Cyanoacrylate glue (CA)

[scarface26]

I am putting a balsa plane together, and CA is used to glue everything together. When I bought the glue, the salesman talked me into buying a bottle of CA Debonder "just in case". Well, two days ago I went to squeeze out a drop and it was clogged and so I squeezed harder and got a gusher all over my hands. Fortunately, the debonder was close by, and I quickly grabbed it. My hand immediately stuck to the bottle, but I was able to get the cap off and pour some on my hands. The debonder won't take the glue off, but it takes most of the stickiness out of it. The glue will wear off over a period of a few days. Lesson learned: if you are going to use CA,
have some debonder handy. BTW, if you do get CA on your hands, don't take a leak for a while. Without debonder, that would be difficult to explain to emergency room personnel. ;D

[Dave]

Puts a whole new meaning to "get a hold of yourself"

Dave

[akent]

All true!!!!

What you really need though is a spray can of 'kicker'. That makes the CA cure INSTANTLY!

With balsa really, you should be using medium and thick CA with much of it, and use the kicker. The thin stuff just soaks into the balsa and doesn't work that well.
====
Wait until your wife comes in neckid into your man cave and you have CA on yer hands. OOPS!, and there is NOTHING that YOU can do about it at the time. Oh, to be young again....

Best!
Kent

[Solitaire]

I can't remember when I've used CA and not glued my hands together.

Debonder does work surprisingly well and as Kent says, a kicker will set the CA instantly. The only thing with kicker is you get a more brittle joint, so right or wrong, I don't use it on high stress areas.

Did you consider using epoxy rather than CA? HC has some double pumpers that have about enough to do an entire plane as long as it's not too big. $1.99

[19000rpm]

Yep, use the medium grade on wood with a kicker. I put a whole Guillows P38 together with the thin stuff before I discovered medium.

The debonder works better on your skin than on plastic or wood.

Once you get used to using epoxy it's hard to go back to CA unless you need an instant bond.

For buliding I use a little of each type of adhesive, including Gorilla Glue, depending on what parts I'm adhereing.

That was good Dave.

[BTCat]

19k, I think you own stock in Gorilla Glue

[Dave]

I can just see it now.

You walk into the doctors office with your hand down your pants stuck to your, well you know and the poor girl at the front desk has to say "Can I help You"

Dave

[19000rpm]

Feb 24, 2010 8:43:02 GMT -6 BTCat said:

19k, I think you own stock in Gorilla Glue

I should!

[BTCat]

Feb 24, 2010 10:22:07 GMT -6 Dave said:

I can just see it now.

You walk into the doctors office with your hand down your pants stuck to your, well you know and the poor girl at the front desk has to say "Can I help You"

Dave

;D ;D ;D

[BTCat]

Okay, I decided to add to this topic. Well, I really didn't plan to but life happens ;D

I don't know how many of you have used that insulating foam called "Great Stuff Big Gap Filler". You can spray a little foam out of the can the size of a golf ball and when it dries it will be the size of a baseball. It works great for gaps and insulating around faucets, etc. BUT it is super sticky and it doesn't come off skin.

I read the directions and it said if you get it on your skin use acetone to remove it before it dries. If it dries it has to wear off or be removed "mechanically" (read "razor blade"). So I thought it would be no problem. Nail polish remover = Acetone and my wife has that.

The first day I used some it was fine, but on Tuesday after the can had set all night, I tried spraying some more. Well the dam nozzle wouldn't shut off and the can was almost full. That sh/t went everywhere! I grabbed a plastic bag and put the can in there and ran it outside. The next day I had a wade of foam outside twice the size of a bowling ball. After I ran it outside, I went into the house to get the nail polish remover because I had it all over my hands. I picked up the bottle and right there, in big bold letters, it reads "ACETONE FREE FORMULA"!

Did you know it takes at least a week for that stuff to wear off and it gets blacker and blacker every day?

[Raygun]

The environmentalist are taking away all are good working chemicals bummer Ray

[19000rpm]

Yeah, I've used that stuff. Both times I used it the second time on a can it didn't work right. I think the stuff gums up the valve on the can. I guess you need to use it up the first application.

And you're right about it sticking to skin. It takes as long as it takes for your skin to shed to come off.

Acetone free nail polish remover. Ha! What's this country coming to? Acetone is about the only thing that will cut almost anything. ;D

[akent]

I haven't laughed that hard in a LONG TIME, BT!!

Sorry!!

[BTCat]

Mar 1, 2010 11:39:20 GMT -6 akent said:

I haven't laughed that hard in a LONG TIME, BT!!

Sorry!!

;D ;D No problem, Kent. I get a kick out of it myself. About half of the stuff has worn off. Lucky I was in the garage, or there would have been hell to pay in the house. When I told my wife about it, she just shock her head and rolled her eyes Didn't say a word ;D

[Tony]

I have never used the spray can stuff but I am very familiar with this type of foam.

Years ago I worked as a maintenance man/mechanic for a company that built mostly farm equipment but also built boats, water stoves, and pretty much anything that they could make a buck off of. They used this 2 part urethane foam for insulating tobacco barns, water stoves, and filling in the hulls on the boats. They had several large pump/spray systems for the stuff and from time to time we would have to rebuild them. Well the only way to do this is to COMPLETELY disassemble the whole system and clean it. Sounds easy enough right...Well, the only way to clean this crap of the metal good enough is to boil all the parts in ethylene glycol (old fashioned green antifreeze/coolant) which posed all kinds of problems by itself. (FYI: Antifreeze is quite flammable at boiling temperatures)

There was no way humanly possible to rebuild one of these pumps without wearing some of the resin for a week or two.