Carbon fibre to metal end cap adhesive?

[Harry Bloomfield]

A friend who fishes local lakes, dropped round with an expensive telescopic carbon fibre catch net, where the net part was fixed to the carbon fibre tube, via a threaded metal (alloy) endcap which slide over the tube. The endcap had pulled off, he had tried to superglue it, which had not worked, but there was no sign of an mechanical fixing.

So no idea what sort of adhesive was originally used, which had failed, but... I abraded the tube and the inner surface of the endcap and used Araldite slow cure. I suppose I ought to have used a couple of pop rivets through the sides too?

[The Other Mike]

Oxide forms quickly on aluminium and can result in a poor bond. For high integrity joints it needs to be excluded

Abrade the aluminium with scotchbrite and acetone to degrease

Then abrade the aluminum with scotchbrite whilst it is submerged in epoxy (a fully wetted small piece of scotchbite an inch or two square is often enough)

With the correct preparation there would be no need for any pop rivets

Very similar methods are used on carbon driveshafts and suspension arms / pullrods.

[newshound]

Sounds good to me. I always worry slightly about using pop rivets in composites. Another option might be to use small self tappers (tapping into the alloy, just poking into the carbon fibre). IIRC most carbon fibre stuff is bonded with epoxy.

[The Natural Philosopher]

superglue is absolutely what works on CF.

Prolly needs to degrease the metal. Or it might have been hot glued

[Brian Gaff]

No that might have made strain points. What about heat shrink sleeving over the whole bit from end cap to handle? Brian

[Harry Bloomfield]

Brian Gaff wrote on 07/06/2018 :

Good idea, to add to the strength. hot melt glue, with heat shrink shrunk on top - thanks to all..