Best glue for fixing plastic together

What sort of plastic? Gluing plastics is problematic in general, many simply don't glue well. Chances of repairing a structural element is fairly small. Does the bit of plastic have any recycling marks? (3 arrows, with a number inside)

Try 2-part epoxy, like Araldite. That'll stick most things togethor, and is fairly durable.

Araldite

Without seein/knowing the what it really looks like I doubt whether you will a succesfull fix if the area is taking stress on it with glue, could you not make another rivet? Modellers shops sell all sorts of plastic rods/sheetplastics.

I'm having difficulty visualising this, but as well as glueing, would it be possible to drill a fine hole through the "rivet" and insert a steel pin (even an expendable drill bit?) to give it some additional strength?

Think about this - your rivet has already failed once, and that was from an un-glued starting point. You have zero chance of getting this to work.

Other options to consider:

- Steel machine screw through the rivet

- Replace rivet with a new one

- Replace rivet with steel equivalent

Mike Dodd wrote: [snip]

Yes it would have been better if the OP pointed out what it is he's trying to repair.

sounds like a hinge on a everyday item of use? mobile phone/Laptop?

Sounds a tall order for any type of glue... also, the optimum glue would depend on the type of plastic - what is it?

I'd definitely go for some form of mechanical reinforcement here - can you replace the shaft with a metal component, eg a bolt with a locking nut at the other end? (Is the cosmetic appearance important - you don't say what the application is) Or at the very least, if you do repair using glue, you could drill a small pilot hole down the centre of the top and shaft, and fit a screw to pull the whole lot together and reinforce it.

David

It depends on the plastic. But unless it's one where there is a true solvent like say perspex,it's unlikely you'll get a strong as new repair.

Without knowing what sort of plastic, and in what sort of application, it's not easy to guess. How about splurging a load of hot melt glue down the hollow bit then whacking the end back on?

I had a plastic lug snap off one of the internal shelf doors in the freezer. This looked like it might be a problem to glue, so I melted the two surfaces quickly over a gas flame and pushed them together, and it's been fine for the 10 years of use since. Obviously, this only works with thermosoftening plastics.

Thanks for all the advice. In the end I decided against gluing because of the weak bond it would probably end up with. The item is basically something 2 foot long with a large 'hinge' in the middle (completely plastic item) to fold it to half size - visualise one of those old rules which folded in half.

The two halves were fixed together by two plastic plugs with a screw which held them together. I cannot see exactly though how they screwed together as removing the screw does not allow the two parts to come apart - maybe someone's repaired it before??

Anyway - my fix in the end was to replace the plastic collar bit which came off, with a large metal washer. A screw used to go through the middle of this collar, so I could just screw the washer on with that. I had hoped to also replace the screw with a longer one, buy B&Q didn't have any suitable.

This is something I've sold on eBay for a not insignificant amount (not enough to just refund the money). It literally fell apart as I packaged it! (It's ex-work). The fix makes the item completely working again and likely to be much longer lasting than either a glued repair, or even maybe the original design. Therefore I'm completely happy to pass the item onto the purchaser - in fact, I'm glad it broke before it got posted, and otherwise it could very well have broken either in the post, or more likely when the purchaser first had a fiddle with it.

Thanks again

Glueing plastics never works well. I'm struggling to understand the description of part your are trying to glue anyway.

I find I have some success by hot riviting small broken plastic parts. For smaller parts I use ordinary paper staples, bent so provide the reinforcement needed, then pushed into the plastic with an hot soldering iron.

There is quite a range of plastics. If you can shave a sliver off, hold it in tweezeers, light it note the nature of the flame (if any) and the odour on the flame going out, I could venture a guess.

John Schmitt