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Topper repair

Rockcrawlindude

a rock crawlin’ dude
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Good afternoon

I was experiencing some cracking in the tailgate drip lip thing on my topper. Some forum members here were helpful in identifying the plastic as ABS and we bounced around some ideas. @Gondul and @Poolmonkey and other members were all helpful. Thanks. This is my repair I will share with y’all and hopefully it helps someone.

This is what the cracking looked like. Toward the end of the lip where the material gets thinner. It was nearly symmetrical on either side.

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The goal with the repair was more to keep it from getting worse than to make it perfect. I bought a small sheet of 1/16” thick ABS plastic from Amazon ($7) and settled on black plastic weld epoxy. The abs will be a reinforcement on the repair. 1/16” seemed thick enough to work but thin enough to work with and not build up too thick for the topper to close right.

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I cut my repair patches, cleaned and scuffed the surfaces. I made a small mix and spread stick out of the ABS and got started.

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after a few hours I returned to check it out and I found out I had a problem. I had taped off the top of the cracks so I could fill in the cracks from the top. Well, the blue tape pulled the paint off of the window trim. This was annoying but nothing I couldn’t handle so I fixed that as well.

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Continued

I taped off the bottom section window trim and used my favorite flavor of powder coat to tidy that back up.

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Repair from the top including the painted window trim. A little oozed out. I may trim it.

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Here is what the repair ended up looking like from underneath

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Too early to know if it really is fixed but I think it is. Hope this helps someone.
 
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Can you identify where the pressure is being applied that caused them to crack?
I believe you did well by filling the gap instead of trying to close it back together.
I don’t exactly know what caused it. The fact that it’s symmetrical makes me think it’s just due to how the material thins out there plus the combination of pressure on the lip when closing and how it’s warped a little over time.
 
I don’t exactly know what caused it. The fact that it’s symmetrical makes me think it’s just due to how the material thins out there plus the combination of pressure on the lip when closing and how it’s warped a little over time.
That makes sense. I'm planning to get a Leer in the next couple of months and would like to avoid the problem if possible.
If it becomes necessary, drilling a small hole at the end of the crack can help to distribute force and keep it from continuing to crack farther.
Good luck!
 
Update.

The lip has cracked again but the promising part is that the glue didn’t fail, the ABS filler material did.

I think I’m going to repair it again with the same stuff but just fill in the cracks instead of trying to get it back to its original shape.

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