Safest Adhesive for Resin?

[darkside]

Hi All:

I've been reading a lot of extremely valuable information on this forum, but I haven't come across a direct answer to this particular question. If I've missed something, please do link me :]

I'm trying to identify an adhesive that would be strong enough for overall construction of resin kits, but be as safe/close to "non-toxic" as possible. My primary concerns are toxicity/respiratory sensitivity (for example, CA SuperGlue and standard 2-part Epoxy are things I'd like to avoid using if at all possible), and strength (good enough for "average" handling/display of stationary painted figures). I'm not at all concerned about cure time (I'd be quite happy to wait several days for a full cure if necessary, and have no qualms about putting together some sort of rig for clamping the pieces together while drying).


Low-Odor CA isn't readily available around here, nor is any sort of "Green" resin. A few things I've been wondering about are:

- The two part Aves pastes, FIXIT or Apoxie. I was thinking FIXIT might work well for the purpose, but I can't find anything to back up this theory. I did e-mail the manufacturer, and they were more directly concerned with the cure time. My concern here is if they're sufficient to structurally hold the model together -- the main references I've seen to them (and the suggestion from the manufacturer) was to use them for gap filling.

- A "green" contact cement like: http://www.lepageproducts.com/ProductDetail.aspx?pid=89 -- one disconcerting thing is I can't find any reference whatsoever to how this product interacts with resin.

Any guidance would be appreciated.

Thanks!

[Joseph C. Brown]

Given your statements, dang.


Maybe the Aves Apoxie will work - their PDF says specifically that it will stick to resin. To me, it's implied that it will stick to clean resin as detailing with no problem.

http://www.avesstudio.com/images/stories/PDF/2Part.pdf

For structural strength, I would absolutely pin the attachment point, and use the Aves in between the parts to be joined.

[kenlilly106]

I'm not familiar with the Aves line but epoxy putties in general can be hit-or-miss when to comes to bonding, the rougher the mating surfaces and the thinner the consistency of the putty the better, you want the putty to flow into every crevice and scratch that there is, that's one advantage of liquid adhesives like CA or epoxy, they bond to every little pit and crack to hepl the mechanical bond.

A "green" contact cement shouldn't hurt the resin, cured resins in my experience are unaffected by solvents such as lacquer thinner, of the course the old rule of test first should apply if you're unsure.

Contact cements would work for a quick bond, the problem is that the bond can be too quick and will not allow for any alignment time.

Another choice might be "green" or solventless construction/paneling adhesives that are typically PVA based, they have little to no smell and are sticky, the downside to any adhesive that depends on solvent evaporation instead of a chemical cure is that the center of the joint can take a while to cure, I know you mentioned you weren't worried about the cure time but if you have to hold the parts in place while the adhesive sets this could be a problem, especially if there's no way to clamp them.

Ken

[darkside]

Thanks to both of you for your responses, I can see I didn't underestimate the helpfulness of the folks here :]

For structural strength, I would absolutely pin the attachment point, and use the Aves in between the parts to be joined.

I was expecting to need to pin, for sure. I'm not overly confident in drill conversions for my rotary tool (the statement "not for drilling hard surfaces" sorta turned me off), so I'll likely be using a normal drill, instead :]

A "green" contact cement shouldn't hurt the resin, cured resins in my experience are unaffected by solvents such as lacquer thinner, of the course the old rule of test first should apply if you're unsure.

Contact cements would work for a quick bond, the problem is that the bond can be too quick and will not allow for any alignment time.

I actually e-mailed the manufacturer of that LePage Contact Cement. Their response effectively boiled down to 'It should work, unless your resin contains polyethylene, polypropylene or nylon'. Luckily (?) one of the kits I'm planning to build arrived with a defective part, so I actually have a piece of resin I can use for testing (manufacturer is sending a replacement). I'll probably pick up a tin of it sometime this week and give it a shot.

Another choice might be "green" or solventless construction/paneling adhesives that are typically PVA based, they have little to no smell and are sticky, the downside to any adhesive that depends on solvent evaporation instead of a chemical cure is that the center of the joint can take a while to cure, I know you mentioned you weren't worried about the cure time but if you have to hold the parts in place while the adhesive sets this could be a problem, especially if there's no way to clamp them.

In my travels, I did come across a few (very few) references to PVA based glues, and there did seem to be a real concern regarding whether the adhesive would properly cure in a model building scenario. Perhaps I'll take a look locally and see what's available for "safer" PVA adhesives -- perhaps I can find another product to test along with the contact cement...after all, it can't hurt to try multiple options?:]

Thanks again for your responses, I'll be sure to report back once I have some reasonable test data collected ^_^

[Kylwell]

I've used Aves to fix resin together. Works great. Stuff sticks like mad to things. I used some on my airbrush to thicken the grip and can't get the stuff off now.

If you've got respiratory issues you're going to want to be careful working with resin. Wet sand it, drill it in a vent booth, etc.

[Mad-Modeler]

Don't forget to pin your kits, I have some Mecha kits that held together just with the Pins.

If you use Pinning you can also use Putty as a Bonder - Filler between the parts. Cleanup is usually easy of it as Figure as you state.

Wave(Japan) Makes a non-smelling and non-fogging CA-Glue but I prefer 2-part Epoxy plus pinning for resin Kits.

[seam-filler]

AVES Apoxie Paste works well. It can take a while to dry, but it is non toxic and eventually provides a really strong bond.

[TER-OR]

Did we mention you need to pin your joints?

Here's a trick: Drill the holes larger than necessary. Put a little ball of Aves in each hole, insert the pin and set your joint. You can use a drop of CA to fix the joint, or use more CA than necessary so it squeezes out and you can trim to fit. A bit of water will make the Aves more tacky.

You can also do the above with one hole larger and the other exact size. This also helps you with inexact hole placement.

[Mad-Modeler]

I did.

Thx, for a more detailed explanation on what pinning involves.
For me it is a must on resin kits and even on some vinyl ones(more involved).

There are a few methods to decide on where to place the pin, I still use the cross methods.

Join the parts in the alignment you want, draw 4 lines across the joint, when joint they should form a cross across both joint-halves.

David Fisher has a good explanation/demo of it in his ModelMania DVD series.

There are a few methods for the pin placement all got their pros and cons, at times I glued the part on and drilled a hole from the outside to insert the pin and than puttied over the hole.

Really depends on the kit you are building as to which method to use.

[TER-OR]

Using Aves means you don't have to get the holes exact. I drove myself nuts pinning stabilizers on 1/72 Macross fighters until I figured that out.

Get some nice sculpting tools and you can use Aves for sanding-free gap filling and adhesive.

Here are some epoxy techniques in use:

Fixing a bad joint:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ter-or/set ... 373328365/

Tinting to approximate interior color for canopy installation
http://www.flickr.com/photos/ter-or/225 ... 704701438/