I bought some side skirts but one of them is ripped on the bottom.
I was thinking this would be easy to fix and my friend has experience and all the materials to patch this. But he is somewhat of a redneck engineer. So i would like any insite you all can provide in the best way to patch this up.

As you can see it's not that bad . I was thinking about throwing some extra thickness inside to reinforce it. Any tips or favorite types of material to use on this project?

 

use masking tape on the face (side showing) over the crack then use fibreglass matting and resin and glass it behind ... when dry pull off masking tape and sand bog then paint

 

Ah ha, i wasn't even thinking about tape. I was thinking about some kind of clamp to hold it while it dried. That's a good idea.

 

Clamp the skirt so the crack is no longer visible. Then like said tape the out side where the missing piece is. Scuff the back of the fiberglass skirt and clean. Lay some resign down and fiberglass it. Wait for it to set. Take clamp off and tape. On the outside, notch the crack with a router or anything that will notch it like a V. Rough up the area around the crack with some 80 and clean. Use a fiber reinforced filler and fill in the crack. Sand out till smooth and use a glaze putty to fill in any pinholes and scratches.
On the rest of the skirt, hand sand with some 220. If there are still scratches that don't come out with the 220 use 180 then 220. Do not use a power sander because there are alot of curves and that just gouges it and makes it flat.
Once done lay some high build primer over them and your set up to that point. Good luck with it.

 

Thanks for the input. Keep it coming.
I was suspecting that the power sander was a bad idea here. I think the block would work best to keep things from getting out of hand.

 

You have to cut out the cracked fiberglass. If you don't then you run the risk of having the cracks creep out further if it's under any stress.

Here's an image of what I'm talking about.



After cutting it out, sand the inside with a low grit to promote good adhesion. Then lay fiberglass on the inside, after it's gelled, lay more on the outside, pat it over the edges. The sand it down, use a filler to smooth it out. Done.

I have a build thread going in this forum, you can see I did the same thing for my front bumper.

 

ah ha.
Yes i have been reading that thread. The one with the grey primer civic and the front bumper fix. Nice job man.

What would work the best to cut it? I have a hand grinder?