edge banding?

[Lee]

How well does the heat activated glue on wood edging (the rolled stuff) hold on ply? If it's a good bond what should I do to prep the laminated edges. Thanks in advance Lee

[Robatoy]

A hard sanding block to scuff off the fibres, keeping it flat to the face. Then blow clean with compressed air. When heating the tape with an iron, do not loiter, keep moving and push down with an aluminum (or some thing that sucks up heat) till the tape cools under pressure. Follow the iron. That assures a good bond. After applying the tape, trim with a stubby 1-1/2" chisel, and observe grain orientation. Cut into the direction of the grain which goes away from the substrate. Otherwise, you'll tear into the tape. (Only of you're using wood-veneer tape.) Then finish up with another hard sanding block with a much finer grit..

180 or finer. If you use a block to finish the edges that is too fine, it will clog up really fast with the hotmelt.

HTH

r----> who did a lot of that before he bought himself an edgebander.

[Upscale]

I've used both types (glue on and iron on) and never had any real problems. For applying, I make sure one edge is closer to flush. When it's all applied, I use a sanding block to remove the close to flush edge and for the other edge which has more waste, I trim it off with a razor knife and then finish off with a sanding block.

Only real difference I've noticed with the iron on type is that when you're sanding the edges off, you're going to spend a little more sanding time to remove adhesive waste. The iron on type goes on faster, the glue on type takes a little longer to dry, but the differences are about equal considering that one requires more sanding time. It's pretty much an equal trade off.