What glues do you use?

[ken anderson.]

and the result of my test at ne...1..end after 22.1/2 hours...the two photos are of the joined bits of pine and oak and the other after I tried to part them using a hammer and screwdriver...….pretty good adhesion I would say?...as the pine left some of its self on the oak...

ken anderson...ne..1..wilco pva dept.

[kc]

Thats very good Ken - just as good as Evostik Resin W - in fact it might be the same who knows? Looks like this one at 3 pounds for 125ml.   Not as cheap as Evostik Resin W bought in bigger sizes but a handy size with long spout so a good buy. However all the Wilko brand PVA seems dearer than Evostik Resin W bought at Toolstation except for the 1 litre size which is cheaper. So not much in it for price and just as good it seems.

I am giving my test pieces a little more time to get the full 24 hours before testing.

Edited By kc on 01/07/2020 16:47:35

[ken anderson.]

hello KC,the one used is in the first photo..

ken anderson....wilco interior pva dept.

[kc]

Just realised it was in your photo and amended my comments.

[John Stainforth]

Aliphatic resin is my general purpose glue (in place of PVA, which I used to use a long time ago).

CA for speed and tacking balsa sheet down, although I don't actually like it very much - rather unpredictable, except in its ability to glue skin!

I often use both aliphatic resin and CA together, on the different parts of the same assembly. Aliphatic allows me to move things around a bit to get the alignments dead right, then CA to lock the parts in place - instead of pins.

Epoxy for all ply and control surface pinned hinges. I like to use so-called half hour epoxy rather than the five minute stuff. I find the working time of the latter is often too short for me.

Preferred brands are Deluxe and Zpoxy, for the aliphatic resin and epoxy. Poundland for CA, which I find just as good, if not better than the hobby-shop brands - and vastly cheaper.

Have also tried many other glues, such as Superphatic, which seems good, though I'm not yet won over by it.

[kc]

The results of my own tests in the challenge. Each glue was used on an identical piece of hardwood and glued to another different piece of good hardwood. Overlap glued was about 40mm sq and clamped for 40 hours. ( longer than 24 to give the cheaper glues a fair chance ) Each piece was given an identical hammer blow which separated the parts.

Results

Evostik Wood Glue ResinW ( an old bottle at least 3 or more years old ) = wood fibres parted about instead of glue line. No sign of glue parting so glue stronger than a good piece of hardwood = very satisfactory.

151 glue = a few traces of the wood fibres parting and some of the glueline parted = a better result than when I tried it before possibly because I left it for 40 hours instead of 24. = not good enough for me to use on planes, but could be OK for DIY use on large areas.

Humbrol Extrarez ( old bottle 3 years old) = wood fibres parted and partial glueline parting = OK for planes where quick drying is needed but not as good as ResinW

Everstone = some fibres parted but mostly the glueline parted= I wouldn't use on planes but only on DIY jobs with large surfaces to be glued.

Westbury Express PVA this glue seemed funny immediately I bought it at a show - may have been frost which separated it a bit so I shook the bottle and it seemed to recover. So as it was 'damaged' I didnt expect good results and used different wood and glued to ply. = the ply veneer parted not the glue line! So OK especially if I need to sand the wood afterwards.

So Resin W gave the best results for me. The Wilko interior glue that Ken used seems as good and it's available in smaller size with long spout so would be an alternative when I run out. Not worth bothering with cheap PVA glues for planes in my view. We use so little and consider the work thats wasted if the fundamental items give way!

[kc]

I did further tests on balsa instead of hardwood ( OK balsa is technically a hardwood! )

Resin W the balsa gave way before the glue just as expected.  = just the right glue to use for balsa if you can leave it to dry for 24 hours without moving.

SuperPhatic. 2 bits of balsa were overlapped 15mm sq and clamped together and the very thin glue was 'wicked in' like we do with cyano. = the glue hardly penetrated and there was little strength in the joint which easily failed. = not satisfactory way to use this. If anybody has used it then please tell me the correct technique! Or has my Superphatic gone off in a year?

Edited By kc on 02/07/2020 11:49:43

[Nigel R]

I've always been somewhat suspicious of the "wicking in" capabilities of alliphatic. Just me, perhaps, but it looks far too thick. It is only the thinnest of cyano that really seems to work well in that way.

I'm using B&Q branded PVA. It has reasonable consistency. Apologies but have not had time to do any joint testing with it. It cost about £5 for five litres some long while ago. I doubt it is as concentrated as Resin W. However, for balsa, I suspect the slightly consistency may work in its favour, as it would soak into the wood and cause it to expand slightly making joints subtly tighter.

I have some pound shop PVA around the house, it is very different stuff. Much, much thinner, not opaque, almost like skimmed milk. I have never used it in anger on anything other than paper for kids craft stuff, it looks poor by comparison. It is the kind of consistency you would expect for sealing plaster before painting.

