Wall warts; was: hams on classiccmp

[Ethan Dicks]

On Thu, Jan 22, 2009 at 2:08 PM, Chuck Guzis <cclist at sydex.com> wrote:
> On 22 Jan 2009 at 13:50, Roy J. Tellason wrote:
>
>> I've been thinking about trying MEK applied along the seam with swabs.
>
> MEK works with some plastics and turns others to mush or has little
> effect at all.  Methylene chloride seems to be a better choice,
> particularly for clear stock.  Just repaired a pair of plastic-
> handled scissors using it and you can't tell it was ever broken.

Yeah... I was just looking that up, since I wanted some plastic-weld
but don't like paying several dollars per oz at the hobby store... I
guess "proper" liquid polystyrene cement is Methylene Chloride, but
MEK is easy to get at the hardware store by the pint or larger
container.

I have a few things I'd like to "weld" up... guess I'll have to find a
source of Methylene Chloride somewhere.  It seems to be the right
stuff for many assembly and repair applications.

I first used "plastic weld" at about age 11 and found it much nicer
for an impatient kid than toluene-based "model cement"... besides
finger prints and sagging bits from overapplication of the thicker
cements, plastic weld was ready to go in seconds so I could spend more
time aligning and assembling than waiting for complex assemblies to
dry before moving on to the next step.

I haven't used it to repair wall warts, but I've always thought it was
the best stuff to use if I ever got as far as regluing.

-ethan