Bonding styrene to plywood.

[GWR_NZ]

Hi,

I have been experimenting bonding / glueing styrene to plywood. I tried using a spray adhesive ADOS Multi-purpose spray adhesive - soaked up by the plywood with no grip at all to the styrene. Second attempt used Selleys Liquid Nails - not sure if this is available in the UK. First attempt - bonded well to the ply but not the styrene. Second attempt roughed up the styrene with 60 grit sandpaper. Much better bond - now bond failure is with the plywood. Third attempt will be rough up both surfaces with 60 grit sandpaper and try again.

 

The question I have is has anyone used such adhesives and what was the long term bond like (or any better idea's?)

 

Thanks

 

Edmund

Edited May 28, 2020 by GWR_NZ
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[Pete the Elaner]

I have never used ADOS & not even heard of it until now.

I use impact adhesive a lot. It grabs a little straight away but full grab is not achieved for about 5-10 minutes.

All of my retaining walls are glued to ply this way. After 3-4 years, none have peeled or reacted.

[doilum]

55 minutes ago, Pete the Elaner said:

I have never used ADOS & not even heard of it until now.

I use impact adhesive a lot. It grabs a little straight away but full grab is not achieved for about 5-10 minutes.

All of my retaining walls are glued to ply this way. After 3-4 years, none have peeled or reacted.

Agreed. Look for the old school type as new health friendly versions have been introduced and I cannot vouch for them. If it smells dreadful and is covered in toxic warnings you have the right stuff.

One caveat: it attacks polystyrene so avoid using it on very thin sheets and spread thinly but evenly. One solution is to use a layer of 30 thou sheet as a barrier layer. This method has been proven over many years by myself and on club layouts. In the UK Wickes homebrand contact adhesive is "old school" whilst Evostick ( the original go to glue) has gone eco friendly and reminds me of the Copydex we used in school 60 years ago.

Edited May 28, 2020 by doilum
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[Matt C]

I have used decorators caulk to stick fibreboard to plywood fibreboard to plastic panels plastic to plywood, styrene to all of the above. Some has been stuck for years with no problems. Not as strong as something like no nails but cheap as chips and I've had no issues with de bonding although its not really been put under huge stress ( unless you count me standing on the plywood panel doors occasionally) 

  You apply using a caulking gun, initially in a thick bead and then if you want to, spread it out with any flat object to your desired thickness, bearing in mind the thinner it is the weaker the bond you will get. 

  With any glues going on to a large flat surface I always butter BOTH surfaces and then join together, this seams to get a stronger, better bond between different types of surface.

[31A]

In the past I've used impact adhesive with but bearing in mind Doilum's caveat, applied it thinly to avoid the risk of it melting the outside of the styrene.  I have also used the 'barrier layer' method, although I used 20 thou.

 

But recently I needed to stick quite a lot of styrene to wood (building bridge abutments) and only having a limited supply of styrene and being 'locked down' I didn't really want to use a barrier layer this time.

 

So I experimented by coating the wood with a layer of neat PVA glue brushed on.  Once dry (doesn't take long) I was able to bond the styrene to the wood using styrene solvent, in this case Humbrol Liquid Poly as I happened to have a bottle of it handy.

 

On a test piece I was unable to peel the styrene away from the wood!  So I've used that method for the rest of the bridge.  Whether it would work so well with other brands of solvent I don't know.