How I fixed my AreaP can.

[KrazyWalle]

So this is my how to/DIY on how I fixed my AreaP can. It had a small hole in it from the previous owner, he had lost the muffler clamp so it kept hitting on the peg. Well I made it worse till I finally decided to fix it. There wasn't really any good information on the internet on fixing a whole of that size. So I just talked to a few of my Coworkers in the shop on how to go about fixing it. They do a lot of fiberglass repairs on helicopters. They suggested I do a patch on the inside then just fill it on top. I ended up doing just that and it turned out great. So some may ask why I didn't just buy a new can, well simply I didn't have the money to do it. My repair was completely free down to the carbon fiber, epoxy, and all the associated materials needed. You can't beat free!

So here's the big hole after I trimmed it up a little, and sanded the can down..


Here's the patch I cut up to put on the inside, I made it so big because there was stress cracks down the sides as well.




This is the patch in place on the inside. I heated it up with a heat gun to speed up the cure time and allow me to lay the fill on top.


The fill was composed of the epoxy mix and carbon fiber cut up real fine mixed together. I packed it in with a little acid brush, and left a little extra just to make sure I could of sanded it smooth and even.



So after the patch and fill was in place I applied some more heat to let it cure. I used a small sanding wheel to smooth it out, and finished it off by hand.




In the last picture I just sprayed Isopropyl Alcohol to clean it off. It helped see the actual repair. I don't have any pictures of the can after I cleared it. I ended up using spray paint to clear it. That epoxy did not set ultra clear and shiny so I opted not to use it on all the can.

Well that's all I did this in one work day total. After work I ran to the motorcycle dealer and picked up some Moose Racing fiberglass. It was all they had so I ended up using it to repack. Reassembled everything threw the can on and no leaks. It's hard to tell the difference between the exhaust note of the stock can when it had the blown AreaP packing and a giant whole. What I can say is that it's still really loud, but a better sounding loud. It progressively gets louder the higher the engine revs. Of course a lot of lost performance was regained due to the exhaust escaping from the hole.

Hope someone finds this useful, I learned a lot just doing that one repair, I did a lot of reading and researching on composite repairs prior to taking the plunge. It turned out great, yeah you could see the fill material but that ended up getting covered up by the new muffler clamp.

[csmith12]

Well done.

[Snake]

Gret job! You can barely tell there's a repair.

[KrazyWalle]

Thanks guys.