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Finally figured out a trick for stripped screw holes on composite panels
I work at a regional hangar over in Jacksonville and kept stripping out those tiny screw holes on the composite panels near the wing root. Tried using oversized screws and they just made the crack worse. Then an old mechanic showed me to heat a small piece of nylon zip tie with a lighter and jam it into the hole before driving the screw. It held tight through the next two inspections and saved me from drilling out the whole panel. Has anyone else tried this or got a better fix for the same problem?
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theawest19h ago
Shoved a lit lighter near a composite panel and jammed melted plastic in there" is definitely gonna make me the coolest guy in the hangar if the safety inspector walks by lmao. I respect the hustle though, I've used zip ties on all kinds of stuff but never thought to try it on stripped screw holes. Bet my boss would lose it if he saw me doing that near the fuel vents though. I'm more of a "red loctite and hope" kind of guy myself but your way sounds way more fun.
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christopher7138h ago
Ha, right? The safety inspector would probably have a heart attack on the spot. I get it though, sometimes you just gotta make things work with what you've got in the toolbox. Red loctite and hope is a solid strategy, but I've seen that stuff fail on dirty threads more times than I'd like. Melting plastic feels like one of those fixes that's either genius or a massive fire hazard, no in between. Have you ever had the loctite actually hold for good?
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