How Can You Repair A Tear In A Roll Up Shade

This week, the repair or replace dilemma reared its ugly head one time once more. This time, the culprit was the vinyl window shade in our bathroom. The only window in the bathroom is right in the tub, where information technology's regularly exposed to high levels of heat and wet from the shower, which have plain acquired its vinyl material to pucker and warp slightly. This, in turn, resulted in a couple of small tears along the lesser seam, ane of which has grown gradually bigger because I occasionally snagged it while squeegeeing the walls. Terminal week, after discovering that mildew was proliferating along these torn edges, I finally decided the trouble had reached the indicate that nosotros had to either repair the shade somehow or replace it. But which?

On the ane hand, a new shade wouldn't be all that expensive. This ane but cost effectually $10, but information technology as well hadn't held up very well — so spending $10 some other i but like it would probably mean resigning ourselves to spending another $10 on a replacement every year or so. Certain, nosotros could easily afford that, but information technology seemed wasteful, specially when the only part of the shade that'south damaged is the bottom seam. At that place was still more enough good fabric on the roller to cover the window, and it seemed ridiculous to just throw it away.

Yet, to go our money's worth out of this this still-useful material, we'd have to find some way to mend that tear, and that wasn't as simple a job as information technology sounded. When we encountered this same problem with our old bedroom window shade, nosotros fixed it by applying a long strip of duct tape along the unabridged bottom seam, which enabled usa to get some other year or two of employ out of the shade before the roller machinery went kaput. Just that was a blackout shade, then the duct tape applied to the back of the shade didn't actually evidence on the inside. This ane is a translucent "light filtering" shade, then the duct tape would definitely be visible through the cloth. Plus, duct record doesn't really hold up that well to moisture, and so this would simply be a brusque-term fix at all-time.

We've also tried fixing this problem on a bathroom shade with our hot glue gun. We cut off the damaged lesser portion of the shade, then put a dowel along the bottom border to weigh information technology down, rolled up the vinyl material around information technology, and used hot glue to create a new seam. That repair held for a niggling while, but it didn't take long for heat and moisture to
loosen the glue'southward agree on the vinyl, and nosotros eventually had to chip the shade entirely and supersede information technology with this one. So that, again, was at best a brusque-term solution.

Thinking that there must surely be some kind of agglutinative that could hold upward in moisture conditions, I started searching around online, and I discovered Tear-Aid Vinyl Repair. The manufacturer claims, and reviewers confirm, that this stuff can make a torn inflatable raft seaworthy again, and so information technology seemed it should certainly exist able to concord upwards on a vinyl shade that'due south only getting splashed with water, not submerged. And it was available at Dick'due south Sporting Goods, which is inside hit distance of other stores where we shop regularly. The only catch: it was $10 for a kit that contained just i big patch (3" by 12"), one medium (1 3/8" foursquare), and one minor (7/8"). It would exist good for maybe two or three repairs — if it worked at all. Was it worth the investment when we could just spend $ten on a new shade and exist done with it?

Applying the guidelines I learned from Jeff Yeager, I decided that the answer was probably yep. For a tear this small, I reasoned, the $10 kit should exist skilful for at least two repairs, which meant that the cost of the repair was only half the cost of the replacement. Spending $10 to supplant both this shade and the adjacent ane that adult a tear would be cheaper than spending $20 to replace them both, non to mention less wasteful. So during our Sabbatum round of grocery shopping, we swung past Dick'southward and picked up a box of the Tear-Aid to attempt the repair.

Even so, when we opened the box, we realized in that location was an boosted trouble. Co-ordinate to the package, the kit was supposed to comprise iii patches, a 12" "reinforcement filament" for repairing tears on edges (similar the one we had), two booze prep pads, and a set of instructions. That didn't audio like a very good value for $x, but we hadn't gotten even that much. Our kit contained only the large patch, the small-scale patch, and the instructions — no medium patch, no reinforcement, no booze prep pads. It would even so be enough to complete this ane repair, but it might not be enough for fifty-fifty one more.

Our starting time instinct was to go back to Dick'due south and return it. Merely in that location were two bug with that: outset, we'd already cutting the small patch in two (to repair the smaller tear) before realizing the other parts were missing, so technically, we'd already used the kit at this point. And second, if nosotros did go all the manner back to Dick'south the next day to return the kit, then what? Substitution it for another 1 that might also be lacking? Or become back to the cartoon board looking for something else we could utilize? I did manage to rail down another product, Gear Aid Repair Record, that might work, but it was only bachelor at REI. The nearest shop was in Princeton, which meant we'd probably have to expect until Thursday to pick it upwards. Faced with the choice of making a second trip to return the Tear-Help, then yet another to pick up the alternative product (if it was bachelor) and having to wait at least a week before nosotros could attempt the repair again, or simply moving forrard with the bird in the hand and getting the stupid thing fixed today, Brian decided to treat the $10 we'd spent as a sunk cost and forge ahead.

Even with the product in hand, however, it took u.s.a. two attempts to really make the repair. The offset time we tried information technology, even though we'd allowed the shade to dry for a total 24 hours and information technology felt completely dry out to the touch, the minute Brian tried to apply the patch to information technology, h2o squeezed out of the seam. He kept wiping it off and then trying over again, and each fourth dimension, water continued to squeeze out. Eventually, the small patch he'd cut (from one-half of the small one we'd been provided) was completely useless, and he just had to throw information technology out. And so he had to hang the shade back up and gave it another 24 hours to dry, and then tested the seam thoroughly to brand sure there was no water left in information technology before attempting the repair once again.

This time, fortunately, information technology went off without a hitch. Commencement, after wiping the shade downwardly with alcohol, he carefully applied the other half of the small patch to the small tear on the right side. This tear was small enough that fifty-fifty this tiny patch was big enough to wrap around to the back of the shade, sealing it on both sides. He too used scissors to round off the corners on the patch before applying it, and so there would be no sharp edges for a squeegee or a fingernail to snag on and pull them loose.

Then, he cut a strip off the large patch that was just big enough to encompass the larger tear — on i side, non both. Once again, he rounded off the corners before applying this patch to the front of the shade. Then he cut another one the aforementioned size, rounded it off similarly, and applied it to the back. This was less fiddly than trying to wrap the fabric around, and it seems near as secure. The repair isn't flawless — if you expect carefully, you can all the same run into the tear — but equally long as information technology holds up, we won't complain. (Nosotros're giving it the rest of the mean solar day to dry before getting it wet, though, just to give it every bit good a chance as possible.)

So did we make the right choice? I guess information technology's besides soon to say. We'll need to see how well this repair holds upward, and compare it with how long the new shade took to get damaged in the first place. Merely 1 thing I tin say for sure is that if I had to try it once more, I wouldn't buy Tear-Aid. I'd wait until nosotros could hit an REI and try the Gear Help tape. It might non piece of work besides, but it gives yous almost twice as much fabric (20" by three") for half every bit much money — and since in that location's only one roll in the box, you know you're actually getting everything you pay for.