Tenax-7R Plastic Welder has been out of stock at Walthers since last summer. Is it still being made?
George In Midcoast Maine, 'bout halfway up the Rockland branch
I've looked for it off and on. Haven't found any. Gave up.
I use MEK for my needs.
Ed
G Paine Tenax-7R Plastic Welder has been out of stock at Walthers since last summer. Is it still being made?
I dunno. I use MEK which I buy in the paint dept of Walmart in quart cans.
David Starr www.newsnorthwoods.blogspot.com
Yep, same here, MEK is JUST like Tenax, if not the same.
Mike.
My You Tube
2-3 years ago there was a rumor going around that Tenax-7r was going off the market, as the couple who owned it was getting a divorce. This led to folks making a run on LHS's and eBay sellers listing bottles for sky-high prices. What came out of all this is unknown to me, and I have no idea of what is fact or 'Internet' myth.
A few years before, Micro-Mark had someone 'reverse engineer' the product and they came out with 'Same Stuff'. They are still selling it in packs of two bottles for the price of one bottle of Tenax-7r.
Micro-Mark has done similar things over the years when they cannot get the 'discount' from a manufacturer that they want. NWSL tools used to be sold through Micro-Mark, and now Micro-Mark has copies of these tools branded under their own label.
I suspect the original Tenax-7r wound up in the same boat. For what it's worth, I have both Tenax-7r and Same Stuff on my workbench - and they appear similar...
Jim
Modeling BNSF and Milwaukee Road in SW Wisconsin
I believe Tenax-7R is mostly Methylene Chloride. It may contain some MEK. MEK is very good for welding polystyrene, but the smell gives me a headahce. Some people prefer Lacquer thinner, acetone, or xylene.
Gary
I bought a bottle last year at Modeltrainstuff, now out of stock. It evaporates somewhere between the bottle and the styrene I want to use it on. Maybe I got a bad bottle?
Henry
COB Potomac & Northern
Shenandoah Valley
BigDaddy I bought a bottle last year at Modeltrainstuff, now out of stock. It evaporates somewhere between the bottle and the styrene I want to use it on. Maybe I got a bad bottle?
It does evaporate quickly because Methylene Chroride is classified as a Volitile Organic Compound (VOC). I used to look for Chlorinated and BTEX VOC's in my former life as an engironmental geolgist. VOC's all evaporate pretty quickly.
I still have a half bottle of Tenax 7R in my tool box. I didn't realize it was no longer on the market since I haven't needed to look for a replacement yet.
Rio Grande. The Action Road - Focus 1977-1983
Same stuff was invariably supposed to replace Ambroid Pro Weld, was My understanding and LHS owner of 50yrs. which contains Methylene Chloride and did a fine job on Styrene, Butyrate ABS & Acrylic and Same Stuff does not do what they claim as far as My experience and the reviews goes. Also I have found through My experience that Plastruct Plastic Weld, which also contains MEK, does a lot better job than Tenex7R ever did and does not evaporate as fast, also stronger. Will bond, all the material that Ambroid Pro Weld did. I still have Ambroid Pro Weld, bought a half case before they stopped making it. Lately (about 20yrs.) I have been using more Plastruct orange bottle found it to be even stronger than Ambroid.
To each their own...but I've built a lot of things in My 74yrs.
Take Care!
Frank
Frank, thanks for the tip. When my bottle of Tenax-7R runs out, I'll hunt down some Ambroid Pro-weld
Pro-weld is gone. I now use Weld-on 3. Works great but is more toxic than Pro-weld but much much cheaper.
rrebell Pro-weld is gone. I now use Weld-on 3. Works great but is more toxic than Pro-weld but much much cheaper.
What the heck, people are recommending adhesives that are no longer on the market? What is actually available now?
riogrande5761What is actually available now?
http://www.modeltrainstuff.com/Plastruct-Plastic-Weld-Cement-p/pls-00002.htm
http://www.modeltrainstuff.com/Plastruct-Bondene-Cement-p/pls-00003.htm
I'll miss Tenax. I'll bet I went through fifty bottles over my modeling "career".
