Bonding method

[Anonymous]

I am looking for a good bonding method to glue stryene to that blue insulation foam. It is a pretty large piece of styrene I want to glue down roughly 3'x4'.
Thanks in advance for the help
Joseph

[nfmisso]

Hi Joseph;

The extruded insulation is polystyrene, so solvent adhesives (Tenax, Testor in black bottle with red label) etc. will weld the two together. It will eat through the foam rather quickly, so experiment if you decide on this route. I would just tack it around the edges, you have to give a the solvent vapours an escape path, or they'll eat through the foam.

Liquid Nails for Projects (double check and make sure you get the plastic compatible version) will create a pernament joint. Apply it to your solid piece, and spread it out to a very thin layer.

Aleene's Tacky Glue (crafts store or crafts section at Wal-mart) will do a good job - spread it out to very thin too.

Yellow wood glue will work, spread it very thin too.

CA will work too.

[Anonymous]

There is a "No More Nails" or "Liquid Nails" that is formulated especially for use with foam. The regular products state that at least one of the two surfaces must be porous. I am not sure if that applies to the special foam stuff. I use the "regular" and it works great sticking cork to plywood, or track to cork.

Alternatively, some people have had success joining foam to foam with hot glue. Don't know if it would work for styrene to foam.

Andrew

[DSchmitt]

I rescently used ACC (super glue). Don't know how it will hod up yet.

[orsonroy]

QUOTE: Originally posted by nfmisso
The extruded insulation is polystyrene, so solvent adhesives (Tenax, Testor in black bottle with red label) etc. will weld the two together. It will eat through the foam rather quickly, so experiment if you decide on this route.

I wouldn't try this method if I were you. I was gluing some strip styrene to flextrack to create wood road crossings recently, and accidentally spilled some Tenax onto bare foam. WOOSH! Like a hot knife through butter! Plastic solvent cements REALLY attack foam; any amount leaves a hole, not a nice bonded surface. Even the fumes from the Tenax attacked the foam surface.

I use wood glue. Liquid Nails works too, but wood glue is cheaper, and I use it whenever I need to glue foam (and my entire layout is foam).

ACC does work too, like Nigel said.

[Anonymous]

If you're gluing the styrene flat it might be ok but if it's standing on edge you may have a problem. Since both materials are basically non-porous you'll likely have to leave clamps in place for quite a while due to the long curing time in the closed environment between the two materials. I would go with the suggestions for LiquidNails or similar.

[Anonymous]

How about the ever popular contact cement? I wouldn't fool around with anything likely to attack the foam or the styrene.

Randy

[der5997]

The ever popular contact cement will disolve the foam. However, there is a Latex (water based) contact cement available, and I've used this to bond my foam sections for subroad bed in N. Just wait long enough for the stuff to dry before putting the pieces together. Works a treat. The stuff I use is "Home - Bond" by Home Hardware in Canada. For the US, try a web search.