I've made things with glass fibre and poyester and repaired various things, including chainsaws, with glass fibre and epoxy, more recently I have had great success with slow curing epoxy and carbon fibre.
Has anyone tried reinforcing superglue with fibre or are they incompatible.
I ask as I have been presented with a plastic hairband, snapped by the owner, my granddaughter and don't want to wait for the epoxy to set.
AJH
I think you would be better off with epoxy. Could always use 5 minute, and/or warm up normal for a fast set.
ah - you too are a victim of the "Grandpa will mend it" syndrome.
Yes but the stuff I have is very low viscosity and difficult to use on fiddly jobs, also it tends to be a bit wasteful on small jobs as I always need to mix a few grams, most of which becomes wasted.
I've not found the fast setting ones to be very good, nowhere near the strength or hardness.
AJH
Ive done a lot with CF and superglue - beware! Someything makes the glue go off instantly ands get very hot - enough to burn
Hmm. Polyester sets in minutes Were you thinking of a wrapped glass or CF cloth patch?
Ive found them fine if well mixed and heated a bit too.
But does it make a strong bond?
I haven't got any polyester resin
I was thinking of teasing out some strands of glass fibre from some coarse mat I have, laying it in the inside of the hairband and squeezing a bead of superglue over it and stippling it in with a needle.
I could use carbon fibre tow instead of the glass fibre but it would look bad, although it would not be visible when worn so if it was a strong bond this is what I would do.
AJH
Haven't tried -- but there are a few powders that are used to fill cracks that the superglue alone won't. (Apparently, baking soda both works well as a filling powder and an accelerator).
Thomas Prufer
Try it.
It does.
Lots of people claim success with superglue and Sodium Bicarbonate (baking soda). I've never tried it, but there are sufficient YouTube examples to suggest it works.
Search for 'baking soda and superglue'.
Cheers
In message <qd44rs$sa8$ snipped-for-privacy@dont-email.me, Clive Arthur snipped-for-privacy@nowaytoday.co.uk> writes
I've tried it, and it did work as a replacement for part of the plastic simulated ivory of a guitar nut, but I would expect its strength to be in compression - not really what you would want for a hair band.
I'd use epoxy, and either make a jig or use one of those things with a magnifying glass and croc clips on the end of adjustable arms to hold it steady while it sets.
Not faster, but maybe better: check to see if the plastic is amenable to a solvent weld. That could be used to join the crack, and also imbed fibres. A google for "flame test" will bring up how to check for the type of plastic.
(I have had excellent result using UHU allplast to repair "Playmobil" toys, in places with stresses comparable to those in a headband.)
Does take ~24 hours, though, so not really faster than epoxy...
Thomas Prufer
It don't work. Well superglue seems to have very little sheer strength and attempts to use it with reinforcement seem doomed. It also means you spend the rest of the day trying to get the fingers back to skin not glue assuming you have not glued them together of course. I hate the stuff, but it is handy in A/E for fixing cuts. Brian
I was a bit worried about the material this hair band is made from. if its snapped that suggests that if its a plastic its beginning to get the old brittle disease and may well snap elsewhere even if fixed. I tried to do something like this with a plastic clip on the outside of a table lamp some years ago, but it did not last, well the fix did but the plastic became far too brittle and as it was always a little under tension it broke somewhere else.
Could it be a UV exposure problem if its worn in the outdoors a lot? Brian
I haven't tried baking soda, but have used this (the rest has probably all gone off in the bottle now) worked well.
No it was new yesterday and she just pulled it apart too far.
It's a trivial thing and not really worth repairing but it just got me thinking...
I have superglued it together so far but it will need reinforcing
AJH
Model plane enthusiasts use carbon fibre and super glue to reinforce balsa components.
Richard
In the limit they are not quite as strong, but then epoxy is *very* strong so they are often good enough. As TNP says, mixing is important and heat makes that easier as it lowers the viscosity. With just the right amount of heating even the 24 hour ones will cure satisfactorily in much less than an hour.
Once I had a plane to fly.
I mixed up some alraditre. Back on 1967 thats all there was. And borrowed me mums hair drier.
The epoxy started to bubble, and then the bubles stopped rsing.
It was clear, reddish and rock hard in 4 minutes.
I've never used epoxy without heat since.
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