[mal brewer]

I've always used Resin W for all wood to wood joints, including dihedral braces and engine bulkheads and bearers since the old days of balsa cement and I've never had a glue failure.The only place I don't use it is on surface joints,such as joining sheet balsa for wing skinning,or when planking a fuselage, as it doesn't sand very well. the best glue I've found for planking is ..........balsa cement...............Mal

[kc]

Nigel i was talking about SuperPhatic which is thin like water.

[Bob Cotsford]

The Superphatic that I've got dries very rubbery, it is a FiveStar branded one and I've no idea if they're all like that. It reminded me of the way Copydex dries, but without the smell. I tried it once but had no confidence in it at all so now it lives at the back of the glue shelf.

[Nigel R]

I have deluxe materials stuff. Smells quite odd. I didn't notice much difference in practice to PVA, albeit slightly quicker drying.

[Doctor Chinnery]

Excellent practical research - I need to restock my adhesives drawer so Resin W it will be via the Internet - postage is generally cheaper than diesel - and in retirement you have all the time in the world. Until that arrives I still have some R/C modellers glue which has been my go to for general sticking duties since forever ( but will continue with epoxy for firewalls obviously and EvoStik for doublers ). In the past I have used white glue with G/F bandage to join veneered foam wings in smaller planes without any problems, and so will have no hesitation in using Resin W in the same situation as I loath working with epoxy unless I absolutely have to. But - would I be pushing it doing the same with an i/c powered Wot4 wing?

[Tosh McCaber]

FWIW:

Titebond 111 Ultimate aliphatic, for most areas that I used to use PVA- used it for 20-30 years with absolutely no problems. Absolute strength, and dries hard compared with any of the PVAs- easy to sand.

I've recently being using No Nonsence CA glue from Screwfix/ B&Q, (Howdens is very similar) with the accellerator on one surface, glue on the other, more or less instant- very strong- bond. The glue is medium viscosity. I've also used Pondlands CAs- very thin and a very good bond on most surfaces.

[Former Member]

[This posting has been removed]

[kc]

Bob said " The Superphatic that I've got dries very rubbery, it is a FiveStar branded one "

The glue I used is marked Super'Phatic! and is the stuff made by Deluxe Materials and is probably a trademark so whatever Bob used is not the same stuff. Of course it could be very similar or it might not. Five Star has something called Hingeite which I thought would be similar, but I couldn't get on with it - perhaps I didn't use it correctly or perhaps it went off in storage.

So if anyone who uses Super'Phatic can advise us how they get on with it and whether it stores well for a year or more then I would be pleased to hear. I am reluctant to use the Hingeite on hinges either until I know it works well.

[Gervaise Vernon Retail manager StarLoc]

Posted by kc on 03/07/2020 19:50:08:

Bob said " The Superphatic that I've got dries very rubbery, it is a FiveStar branded one "

The glue I used is marked Super'Phatic! and is the stuff made by Deluxe Materials and is probably a trademark so whatever Bob used is not the same stuff. Of course it could be very similar or it might not. Five Star has something called Hingeite which I thought would be similar, but I couldn't get on with it - perhaps I didn't use it correctly or perhaps it went off in storage.

So if anyone who uses Super'Phatic can advise us how they get on with it and whether it stores well for a year or more then I would be pleased to hear. I am reluctant to use the Hingeite on hinges either until I know it works well.

Superphatic by deluxe is very hard , similar to a waterbased acrylic varnish, some people like it some don't,

I don't like the deluxe one or the Five Star one we sell, I find neither wick in well enough and prefer to use a real aliphatic resin (used like a pva...the thick glue ) or a wicking thin cyano if wicking is required. 

The FiveStar products one superAliphatic was launched around the same time but is completely different base, it is based on a very hard waterbased self curing synthetic rubber made with an adhesive base produced by the worlds largest chemical company from Germany ( it sets at a very low water loss but once water leaves it cures to a very high strength, people think it has set once it `coagulates` but 95% of the curing is still to go, it is rubbery until it sets fully ).

Many people like our one as it sands better and is stronger but there is a knack to using it.

Neither SuperAliphatic super aliphatic or the other one ( something like active aliphatic ) are really related to a real aliphatic resin glue like `aliphatic resin ` or titebond other than they are a glue.... `real` aliphatic resins do not wick into joints, you use than just like a pva glue

Derek hardman from solarfilm ( I think it was him...) once told people how to make a substiture for superphatic in an aeromodeller article by adding methanol and water to pva glue...