I do have some "MEK substitute" from Home Depot to which I added about 10% Xylene (Toluene works better if you can find it). It works OK and I use it for non-critical work, such as inside bracing or large wall areas and such.
I did buy some of this to try but have not had a chance to check it out yet.
http://www.modeltrainstuff.com/Faller-Super-Expert-Plastic-Glue-p/flr-170490.htm
I have heard good things about Tamiya extra thin cement as well but have no personal experience with it. I'll get some soon.
https://www.tamiyausa.com/items/paints-finishes-60/tamiya-maintenance-material-62000/extra-thin-cement-87038?product-id=87038
Regards, Ed
Hello all,
I use Micor-Mark Same Stuff.
According to the label on Same Stuff does contain methylene chloride.
Which is chemically different than MEK (Butanone).
Not sure what materials you are trying to bond (cement).
To assemble models I use several different bonding agents including Same Stuff, two-part epoxy, cryanolite adhesive (CA) [Super Glue] and solder.
Hope this helps.
"Uhh...I didn’t know it was 'impossible' I just made it work...sorry"
By no means am I trying to confuse the thread any more than it is.....but..
Does any substance weld slippery engineered plastics like delrin very well?
- Douglas
Doughless By no means am I trying to confuse the thread any more than it is.....but.. Does any substance weld slippery engineered plastics like delrin very well?
http://www.masterbond.com/applications/bonding-acetal-plastics-industrial-adhesives
jjdamnit Not sure what materials you are trying to bond (cement).
Mostly what I have used Tanex 7R for is joining flat part kits together like buildings (like Walthesr ADM grain elevator ) or flat part train cars (Eel River for example).
Riogrande5761,
I did not mean to mislead You about the Ambroid Pro-weld, but if You re-read My post, I did say it was no longer available and that I bought a bunch while it was still being made.
For what You are working on, I would suggest using Plastruct Plastic Weld orange bottle, You have some working time in using it. If You have large surfaces to glue, You can put some on both pieces and not to worry if they start to evaporate, when put together, they will still bond. Then You can go ahead and brush more on in the seams, capillary action will do the rest. I did try to respond last night and after typing a very long msg. with some explainations of some adhesives for alternatives, CS.Trains timed out for some strange reason and I lost everything I typed. That put Me in a foul mood....so I said the heck with it.
Like Frank, I use Plastruct Bondene with the orange label, for both similar and dissimilar plastics. I found that Tanax evaporated in the bottle over time. A LHS near me doesn't stock Tanax for that reason.
I have read with interest what everybody uses instead, but I am curious about the original question. Has anybody seen any definitive information that Tenax-7R is indeed officially off the market forever?
I have the right to remain silent. By posting here I have given up that right and accept that anything I say can and will be used as evidence to critique me.
Yes it is gone....has been around 2013/14. There was a thread on it about that time on the forums. You could actually find the thread faster by using Google. A lot of distributors had quite a few cases of it until it ran out. Like a lot of other things that are no longer made.
EDIT:
Dave Nelson posted this on Jan 22, 2013: From the other thread I was referring to:
For those of you who liked using Tenax as a bonding agent for styrene and have noticed it is not readily found at the LHS, I received the following email the other day from JMD Plastics of Green Bay WI
Dave Nelson:
As many of you may know, it has been impossible to get the highly popular TENAX 7R plastic welder for use in gluing together styrene models, sheets, etc....Ironically, this product was distributed by Hebco, just down the road from us near LaCrosse, Wisconsin. At one point, they even asked us for 10,000 pieces of styrene so they could demonstrate their product at shows they attended. Well, their e-mail, phone, etc....is no longer in service. And good luck finding a back stock of TENAX at any hobby shop or even on E-Bay! (I know--we tried---and bought up as many bottles as we could find!)
That being said, we have been working with the same folks who helped us to bring our Instant Track-Tack-It and Grass-Tack-It products to you to design a replacement product. In mid December, we finalized the product after much testing and then made our initial marketing test at a recent train show in Kansas City with RESOUNDING SUCCESS, with hundreds of individual jars and cases sold!
