First post on here , few questions - Glue and Knife making supplies?

[Atgni]

Evening gents and ladies .
Owing to circumstances over the last few years I’ve sort of been out of the loop a bit .
I’m probably gonna cause more question than I could hope for answers .
I’ve recently come across some blades which I made a few years ago , and would like to get on with finishing them , my question would be ,
What resin based adhesive are you using for your handle scales ??
it would appear that “Devcon 2 ton “ is no longer available especially in 256ml bottles


I was looking for a site “British blades” where I was a regular poster under the name “ razorblunt “ unfortunately it would appear that the owner of the site has ill health and has closed down the site .
What a massive waste of resource as the site was just packed with information .
I do note there are a few names I recognise on here from British blades .

Do we have a knife maker materials, supplier among us ?

 

[C_Claycomb]

Hi there,

I would recommend this stuff. It is long cure, very tough, good flow, eventually sets hard enough that it can be filed and sanded well.
https://golfcomponentsdirect.com/product/brampton-pro-fix-20-20-long-cure-epoxy-4-oz-bottles/

I know lots of people liked Devcon 2Ton, but after reading how it under performed in the Glue Wars threads over on Blade Forum, I haven't used it again. I did use the Clubmaker Shafting Epoxy, which Glue Wars rated highly, but it became hard to get. There are other adhesives on that site, and pretty good prices too. I have heard good things about West Systems GFlex, but have never tried it.

I work in aerospace engineering, and my reading when looking for adhesives is that the industrial and use-specific stuff is always stronger than the hobby/ retail grades. 3M and Loctite do some great adhesives, but they can be expensive. The golf shafting stuff, designed for toughness in impact and sticking metal to composites seems a good choice.

Most of the British Blades crowd went over to Edge Matters forum, if you are looking for specific suppliers. I guess that is a more concentrated knife environment than BCUK.

All the best

Chris

 

[Janne]

I do not know exactly what brands/types you can buy in UK, but what I look for is slow setting, high hardness and certain flexibility.

But to be truthful, it does not matter much. In old days, they used a tar/pitch mixture. In Japan, for their traditional knives, they do not use even that, they just force the wood over the tang.

Are you a stick tang boy or full tang?
The few full tang blades I have put scales on I used a marine grade Epoxy.


My dream is finding a glue that bonds chemically to wood, plastic, and steels.

I am lucky as I have stuff that bonds metal to plastic.

 

[Stew]

Nice to see you!

Glue matters! I'm doing well with z-poxy at the moment.

 

[Nice65]

As above, welcome from another ex BB member. Sad loss of a big library of information.

Can’t help you with glues, Chris and Stew know what they’re on about.

 

[Brizzlebush]

Thus is all dead handy to know, thanks guys.
Out of interest, and you can tell me if I'm highjacking the post, apologies, there's a lot of choice re. blade blanks out there.
I'd like to handle a full tang blade myself.
My thoughts are to start cheap in case I make a mess of it.
Can anyone recommend a supplier?

 

[Flynnsmith]

I and several of my well known knife making colleagues use West Systems G/Flex. But remember that preparation is more important than quality of this or that epoxy resin

 

[Nice65]

Thus is all dead handy to know, thanks guys.
Out of interest, and you can tell me if I'm highjacking the post, apologies, there's a lot of choice re. blade blanks out there.
I'd like to handle a full tang blade myself.
My thoughts are to start cheap in case I make a mess of it.
Can anyone recommend a supplier?

Try Brisa, good quality for not too much money.

https://brisa.fi/enzo-folding-knives/brisa-enzo-knives/enzo-necker-knives.html?limit=9

 

[Janne]

I second Brisa. They have excellent stuff, and are very reliable. Fast shipping too.

 

[Atgni]

Nice to see you!

Glue matters! I'm doing well with z-poxy at the moment.

Another name I recognised , glad to see your still making .

 

[Atgni]

As above, welcome from another ex BB member. Sad loss of a big library of information.

Can’t help you with glues, Chris and Stew know what they’re on about.

Nice65 , always happy to see fellow members .

 

[Atgni]

Hi there,

I would recommend this stuff. It is long cure, very tough, good flow, eventually sets hard enough that it can be filed and sanded well.
https://golfcomponentsdirect.com/product/brampton-pro-fix-20-20-long-cure-epoxy-4-oz-bottles/

I know lots of people liked Devcon 2Ton, but after reading how it under performed in the Glue Wars threads over on Blade Forum, I haven't used it again. I did use the Clubmaker Shafting Epoxy, which Glue Wars rated highly, but it became hard to get. There are other adhesives on that site, and pretty good prices too. I have heard good things about West Systems GFlex, but have never tried it.

