Author: Matt74
Date: 2017-11-21 03:54
Epoxy and superglue have their uses, but are not easily reversable. Traditional materials are not always the best, but they can usually be easily undone.
Imagine you are the guy fixing that horn in 2 or 10 years. You want to remove the post for some reason. It won’t budge and you are afraid of damaging the post or body. It may be stuck in with boogers, but you don’t know. You can try heating it to a point, or tapping on it, but you just don’t know what’s in there.
Epoxy can be anything from poorly hardened JB Weld, to NASA quality marine epoxy that lasts 10,000 years under saltwater. It might let go with a little twist, or never come out.
E.G. Right now I have a post with a stuck pivot screw. All the screws had locktite on them (apparently), and not a little dab. They were stiff. With care I managed not to impale myself or strip the heads. Except for one. I tried everything. Oil, alchohol, acetone, heat, freezing, tapping with a hammer. It could be locktite, some other kind of adhesive, cross threaded, dirt, or it might just be “old”, but I assume there’s something on it. One could try a whole variety of solvents, but it’s stuck. It’s in there so bad that when I turn the screwdriver, without slipping, the metal simply deforms without unscrewing. I don’t have the tools to make another screw, etc. Fortunately I got the key off. The screw is in there for good.
When I was a picture frame restorer the absolute worst thing was when someone had put epoxy on the frame. Nothing dissolved it, and it was hard to cut. There were probably different kinds, but it was all extremely difficult to cut or remove. I mentioned the caulking in my other post. There is this kind of outdoor caulking that dries hard as rock. You have to use a hammer and a 5 in 1. If it’s stuck on there good, the wood will actually come off off with it. That’s the way modern materials are. If you know what it is and have the correct solvent you are ok, but you usually don’t know what it is.
Modern materials often seem more convenient than they are. Epoxy is always messy. Thread, tape, or baking soda seem a lot easier to me.
- Matthew Simington
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