Boredom Fixes

 Since the atmospheric river rain event began I haven't gone anywhere.

Not that I have anywhere I'd want to go currently unless I need groceries.

The pouring rain began last Thursday and has kept it up sometimes coming down in buckets.

There was enough break in the rain for me to remove the broken rear hatch release cover on my car, to attempt a repair.

I had to remove the inside cover, to get at the back of the bolts to remove those.  They had broken out of the cover on the back, since they had knobs on the end that jammed up into plastic tubes off the rear hatch release cover.  Those plastic tubes broke, leaving pieces on the bolt and its matching broken piece on the backside of the hatch release cover.

Besides the plastic breaking in two at one end of the cover, two clip holders had broken off on the back, plus an upright plastic piece one license plate light attaches to and both bolt holders one at each end.

Both these little tubes that held the ends of bolts broke off.

This side at least had a little more left to it than the other side.

On one side, the plastic upright where the license plate light attaches was intact.  On the other side, that plastic upright had broken off.

Same place on the other side, where the upright should be, its broken off.

I spent all day, in my pj's, using glue and duct tape, to repair the pieces.  It was fun, I won't lie.   And no pressure because I found a replacement part on ebay motors cheap and ordered it.  The part coming is primed black.   It won't be here for a week, won't match my car color, but I need to be legal which means having a license plate light, for a road trip with cats Friday to Portland which means driving in the dark both directions.  Hence the attempt to repair the broken one.  

I glued the "break in two" spot together and covered it then in duct tape which I glued also, at its edges.   I usually reinforce broken plastic across the break with something rigid attached either side of the break.  I was searching my boxes of what nots for something that would work and finally decided I didn't need to go to that trouble since the spare was coming, from ebay.   I didn't want to buy a single thing if I'd bought that spare part coming, to repair the old part.

I glued the bolts, still with the broken off pieces of plastic on them to their matches.  I held them in place while the glue got tacky with duct tape too.

Bolt glued back to broken tube, held in place to set with duct tape

Other end, same thing, glued it back on, held it in place with duct tape while it dries

I reinforced the glued spot by wrapping with duct tape

Then I glued back on the broken off plastic upright to hold the license plate light on the one side.  I cut a tiny piece of old foam and wrapped it in duct tape, to help hold it in place while the glue dried and to leave there for a bit of reinforcement.  When I screw the license plate light back into the hole the screw can easily pierce the taped over foam.  

That white foam on the top is just to show what I used to reform and support the taped over glued together screw attachment stand.

It's just been sitting now for overnight, for the glue to dry hard.  The pour down going on outside is supposed to slack off this afternoon and we may get a short break.   If we do, I will be ready to reattach this thing.  Right now the electrics are hanging off the back of my car bagged in plastic to keep out the rain.

Duct tape is the same color as my car, turns out.  Now I know what to call my car color--duct tape silver.

I don't know if these fixes will hold even long enough to reinstall it.  The plastic is brittle with age and temperature changes.    But the attempt entertained me all day yesterday while outside the rain pounded down.