69red

I need some advice on the best way to fill in holes in the rear deck lid. I removed a luggage rack and am getting the car ready for paint. I have read several books on fiberglass repair and have a little experience working with it. I want the repair to be long lasting and undetectable. Would someone please describe how they would go about such a repair and what they would use.

I believe that all bodies came with holes for the antenna. How did the factory fill this hole in on radio delete cars? What did they use?

Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions.

Easy Mike

Lay up a regular fiberglass patch from both sides: underneath and top side. Sand and prep the top side patches.

Bonding compound, often with a plug on the underside. Their stuff kicked off in about six minutes and was then ready for sanding.

Alan 71

Hi 69,
On way to do it is to taper a 'saucer' shaped round area on the top and bottom of the deck around each hole.
The tapered area should be about the size of a silver dollar.
Then build up layers of mat and resin on both the the top and bottom sides.
Do not use ANY filler in the repair…. just resin and mat.
The longer the repair sits without even any primer on it the better.
Regards,
Alan

phat87

A repair like this is simple but it ain't easy. You'll be surprised at how much time it takes to make it right. You will come to know the underside of your deck lid very well

For the repair itself you won't need much material so just buy a small local repair kit. This may seem like a hole plug repair, but really it all starts under the deck lid. If the patchwork under the deck is not done right it WILL flex and eventually you will see hairline cracks where the holes were filled.

Epoxy or Polyester resin? Well that is the question of the century. If it was a C4 definitely epoxy. With a C3 that laid up with a chopper gun and mat you can use polyester resin.

To make the repair durable ( so you don't get circular cracks where the holes were) you have to apply at least two layers of patch material under the holes to be filled, three would be better.

The patch material doesn't have to be huge, I would say first patch to go on will be about 2 "sq, the next patch 3" to 3 1/2"sq and the third patch if you use it about 5"sq.

It is essential that you scuff the underside of the repair area pretty goo to expose clean substrate. On the top side you will have to carefully feather back the edges surrounding the hole so you don't have an abrupt edge. Also the resin will not bond to paint (properly).

There is a tool you can find in second hand tool joints the is made specifically for rolling out the air bubbles out of the mat, it's called a sceeding tool. USE IT.

There are two types of cloth, Mat (or Matt) or Cloth. Cloth comes in two weights Finish and Roving. These are both woven material.

Roving is very heavy compared to Finish Cloth. It is intended for holding more resin and multilayer build ups and more strength. You will probably get a material called MATT in your repair kit.
Mat is a little easier to work with but the finish takes a little more trowel work, filler and elbow grease to get it really smooth. Seeing as the majority of you repair will be under the rear deck this is no such a concern.

Matt is an oriented strand product, it's made of short strands of FG laid down in a large sheet and then run through a press to give it some body so you can handle it. This probably the easiest material to work with.

Well, I gotta go to work....didn't thing it would take so long to type all this. I talk much faster in my head.

Go to the library and get a book on glassing. If you have anymore questions come on back, 'm here quite a bit.

Many other people will chime in I'm sure. TOO FUNNY just in the time I was typing this two people posted responses.

69red

Thanks for the advice. I neglected to ask about the best way to repair another area. There are several evenly spaced raised areas above the metal bracket that supports the headlight buckets. What is the best way to repair these? Thanks

gbvette62

The bumps in the nose are caused by the aluminum rivets that attach the front surround header reinforcement, to the nose surround.

The only way to repair them is to drill the rivets out, fill the holes and then bond the reinforcement back in. Around 73, Chevrolet stopped using the rivets, and started epoxying the reinforcement in. Because of this, 73-82 Corvettes don't have an issue with the rivets pushing up through the nose.

jimvette999

Some good technical advice offered here IMO, may I add, let the final repair bake in the hot summer sun as long as you can (unprimered) to allow shrinkage to set in so this repair remains invisible. I've seen these repairs look fine until a year or two when they finally rear their ugly heads and become visible under close scrutiny, especially in an area like the deck. I recommend 2 weeks in the daily direct sun, no tree shade/sap then recheck for dead flat repair sites. Good luck,
Jim