Liquid Styrene Glues

Art Murray wrote: : In the past I've primarily used Testors Liquid Glue. However, it was not : hot enough for me and I always had gaps in the weld. I tried Tenax but it : left bubbles in the weld that showed as pits when I sanded the seam. : Tenax also requires the cap be screwed on by a gorilla or it will evaporate. Not cool... : : Any shortcomings of Ambroid I should know about before I fall too much in : love with the stuff? : I found on some plastics it never seems to completely evaporate, leaving the plastic soft.

Have your tried Tamiya Extra Thin Cement? I find it to be between Testors liquid and Tenax, plus the green cap bottles have a lovely applicator brush. No, not anything like the useless brush in the Testors bottle, unless you are thinning putty...

It has become my standard plastic cement. After that, I use the Testors cement in the black plastic bottle, and then some Ambroid ProWeld, which is better mannered than Tenax, but is also very hot.

Tamiya has a thicker plastic cement in an orange(?) topped bottle. I have some around the clutter somewhere... Hmmm, now where did it go... mutter, mutter...

Bruce

Thanks for pointing that out. Today I was going through my "glue drawer" and found an empty Tenax bottle. I scratched my head and wondered why I would have an empty bottle in there. Then I couldn't find the half-empty bottle I thought I had. You solved both mysteries for me.

I'll give the Tamiya glue a try.

Thanks again!

Art

Art,

Go to your local plexiglas supplier and buy a small can of Weld On #3

I have used this for around 25 years now and it works great on styrene. Also good for cleaning a paint brush or the airbrush you forgot about and left full of paint over night.

HTH, Mike West/Lone Star Models

Testors liquid cement is my favorite - the trick it took me years to learn was how to properly use clamps. My favorite clamp is the Berna Assembler. I buy a set every time I see them. Once you get the hang of properly clamping up an assembly I think the choice of glue may actually become moot...

The trick with Testors is to treat it like contact cement - brush both sides of the join generously, then stick them together and clamp. I also like to flow a bit along the interior side of the seam for good measure. If I can get the seam to "mush" a bit, then it's "right".

When I clamp that up and dress it with a Flexi-File when cured, I usually get a seamless, no putty required join.

Art, I keep Tenax from evaporating by putting Teflon tape around the threads before putting the cap on, with gorilla torque of course. HTH, Bruce

Bruce,

Good idea! I have plenty of teflon tape after rebuilding the irrigation system that my dog ate this past fall.

Art

Personally, I like the 'keep it simple' approach, so I use MEK. A quart can from Lowe's is about $9. I haven't had anything fall apart yet. When I have a joint that I need to lock solid immediately/five minutes ago I use Zap-a- Gap and accelerator.

I use the same technique as Rufus, get it sloppy with the Testors and let it mush out the top to be filed, scraped, sanded for a seamless, no putty bond. Testors and Tamiya are MEK based and Weld on, Tenax, and Pro Weld (good stuff) are methylene chloride. Tenax evaporates too quick for my tastes but the other stuff works fine for small welds. hth The Keeper

Yeah - seen that. The last bottle of Tenax I bought evaportated on me before I even got to try it...so it was my last bottle.

Had the same thing happen with a large Alclad purchace. Be warned - only buy what you plan to use, folks.