How to glue Depron together

[Sev Fontaine]

:confused:
Sorry to dig out an old thread but this seems like a good post to write this in. I'm in the process of building the depron avro arrow myself. I cut all the pieces out and bought some flash odorless CA for gluing everything together. I went to glue the first pieces together and nothing... I mean this CA is about as usefull as water on a good day.
I've tried several methods on test pieces;
I tried the glue straight up....
I tried misting water on one side,
tried holding the pieces in a jig while applying the glue,
tried holding the pieces for over an hour in a jig....
tried sanding the two pieces before gluing and many combinations of the above methods. What am I missing here.

I even tried regular CA and that works like a charm but damages the foam and is obviously not the best way.
I would really like a little bit of advice here.
Thanks!

Sev

[Gabriel]

Hello Sev,

The planes I have built so far are mostly depron. Here is how I glue them. I make no claims that it's the best, but it serves the purpose for me.

Until recently I only used Gorilla Glue (GG). Just moisten the surfaces a bit, apply a strip of GG, (don't over apply) and press the parts together. GG expands up to 3 times. In order to keep it in place and to force it to penetrate the depron I do 2 things: prior to applying the glue, I pinch the surfaces with a knife to make small holes. Then, I apply a piece of adhesive tape on top of the joint. When GG expands it is forced to enter the holes. The bond is very good. I can take a few pictures of the bonds and of the whole process, if you like. Details about GG at www.gorillaglue.com

More recently, I learned another method. Prior to applying GG, I just put the parts together with spots of hot glue. It's fast, but it's just for spots here and there because it is too heavy to glue the whole plane.

My first plane was an Aerobird Challenger. I used a lot of GG on it and it's still flyable.

Hope it helps,
Gabriel

[cgroves]

This is enough of a "reference" post I think it warrants a thread of its own.

[Tom Hastie]

The reason it's not sticking (well) is that you're not using accelerator.

Accelerator is a necessity (not just a luxury) IMHO when using this CA on foam.

Make sure you get something that's foam safe (not the metal aerosol ZIP kicker). I recently got my hands on some foam safe Eflite Accelerator, and that stuff combined with the Odourless Flash works great (the nose of Dave's F3A is testament to that).

I also use hotglue routinely on my foamies. It's heavy, but rubbery and gives a very strong bond on foam. (I use exclusively it for building depron skis).

I haven't used Gorilla Glue, but heard good things about it.

I've also heard very good things about UHU "Por" glue. It has to be used as contact cement though (Apply - allow to try - stick parts togehter).

Tom

[John Weekes]

I totally agree with Tommy-boy (and I don't even need to drive my postings up). If you're going to use foam-safe CA you must use accelerator. You simply can't build with Depron in an efficient manner without it. For those of you who have seen my scratchbuilt Tensor "JW",:cool: it would have been a nightmare to have tried to construct that kind of more complicated airframe without kicker.

Fred at Dynamic Hobbies sold me a kicker in a aerosol can that worked for him and works for me (used it on every single glue joint and CF piece on the Tensor). I even used it at the Algonquin Dome last month to (inadvertently) glue a wheel to an axle while doing a field repair! :confused:

It also works with regular CA so it is worth it.

John
(Back from the UK)

[Sev Fontaine]

Thanks Guys,
Since I have Gorilla Glue from a previous full size boat project... I'll probably go that route. But thanks for the tip Tom/John. Working with balsa and CA I've never used accelerator but you're saying it's necessary for foam.

[Dave Rees]

I'll chime in here just for s*&^ 's and giggles, and to help me get closer to the Seniors Lounge.

Depron, while easy to work with can be a real pain (for me) to glue together. HotGlue works great but, is heavy and on some foamies that is an issue. I won't repeat the above advice as everything already mentioned works very well. I can't comment on the Gorrilla Glue as I've yet to try it but, happen to have some repairs :o so I'll probably give it a shot.

The UHU "por" glue works awesome. It came in the latest Ikarus Shocky that I bought but, unfortunately thay only package enough for the kit it came with and have since been trying to find it locally. Have purchased several different UHU glues thinking that it may be called something else here in Canada, (the kits are produced in Europe) with no luck. Unless you consider a blob of melted foam luck ;) FYI, it doesn't "need" to be used like contact cement, it can be applied "wet", then place the parts together and allow to cure. The instructions recommend that methond in a few places.

If anyone knows of a supplier of UHU por, I'd be greatful to hear where.

Cheers,
Dave

[Tom Hastie]

The silver aerosol has caused me grief. No matter how little I try to put on, it seems to eat my foam. Dave (and John) have apparently had success with it, but I've relegated mine to Balsa duty only.

Actually... I also never tried kicker until only recently. Now that I have it on my shelf I find that I'm using it all the time, even when building with balsa. It's great for sticking down stubborn corners of balsa sheeting. And making CA fillets as follows:

My last StevensAero build, the manual suggetsed doing critical corner joins as follows:
-glue your pieces together as per normal.
-once the glue has set up, soak the corner in CA kicker.
-now drip some thin CA onto the kicker soaked joint.
-the thin CA expands and bubbles and forms a nice fillet between the two pieces. It's a good replacement for places where a triangular balsa gusset isn't appropriate.

And on top of that, it's SO much fun to watch the pops, sizzles, and smoke when you dump CA into a pool of kicker :)

Tom

[Ed King]

UHU is available at Michaels. Don't forget the 40% off coupon when you go. I have have good success with CA/accelerator and UHU. The problem with the contact cement is you can't slide the pieces into position.

Ed

[Tom Hastie]

40% off coupon?

[Ed King]

Almost every week Michaels has a flyer with coupon in the Saturday Ottawa Citizen. I don't know if the flyer is in the tabloids:)

Ed