Glue recommendations for a 630 caboose roof corner?

Super type glue (heavy consistency) should work fine If you have some. Testors tube glue (model glue) would also do the trick. Trouble with glue is it dries in the bottle in a few months once its been opened. Every time I go to grab some, its solid. There is a train store in my area that won't even stock Zap because of its short shelf life- even unopened!

Rich   

I would use a super glue that I know that works. The new Gorilla brand super glue don't work that well, it is all advertising hype!

Lee Fritz

I would use epoxy on the underside with a plastic or metal patch to spread out the area and the epoxy. You will be able to see it from underneath, but it will be solid.

Testors tube glue, what we used to call airplane glue back in the Midwest in the 50's will work, but it is hard to make it invisible.

Every time I use super glue, the repair fails.

rick s posted:

Hi Everyone,

What would you suggest I use to glue a corner back on, on my American Flyer 630 caboose roof?

Um, just what's the actual material being glued here?  That might be helpful information from which to make a recommendation.

Thank you for the replies guys.  I will attempt the super glue first.

rick s posted:

Hi Everyone,

What would you suggest I use to glue a corner back on, on my American Flyer 630 caboose roof?

Rick,

I usually use a solvent cement to fix any broken plastic.  Most Gilbert and Lionel items are good candidates for its use.  Plastruct makes a good one, but I use straight MEK.  Very volatile and you must use it with adequate ventilation.  But if you use it, I'd also recommend fitting the parts and applying it from the underside.  Capillary action will spread the cement in the crack and it will set in a few seconds, but you have to leave it longer, perhaps an hour or so, or it to set up completely. 

Super glue will work, but again, it's hard to make the repair invisible.  You have to use the absolute minimum.

mwb posted:

rick s posted:

Hi Everyone,

What would you suggest I use to glue a corner back on, on my American Flyer 630 caboose roof?

Um, just what's the actual material being glued here?  That might be helpful information from which to make a recommendation.

The earlier 630 cabooses were nitrocellulose plastic, the super shiny stuff from the immediate postwar years that was prone to warping. The later ones were polystyrene. The change came somewhere around 1949.

rick s posted:

Thank you for the replies guys.  I will attempt the super glue first.

Not a good plan IMO. If the super glue does not hold, it will make a barrier on the plastic so that other glues will not hold either.

The best is Testor's gel glue for plastic, IMO. We used to call it airplane glue back in the 50's.

RoyBoy posted:

mwb posted:

rick s posted:

Hi Everyone,

What would you suggest I use to glue a corner back on, on my American Flyer 630 caboose roof?

Um, just what's the actual material being glued here?  That might be helpful information from which to make a recommendation.

The earlier 630 cabooses were nitrocellulose plastic, the super shiny stuff from the immediate postwar years that was prone to warping. The later ones were polystyrene. The change came somewhere around 1949.

Polystyrene --> solvent glue either Tenax or MEK.

Nitrocellulose plastic is something I don't know enough about to even make a guess.......

RoyBoy posted:

 

Every time I use super glue, the repair fails.

Same here, for the most part. I've about given up on so-called "super" glues. They rarely seem to work, and I've tried many different brands. I've never understood how people use this stuff with any success. I'd go with the gel model glue suggestion.

My favorite glue for styrene is methylene chloride (aka: dichloromethane), but it is hard to find and tends to evaporate even in the sealed container. My second favorite is MEK, which seems to last longer in storage and bonds almost as well as mc.

Super glue will coat the mating surfaces, preventing any future attempts with solvent glues from working.

Bill in FtL

Bill Nielsen posted:

My favorite glue for styrene is methylene chloride (aka: dichloromethane), but it is hard to find and tends to evaporate even in the sealed container.

Basically what Tenax is and those bottles that they sell it in barely meet the definition of sealed.

I keep mine is these vials with the compression seal in the cap for years.

 

My second favorite is MEK, which seems to last longer in storage and bonds almost as well as mc.

MEK can actually be too aggressive with styrene particularly with smaller or thinner parts.  It also has a higher boiling point so it lasts longer on the parts.  It also has a rather nasty aroma and is extremely flammable while MC is not and also being heavier than air, tends to not be a big inhalation hazard unless you're huffing the stuff,

MWB, where do you get those vials? Look like they might be real nice for playing bottleneck (slide) guitar. As long as I get get my ring finger through the opening. (sorry for being off topic)

Rich

Smoke Stack Lightnin posted:

MWB, where do you get those vials? Look like they might be real nice for playing bottleneck (slide) guitar. As long as I get get my ring finger through the opening. (sorry for being off topic)

Rich

I think that they are too small for most fingers - I' can't get even my pinkie in through the neck of one of these - 20 mL scintillation vial

The MC "glue" is more like a weld than a glue. Its thin like water and rather than being sticky itself, it melts the plastic together then it evaporates off. Not a gap filler. You can melt plastic shavings into a few drops in a metal bottle cap to make a gooey gap filler though.

Gorilla super glue gell is the best I've used. A dot of it to set fast along with another regular glue for holding power works really well at times. The gel even works ok on wood without mixing in sawdust.

 I have used Testors(bottle) and Plastructs liquid cement with success.

 Al