Glueing a teapot - which glue to use?

[Terry Casey]

SWMBO managed to knock a chunk off the spout of our Teasmaid teapot.

The teapot itself is intact - it just won't pour properly.

I have the chunk - more of a sliver really, but don't know what glue to use.

I'm sure I've seen a reference to high temperature adhesives here somewhere but can't find it.

The pot is china and I've thought of using epoxy or cyanoacrylate.

If I'm right about the way cyanoacrylate glues work, I wonderered if slightly moistening the porous surface would give a better result than trying using it dry? What temperature are they good for and do I need to look for a specific variant?

Or am I looking in the wrong direction?

Epoxy would give me more working time but whatever I use will have to be reasonably fast acting as I can't see any way of holding it together, barring finger and thumb!

I need such a small amount that I want to avoid an expensive adhesive that only comes in (relatively) large sizes.

Obviously the highest temperature here is 100 degrees C.

What does the panel think?

[Clive Page]

I dropped the lid of a cheap china teapot a few years ago and to my surprise it split into two pieces. I thought we'd have to buy another one, but I used cyanoacrylate (superglue) on it. The lid was fairly thick and the surfaces of the break were very rough after the fracture, which seems to be the sort of surface on which glues work on pretty well. I didn't pre-moisten them or anything, just spread a drop or two of the stuff on and pushed the two pieces back together. It worked amazingly well, and has even been through the dishwasher (at 60 C) what must be hundreds of times since, with no sign of failure.

I've never found cyanoacrylate glue much good before, but on this cheap china lid it worked perfectly.

[Nick Odell]

Same here. The handle of one of my favourite tea mugs broke off at the 'roots' and broke into two. I superglued it together, supported by rubber bands while it dried and it's been putting up with boiling water, washing up and being put in the microwave oven ever since.

Nick

[Andy Dingley]

Clean pottery breaks are a "best case" surface for many glues, so long as you get to them early.

OTOH, if you have a cracked teapot and you're trying to glue a surface that is covered in tannates and rounded off by repeated dishwashing, then it's nothing like as successful. If you have to, try an oxalic acid cleaner (Barkeeper's Friend) to shift the tannates first.

I've a couple of 18th century Chinese blue & white plates with old riveted repairs. The plates themselves are nothing special, but I do love these old purely mechanical staple and rivet repairs.

[Clive Page]

An update. The teapot lid that I superglued a few years ago got dropped in the sink, and fell apart along the original seam. I put superglue along the break, seems ok again. So it may not last for a lifetime, but seems ok for a year or two.