly starting to repair my 73 Attex Chief. The first abs repair I'm tackling is the floor pan. The black ABS cockpit floor has several cracks in the bottom - mostly in the rear corners and and the bottom edge and one from the edge to one of the holes the control levers come through. This seems to be where you would put your weight when getting in and out of the machine. A previous owner tried to repair these with fiberglass, but just made a mess of it. I've scrapped most of the resin and glass off and have begun to weld the cracks back together.

I'm using a soldering iron with a 1/4" wide tip and black abs "welding rods". I ordered a sheet of 1/8" black abs sheet from McMaster Carr and cut it into thin strips on my band saw. I open up a nice "v" trough along the crack from the bottom side, and then I melt in the abs welding rod to fill up the v completely. I then melt in more abs from the top side. This seems to be working pretty good, the areas that I've filled in seem fairly stiff and solid now.

What I'm wondering is what can I do to reinforce the floor pan once it's back in the machine so they just don't crack again when I start to stand in it? It seems like there is no support under the floor when it is in place. It's pretty hard to tell how much clearance is needed, and if I could put a sheet of plywood or some other stiff sheet under the abs floor that would rest on the frame. I would like this machine to look pretty stock when I'm done, so I don't want to build a brand new floor like some of the racers have, just something to take the weight of someone getting in/out. Anyone have any suggestions on how to approach this? The stock floor pan seems pretty weak given the number of cracks mine has, so I'm guessing others have had to deal with this.

Thanks

Tom

[hydromike]

Hey Tom,

I used to have an ST/295 that had a brace bolted to the frame, which supported the floor pan in the are you're concerned about. If I remember correctly, it was a piece of 1" square tubing that had a couple pieces of angle welded to it, which then bolted to the frame. The floor pan actually rested right on the 1" tubing. The whole setup looked reasonably "stock", and helped out a great deal. I'd bet you could do something similar...

[racerone3]

I haven't done it on a floor pan yet (although the one in my Wild Wolf desperatly needs it), but I've been having good luck using fiberglass cloth or mat. Instead of resin, I am mixing ABS GOO (scrap ABS melted in acetone) very thin and soaking the cloth with it. I also brush the part to be repaired several times with acetone to get it soft before laying the cloth in place.

[JoeMeg]

Glass reinforced ABS. Great idea!

Joe.

[racerone3]

The GOO/ Glass treatment is holding most of my tank trainer together I failed to mention in my earlier post that all cracks were welded before they got the goo/ glass

[RocketHurricane]

That is a good idea. How long did it take your fiberglass/goo to harden?

[racerone3]

with it mixed real thin, It hardens pretty quick. hard to the touch in an hour or 2. I let all my repairs dry over night before moving the part. Fiberglass mat is a lot thicker and might work better for what your trying to do with the floor.