the permatex question (perhaps answered for good?)

The problem with the covers of the Mercane Wide Wheel is that the covers for the suspension are crap plastic and break (often come broken) at where they attach. This is one of mine which you can see is pretty new but just broke as soon as I started to screw it in

Indeed looking at the striated marks in the plastic I wonder about the production. However the other parts of the plastic are strong enough, its just the critical part where they attach. See my page on a repair option here.

Its increasingly said on Reddit (which seems to be the online instrument of the Zombies of Morinity) that somehow relatively benign thread lockers (essential for good scooter life in operation) are somehow damaging the plastics. Statements like this crop up with out any validation:

Just realized that blue loctite causes the suspension covers on the WideWheel pro covers to crack.

and seemingly nobody does anything more than read the headline to take the claim unchallenged. But I guess this is "normal" in a BLM (Blank minded Looting Mayhem) world.

So while a bit of internet searching found this interesting post (which it would seem again, people only read the headline, but not the substance). In that post (claiming that permatex caused fractures in his 3D prints) there were some intelligent questions (which went unanswered), such as: "I can’t speak to ABS, but we’ve used Loctite dozens of times with screws in tapped polycarbonate without any issues. Perhaps the specific kind of Loctite or polycarbonate you’re using is more susceptible to problems?"

There were (in the comments) mentions of Acetone, being one trained in Organic Chemistry I know well the smell of Acetone, I can't smell any in Permatex Blue. Further acetone is regularly used as a glue for ABS plastics ... so that's weird too.

So as exactly this sort of fracturing happened to me straight out of the box on my Widewheel without even any Permatex ever coming near it, and again on half the ones I bought new I'm going to say that the low hanging fruit here is: crappy molding which let the plastic get cold and  become  brittle. I notice its not a problem anywhere else on those covers (wheel or base).

Futher discussion without any testing is just meaningless, so I decided to do some testing to answer the question with the product I use (which is Permatex Blue). So this is the video of the start of the experiment:

and this is the conclusion:

My findings were that I can't see anything obvious that would implicate permatex blue thread locker as having any obvious effect on the plastic. Given that people claim this happens instantly and I let it sit there for 24 hours, with drops of permatex on it, not just the vapors suggests this claim is false.

I didn't test the loctite brand.

Further I've used Permatex Blue on my both my scooters and on my friends three (himself plus his two daughters) for a year now with no evidence that this claim has any substance.

So if your covers break at the mount points its either (or a combination) of these:

1. crap plastic from the start
2. you overtightened it ... so use permatex.

Now if you're unconvinced (some people still believe Donald Dumps claims of COVID) then I suggest you remove all the metal screws ther and replace them with Nylon ones (which can be easily trimmed to the right length). They are M3, but see my above mentioned blog post for details. They probably won't vibrate out and won't rust in there. 

If you're going with the OEM metal ones, please, put a drop of permatex on there when inserting the screws (just a drop) and you'll have no rust problems and they won't fall out. I've not needed to open the bottom of my dualie since doing initial inspections.

Lastly, if in doubt, do your own test (with your own choice of thread locker) and see. Science and Engineering built the world we have today by validation and verification, not finger pointing and did / did not / did too circular arguments with no substance. Unless you're a narcissist prone to magical thinking with no concept of reality except it to be what you want it to be (like Donald Dump).

Happy Scooting