The new product, STYRENE TACK-IT, works exactly the same as Tenax, in the fact that it dries quickly (5-10 seconds), will evaporate if you forget and leave the cap off for a few days, and in truth, acts as a bonder should---"activating" or "melting" the styrene to achieve a solid bond instead of "gluing."
If you mess up a joint, simply apply an additional bead of the STYRENE TACK-IT, pull the bond apart, sand it lightly, and rebond the joint properly!
The retail price on individual jars (1 ounce---same as Tenax jars) is $4.75---less cost than Tenax.
The retail price on a case of 12 is $57.00---also less than a case of Tenax.
Hobby shops wishing to stock the product get will get their standard dealer discount on cases of 12. Call us (920-865-1219) or e-mail us for details.
Individual hobbiests may purchase by the jar or case.
You are receiving this information even before it goes up on our website next week!
Thanks!
JMD Plastics
4492 Annabell Circle
Green Bay, WI 54313
www.jmdplastics.yolasite.com
I only use the liquid cement for bonding flat pieces edge to edge and prefer gel cements for everything else. I used my last bottle of Tenax up several years ago and I've heard about the Micro Mark products, MEK and the rest of them. Right now, the only liquid cement I have is Testors liquid cement for plastics/styrene. Has anyone used this product and if so, what are your thoughts? I have only used the Testors product on a limited basis, not enough to really form an opinion. Also, How will this work on Plastruct parts?
riogrande5761 rrebell Pro-weld is gone. I now use Weld-on 3. Works great but is more toxic than Pro-weld but much much cheaper. What the heck, people are recommending adhesives that are no longer on the market? What is actually available now?
Sometimes working time can be needed, but I found in the case of joining the walls of my ADM Grain elevator, Tenax7R, I could hold the parts together, brush it on from the inside, and it would be almost instant so I didn't have to sit there holding it for very long. Thats one of the hard parts about building some kits is holding parts until they are bonded.
In another case, last weekend I thought I'd finally try to build the end-cages for the Walthers 53' GSC flat car bulkheads. In that case I tried liquid super glue which normally bonds pretty fast, and I never did get the parts together properly. I have repeated attempts to simply get two of the parts together, first ended up bonded at the wrong angle, pulled them apart and tried seveal more times. After two hours, I still only ended up with two of the cage parts together and with a substancial visible gap between them. I can see why so few Walthers 53' GSC bulkhead flat cars have been built as bulkheads. What few I've seen built that way didn't look so hot.
In addition to what was recommended, I have used Microscale's MicroPrep as directed along with CA. It does a pretty good job, I have used it to replace handrail sections.
I pulled out my old bottle of Tenax 7R to work on a Lonestar 40' flat bed trailer kit and it was bone dry. The lid was cracked so that much have been enough to allow what was in the bottle to escape and evaporate.
I've ordered a bottle of Plastruct Plastic Weld off of Ebay since it was highly recommended by our friend Frank in a post above.
I needed something to replace the Tenax that I could brush on to bond plastic.
I have been using Plastruct Plastic Weld lately as well
Just as Darwin said I would, I've learned to adapt.
I like this as a "near" substitute:
https://www.tamiyausa.com/shop/finishing/extra-thin-cement-2/
(Last time I bought a supply, Horizon Hobby (Atheran) had a very reasonable price.
https://www.horizonhobby.com/tamiya-extra-thin-cement-tam87038
Or this for joints using thicker, slower setting stuff:
https://www.modeltrainstuff.com/faller-170490-expert-super-fast-setting-plastic-cement/
Some people say "Same Stuff" is the same stuff. This I have not tried...
https://www.micromark.com/SAME-STUFF-APPLICATOR
Seems a little pricey.
YMMV, Good Luck, Ed
I have lacquer thinner and MEK. Both are a whole lot cheaper than "model glue".
Modeling the Baltimore waterfront in HO scale
Jumijo I have lacquer thinner and MEK. Both are a whole lot cheaper than "model glue".