Oh man, baked beans in chili sounds like my kind of kitchen chaos! @grantf73's fruit curry trick is way smarter than my usual move, which is just adding hot sauce until I can't taste the mistake anymore.

Something I haven't seen talked about is the paint. With a bonded patch, you don't have any rivet heads to trap moisture and cause corrosion under the paint later on. We had to redo a riveted doubler on an old 150 because the paint failed around every single rivet after a few years, started some light corrosion. The smooth surface of a composite patch just seems to let the finish last longer in my book.

Yeah the yearly pass trap is so real. I did the same thing with a zoo membership once.

I mean, my breaking point is when the repair costs more than my last three takeout orders combined. That $120 quote would have me trying to fix it myself first, maybe watching a few shaky YouTube tutorials. Could be a fun weekend project if you don't mind getting a little greasy.

My buddy tried those plastic feet and his sawhorse tipped over when he leaned on it! He went back to wood shims real fast.