Car body repair

[lvfd221]

What would be the best way to repair this? I'm thinking of carefully shaving the high ridge off and filling low spot with putty. What is the best pully for this.

 

Thanks

[TarheelRick]

That is a nasty tire burn (?). Your thoughts of scraping off the high ridges is a good start, just be extremely careful around that body line. As for a filler I would consider maybe sprue-glue (sprue dissolved in glue to the consistency of putty). You will need something that dissolves the base styrene so the patch will stay in place. One other option is acrylic nail-filler. It has a very strong odor, can be difficult to build up a large area, and is extremely difficult to sand; however, once in place it will stay there and does not 'ghost' under paint. A word of caution with the nail filler is not to put it in a dehydrator as it will expand. Hope this helps in some way.

[Mark]

I'd use a two-part epoxy putty like Milliput or Magic Sculpt.  The trim strip can be added with styrene strip after the area is smoothed and the door line is reestablished. 

One thing that MUST be done first is to grind out ALL of the surface damage; that is, wherever the tire contacted the body.  Chemicals from the tire have migrated into the plastic and softened it.  All of that has to go, otherwise it will keep working behind the repair.

 

[Bainford]

I would also consider shaving off the lower door hinge to make the body work easier, and add it again after the repair.

[stitchdup]

have you considered a fender mounted spare ala 30s caddy

[peteski]

A word of warning.  The plasticizer chemical that makes vinyl tires soft leached out of the tire and made the kit's plastic soft enough to cause the damage. But the plasticizer remains in the plastic, so that entire area is now softer than the rest of the body. Even if you remove the raised areas and fill in the depression, the surrounding plastic is still affected by the plasticizer.  It would make sense to remove plastic surrounding the tire-shaped depression. Sort of like with cancer - you don't only remove the tumor, but also some tissue surrounding the tumor.

[lvfd221]

Thanks for all the help. I started to remove the ridge and did notice that the plastic was soft. The trim is not a problem as I want to remove it anyway. I will take my time with this and do it right, that is why I ask for help here. 

Thanks again everyone.

[bobss396]

Fixable for sure, just take your time. Things like that, I set a timer. 10 to 20 minutes at a clip. This goes with polishing/ color sanding, etc 

[mcs1056]

A tire did that???

I get that it's easy to see, but I had no idea. I'm on my first kit in fifty years, so...

Do tires similarly affect plastic display cae platforms?

[Bainford]

1 hour ago, mcs1056 said:

A tire did that???

I get that it's easy to see, but I had no idea. I'm on my first kit in fifty years, so...

Do tires similarly affect plastic display cae platforms?

I suppose it depends on the type of plastic, and the material make-up of the particular tires in question. With the right combination of elements, it is certainly possible. The phenomenon is known as 'tire burn'.

There is an almost unending variety of recipes that make up the various rubbery/plasticky tires in kits over the years. Some of them, with the added ingredient of time, can have devastating effect on the kit parts they may be in contact with. The plasticisers used make the tires flexible is the suspected culprit. This is a real problem with vintage kits stored for decades, especially on clear parts. This may have a lot to do with the fact that old kits did not bag tires or glass separately, both lying together in the bottom of the box. Some claim that kits stored in hot environments (attics, unventilated garages, etc) are more susceptible to this, though I don't know the degree to which this is true. Heat often increases chemical reactions, so it sounds reasonable. There are a few kits out there of which the tires are known to eat the wheels on which they are mounted (the Revell Jaguar XK-SS being one).

[Mark]

1 hour ago, mcs1056 said:

A tire did that???

I get that it's easy to see, but I had no idea. I'm on my first kit in fifty years, so...

Do tires similarly affect plastic display cae platforms?

Yes.  Especially clear plastic.

[rattle can man]

An interesting observation: I have three identical releases of the Lindberg /AMT '34 pickup. The last one I picked up has tire melt, but not the other two. I wonder if it was storage conditions or just different batches of tires.  

[peteski]

7 hours ago, mcs1056 said:

A tire did that???

I get that it's easy to see, but I had no idea. I'm on my first kit in fifty years, so...

Do tires similarly affect plastic display cae platforms?

This problem (tire melt) has been occurring from time to time ever since soft vinyl tires started being included with plastic model kits.  PVC a hard plastic material. Plasticizer (type of chemical) is added to vinyl to soften it, making it more rubbery. Over the years some (but not all) batches of this type of vinyl were unstable, with the plasticizer (thick clear liquid) leaching out of the vinyl.  When a tire is on constant contact with plastic, that chemical over some time (sometimes long time) gets absorbed into kit's plastic, softening it to the point that it gets distorted by the pressure of the tire like it is shown (in pretty severe form) in this thread.

While not widespread problem nowadays, some Chinese-made plastic kits or diecast models with vinyl tires will also have the tire melt problem. And yes, it can affect the plastic base. It can also affect lacquered wood surfaces.  Sometimes, on plastic bases you can even see the oily plasticizer liquid surrounding the tire in the contact area with the base.  There might also be some types of plastic not affected by the plasticizer.

[Mark]

There's a variety of factors to contend with: composition of tires, composition of plastic, as well as the infinite number of combinations of vinyl and plastic.

The worst tires I have encountered are early Sixties Revell units.  Those often wreak havoc on their wheels because: (a) Revell plating was weak then, often applied with no lacquer coating on the plastic as other manufacturers did, and (b) their plated parts were often molded in clear plastic.  It's a shame, as a couple of those early tires were never made later in a more plastic friendly material.

[bobss396]

I had another BACK IN THE BOX! special I dug out last year. It provably had sat for a good 12 years.

It is a stock car with resin wheels and the AMT wide oval kit tires. Something between the tires and wheels did not play well together. 

Where the 2 met was a soupy mess. The tires melted into the resin, despite the wheels being primed and painted. I've used the same paint/primer on everything, so it must have been something in the resin.

[Carmak]

On 5/1/2025 at 12:38 PM, mcs1056 said:

A tire did that???

I get that it's easy to see, but I had no idea. I'm on my first kit in fifty years, so...

Do tires similarly affect plastic display cae platforms?

I have an early 60's AMT in an early 60's display case (the ones with the clear bottom that flares out on the sides). The tires have melted both the car's wheels and the display case base a little.

[Carmak]

This is a 60's vintage tire (the top one) that has leached plasticizer to the surface. It kinda looks like oil on water (the purple shimmer).

[mcs1056]

So; Is there something to be done to protect wheels and cases? Something to keep tires from "melting" them on the shelf? Epoxy? Tape? Polyrazzmatazz?

I'll be dead long before this comes into play on anything I'll build, but I don't want my grandchildren to think I'm the ignoramus I really am. 

[Bainford]

15 hours ago, mcs1056 said:

So; Is there something to be done to protect wheels and cases? Something to keep tires from "melting" them on the shelf? Epoxy? Tape? Polyrazzmatazz?

I'll be dead long before this comes into play on anything I'll build, but I don't want my grandchildren to think I'm the ignoramus I really am. 

Some people have suggested using a surface sealer such as BIN or similar, though I don't know how effective these are. The one solution that has been known to work over the long run is covering the interface between the tire and wheel with BMF. It can provide an effective barrier to prevent the chemical reaction from taking place between the two parts. However, if the tires themselves are on a path to self destruction, it won't help that.