I work in aerospace engineering, and my reading when looking for adhesives is that the industrial and use-specific stuff is always stronger than the hobby/ retail grades. 3M and Loctite do some great adhesives, but they can be expensive. The golf shafting stuff, designed for toughness in impact and sticking metal to composites seems a good choice.

Most of the British Blades crowd went over to Edge Matters forum, if you are looking for specific suppliers. I guess that is a more concentrated knife environment than BCUK.

All the best

Chris

Thanks Chris , I suppose as technology moves forward , so must the adhesives industry .
Mel

 

[Atgni]

Thanks very much for all the useful information.

 

[Brizzlebush]

Try Brisa, good quality for not too much money.

https://brisa.fi/enzo-folding-knives/brisa-enzo-knives/enzo-necker-knives.html?limit=9

Lovely, thanks.
By golly there's a site that could get me in trouble

 

[mark.177]

with epoxies cleanliness, preparation and temperature is key,
all surfaces must be clean, free from dust, grease, oil and once clean kept clean
the epoxy needs to be mixed well.
temperature needs to be warm for it to mix, flow and cure correctly.
you need to leave it at least 16 hours past its cure time to harden fully.
iv found that epoxy can become milky due to tiny bubbles forming when cold which weakens the epoxy also it doesnt flow/penetrate well when cold
i use the 30 minute gflex stuff for scales. for hidden tangs though a prefer a slower cure to give me more time to work and clean up before starting to harden. jb weld has worked well with hidden tangs.
i have a slower 2 hour epoxy as well i use for hidden tangs evo-stik control.
for clean up i use acetone

 

[C_Claycomb]

......

But to be truthful, it does not matter much. In old days, they used a tar/pitch mixture. In Japan, for their traditional knives, they do not use even that, they just force the wood over the tang.
......

My dream is finding a glue that bonds chemically to wood, plastic, and steels.

I am lucky as I have stuff that bonds metal to plastic.

What you mean is, it does not matter much to you . However, it matters to a lot of other people. I would say that it is reasonable for it to matter to someone buying a hand made knife...unless of course they wanted to purchase a neo tribal type knife held together with pine resin and moose droppings

What plastic are you looking to bond/successfully bonding to? It isn't usually much challenge to find epoxy, urethane, polyester or silicone based resins that will bond to metal and polymers in the same family as the adhesive. There is even overlap, but some plastics have particularly low surface energy and as a result are difficult to bond to without a surface treatment.

As for a source for adhesives in the UK. In addition to some on-line golf supply places, you can get the industrial stuff from Cromwell, RS Components and Silmid. G/Flex is often sold from marine supply places. Learn to love mail order .

There is a lot to be said for looking through the Technical Data Sheets, (TDS) associated with most good adhesives (you can find one for Devcon 2 Ton for comparison). The problem for us knife makers is that the figures for shear and peal are for standard tests, usually on aluminium substrates. That was where those Blade Forum tests came in, folk trying to compare bonds between steel and handle materials.

For degreasing, which is very important, I like acetone, but have also used brake disk cleaner.

ATB

Chris

 

[mark.177]

should have added i use acetone to clean up epoxy over spill
for de greasing components befor epoxying i use acetone on handle material followed by petroleum distillate
on the steel i use petroleum distillate
its also important to give the surfaces a good key

 

[Woodcutter2]

Another very strong vote for Z-poxy from me, been using it for 6 years now, it dries clear and retains a modicum of flex that I think is important to allow natural handle materials to move a fraction as they do through the seasons without 'popping' off the steel. Watch the batch numbers for shelf life though!

I have found that warming the (full tang) blade and the resin (gently) with a hairdryer allows air bubbles to escape for an immensely strong bond in any tang lightening holes you might drill in the tang.
I have used the 2 hour and 30 minute set versions and cannot find a tangible difference in performance so use the 30 minute set as it works well with my build process.

Another vote also for Brisa, good quality stuff reliably delivered.

 

[snappingturtle]

I use a long set bostik mainly as a sealer, the pins, tubes or tang and cap do the holding work for me as I peen or flair to hold it all together.