Is it aluminum or magnesium?

If there is an area that you can scape off a few shavings with a knife, and then hit them with a propane torch, you may be able to tell if they are magnesium if you can get them to ignite. If they are mag, you will get a very intense white flame. Make sure they are small slivers, and do it on a nice steel table of cement floor well away from flammables, as magnesium fire is HOT.

Dave

Any ideas on how to repair it?

Here is an option if it is pot metal

Metal powder filled Epoxy putty. Permatex Strong Steel Stick is a favorite of mine.

I will give it a try and see how it works. I have nothing to lose at this point. It's a pretty small area but I guess we'll see. THANKS

Tried the JB Weld last night but it just didn't work, I'm guessing there is to much pressure on it. I called about getting a new part and after a few hours of talking to the parts guy I found a part number and a price. This little 3 inch long guide for the sunroof is $280. I think I'll be calling some junk yards.

You don't mention the specific model you are looking for, but I wish you luck. I have found that VW parts for most models are difficult to find used. And of course, when you do find them they have the same problem that you are seeking to solve.

Just my experience. You may want to check out: rec.auto.makers.vw.watercooled and see if anyone over there has what you are looking for.

JW

I've already checked there but thanks. I just can't believe that this little clip is almost $300 CDN. I'm thinking about trying to cast my own part, I could spend a whole week of night playing around and still come out ahead. As long as it works...

Is the break in an area where there is a reasonably flat surface that doesn't contact anything? I have fixed a number of items that wouldn't hold if I simply glued them due to too much stress on too little area. But if I could glue the break and glue a piec of aluminum sheet to the surface over the break, it would hold.

Ted

Actually it's an "L" shaped piece roughly 1/4 high and 3" long it starts about 1" wide and then tapers down to 1/4 inch. It's the 1/4 end that's busted off. What glue do you use to attach these aluminium pieces. the 1/4 piece is only 1/4 long as well.

Have you given any thought to having it milled out of aluminum? It will likely last longer than pot metal, although not look exactly the same. Probably cheaper than casting it, especially when you look into the hassle factor.

I'm going to keep looking into this but I'll figure it out next week when I have some time to give it more thought.

Do you have both pieces? If so, use super glue to re-attach the broken piece and use the result as the pattern for casting. The super glue bond will be strong enough for molding, but not for use on the car. I have done this with parts.

Bob

How about a piece of aluminum angle iron (1x1 sounds right) of the appropriate thickness? Cut, file, jig saw, table saw, snips. Take away the parts you don't need and keep the little bit that you do need.

(top posted for your convenience) ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Keep the whole world singing . . . . DanG (remove the sevens) snipped-for-privacy@7cox.net

today i was wondering... what economic reason would compel a manufacturer to use magnesium over aluminum? and, more importantly, how in the hell do they cast magnesium if it is so prone to rapid oxidation?! (i just did a simple google search and found a few things but none seemed to address my questions) i'm thinking the fact that magnesium burns is exaggerated. i can't imagine they would melt and pour liquid magnesium in an inert environment, i mean, for cheap parts like a chainsaw housing, maybe pour liquid magnesium in an inert environment for a part for the space shuttle, but not chainsaws. i'd guess to melt and pour in an inert environment they'd have to use (relatively) small (comparatively miniscule) batches, very expensive, economically unfeasible. i'd guess there is a (presumably very narrow) temperature range in which magnesium can safely be in a liquid state before it ignites... probably any sharp edges within the crucible could ignite it. but then if it is so tricky to use what economic reason would there ever be for a manufacturer of mass produced items to use it?

b.w.

Decades ago I worked in Magnesium research. The production plants routinely carried it around in crucible cars on tracks from the cells to the casting plant. Gas burners were used to keep it hot and "inert" it on top the melt. It didn' burn unless it spilled, and then only sometimes. We had containers of some kind of powder to shovel on it if it spilled and caught. We pumped it out of our experimental cell with a centrifugal pump. That was at about 700 deg. C.

Pete Keillor

Hello

If you would like to repair any of the aluminum zinc alloys then check out this filler metal

John

Yahoo has a casting group called hobbicast. You can go to

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HotRod wrote: