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Originally Posted by Goose
Arno, are you out there? I'll bet the self-proclaimed "nerd" could shed further light on this...
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Most of the stuff has already come by as far as I can see.
Life expectancy of the bonded chassis is indeed still 'unknown', but even one of the first built S1's right after the real test-mules called 'Ruby' is still running and AFAIK still owned by Dave Minter.
Also, as is explaind in the original Elise video...
The bonding agent used on the chassis is of a 'hot cure' type. This is the reason why the chassis is put together and then goes into an oven to be 'baked' around 190 degrees C, at which time the bonding agent cures completely and gains it's final strength.
On every car you can find stick-on thermometers. Usually on the chassis extrusion visible in the engine bay towards the passenger compartiment. These are there to verify that the chassis did indeed reach the right temperature and are checked after they have cooled down again.
As far as I know there is no (generally available) bonding agent that gives the same strenght and has the same properties, but cures at ambient temperatures.
This is basically what makes repairing the chassis 'impossible' as you'd need to 'rebake' the chassis after a repair, but that can't be done without stripping it completely bare.
The expense in labor cost would be horrendous, making this not a commercially viable option. Technically it's 100% possible, but economically it's 'interesting'.
It will be interesting to see how the chassis holds up as the years pass. It is still a bit of a guess what will happen. A lot of experience with bonding has of course been gathered in the aerospace industry, but I think someone in the Elise video does remark on the aging data from planes and crash-resistance that 'if you crash in a plane, bonding strength doesn't really matter anymore'..
Bye, Arno.