The hingeite is totally different chemical again , its a waterbased emulsion but of a diffrenet resin and different plastic, , its not wicking needs to be applied into the slots just like the pacer hinge glue, designed to bond to almost aby surface, very similar to a canopy glue but harder to give higher tensile strength due to smaller bonding area

 

Edited By Gervaise Vernon Retail manager StarLoc on 03/07/2020 21:36:48

Edited By Gervaise Vernon Retail manager StarLoc on 03/07/2020 21:37:50

[Bob Cotsford]

Thanks for the explanation Gervaise, does your Superphatic deteriorate with age? The bottle that I have may be a few years old now.

[Gervaise Vernon Retail manager StarLoc]

It should work fine if it is still liquid , but if it has been frozen ( bellow 8C ) it can turn to a bottle of lumps in water occasionally . if it has been in bright light it can darken but still works the same.

[leccyflyer]

Posted by kc on 03/07/2020 19:50:08:

Bob said " The Superphatic that I've got dries very rubbery, it is a FiveStar branded one "

The glue I used is marked Super'Phatic! and is the stuff made by Deluxe Materials and is probably a trademark so whatever Bob used is not the same stuff. Of course it could be very similar or it might not. Five Star has something called Hingeite which I thought would be similar, but I couldn't get on with it - perhaps I didn't use it correctly or perhaps it went off in storage.

So if anyone who uses Super'Phatic can advise us how they get on with it and whether it stores well for a year or more then I would be pleased to hear. I am reluctant to use the Hingeite on hinges either until I know it works well.

I've been using Deluxe Material Superhatic for years - because I get a strong adverse reaction to CA, so I substitute Superphatic instead of CA for most balsa to balsa joints. I haven't had a problem with things coming undone, but I haven't done a huge amount of bare balsa building in recent years. I often go over the joints in ARTFs with Superphatic as well.

However in response to requests in this thread I did do a test with some scrap balsa. The was a piece of fairly thick sheet and a piece of about 1/2" square balsa strip, pinned together and with Superphatic wicked into the joint, as I would normally use it. This bottle of Superphatic is several years old, has gone quite brown with exposure to the light I don't recall whether it was in my glue box indoors in previous years, but more than likely it was, but last winter it was definitely stored in unheated workshop and sub-freezing temperatures.

The joint has had 32 hours curing time, as I made it up on Thursday evening. I photographed it this morning -first picture, then tried to break the joint. With quite considerable force in trying to pull the pieces apart the balsa sheet broke along the grain, just off the glue line. Then I tried to break it again and eventually manage to separate the pices -again, with considerable force, which broke the piece of strip, leaving chucks and fibres close to, but not on the glue line. The balsa failed, rather than making a clean break at the glue line, as seen in the second picture.

I'm more than happy to continue to use the Deluxe Materials Superphatic as my main glue for balsa-to-balsa and ply joints. I concur with the previous posts that this glue is nothing like the normal, thick, aliphatic glues -it has the same consistency as semi-skimmed milk - and is used in a different way. For me, with the sort of models I build, the assemble, pin (or clamp) and wick the glue technique works, but it would be trivial to coat both surfaces, then clamp together if preferred. The glue definitely does wick into the joint and into the balsa.

Edited By leccyflyer on 04/07/2020 10:03:04

[Bob Cotsford]

Nowt wrong with that joint leccy, any joint where the wood breaks is good enough. I would be interested to see how it would get on with an end grain joint, eg a joint between longeron and upright in a built up fuselage. Over the years I think this is the one type of joint that I've seen fail more often than any other. Presumably it's because of glue wicking up the grain away from the joint. Even with pre-cementing I've still seen these fail.

[leccyflyer]

Happy to run another test Bob - I'll make up a longeron to upright joint, with and without gussets and give it a test this afternoon.

[Bob Cotsford]

[leccyflyer]

Here's the second test with the Superphatic with some 1/4" square medium balsa longerons, pinned to the board, glue wicked in and left for 24hours. The glue is setting quite brown and a bit rubbery bot sands okay.

In the first instance I just made a butt joint, simulating a longeron and an upright. Once set the joint seemed very solid and it took some considerable force to break it. I couldn;t get it to part by just pulling directly orhogonal to the longeron, but the joint did fail when I put some twisting motion in at the same time.

The before shot shows that the glue wicked in nicely round and into the joint.

Examining the failed joint after testing to destruction the joint failed very close to the joint line, but did fail within the upright itself. In other words the wood broke, not the glue.

With joints of this type though, I like to fit at least one, if not two gussets. Which looked like this.

That did feel stronger, especially once I started twisting, and broke away leaving bringing quite a bit of the longeron and gusset away from the joint, reauiring more force. I did screw a wee hook into the upright and thought I might be a bit more scientific by adding weights to the joint until it failed, but this will do, I'm still happy to use this glue for my balsa to balsa and ply joints.

[Bob Cotsford]

I'm beginning to think the only glue not strong enough for our wooden structures is Prit-stick!