Hello all!
I am replacing a hinge on my teardrop - changing a plastic living hinge to an aluminum piano hinge. Everything's going pretty well, except....
The butyl tape isn't squishing and oozing as much as I thought it would.
https://imgur.com/a/4T5ehwU shows two views of the issue.
The one showing the end of the strip is pretty much OK. The one focused in the middle shows a large gap at the front, and doesn't show a slightly smaller gap at the back.
I intentionally overloaded the butyl tape - made a sandwich on either side of the EPDM sealing overlay - to make sure this is waterproof. I made the assumption that the extra would find its way out from under the stainless top strip, and that I'd trim it off, but instead it's keeping the top strip from settling. Screwing the top strip down harder is simply bending it.
Would heat help at all? Working temp in the shop is ca. 77° F.