I have worked on these cabinet trims myself; used the heat gun to soften
them up to either stretch or just straighten them out.  Inside the corners
of the cabinets I used the handle of the screw driver to push it back into
the corner, then hold it down by hand until it was cool enough to stay.
They stretch well.  I did not even use glue, the center part is meant to
hold it in the wood.
Zoltan

-----Original Message-----
From: Stuart MacMillan
Sent: Saturday, July 14, 2012 5:00 PM
To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM
Subject: Restoring Westy cabinet edge pieces

I spent some time today "restoring" the hardened and shrunk plastic cabinet
edge trim on my '85 project.  This van had lived a long time in the sun and
heat of eastern Oregon, and all of the plastic trim was hard and had pulled
back from the ends as well as from the round inside corners of the cabinet
frames.

I used a heat gun to soften and stretch all of these pieces, and  I did not
have to remove any.  For the thick (no longer available) edge trim I peeled
back a foot or two and used the heat gun to soften and stretch it back to
length while one end was still attached.  For the cabinet corners I first
softened them with the heat gun, then pulled a bit more out past the corner
and softened and stretched it enough to form them back to the original
curve.

You could certainly remove the trim and soak it in boiling water briefly for
the same result, but to remove the cabinet opening trim you have to unscrew
the hinges and latches, which makes the job a PITA.

A couple of these corners had shrunk so badly the doors couldn't be shut.

It worked really well and was easy to do!  These trim pieces are a
thermoplastic after all!

Stuart

'85 Westy

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