EPOXY GLUE

[simbarb1]

hi,her indoors wants me to make a garden bench. not being too familiar with outdoor stuff the best way to go is two part epoxy.now I see a lot of epoxys on the market. can anyone shine some light as to which one might be best suited for the job etc

 

[kostello]

Had you thought off using cascamite.?

 

[Glynne]

Or Titebond III ?

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Or Everbuild D4?

 

[Mike.S]

Not built an outdoor bench myself, but for Epoxies I'd look at either Araldite or West System.

 

[Peter Sefton]

The West System is very good but expensive, it would deal better with greasy timbers like teak but for most outside uses all the other suggestions would be more than up to the job.

Cheers Peter

 

[Sgian Dubh]

hi,her indoors wants me to make a garden bench. not being too familiar with outdoor stuff the best way to go is two part epoxy.now I see a lot of epoxys on the market. can anyone shine some light as to which one might be best suited for the job etc

A lot depends upon the type of wood you plan to use. If it's dry wood, i.e., 20% MC and below, all of the previous suggestions will either work reasonably well or very well. If you plan to make the item from green or wet wood, i.e., wood at 20% MC or more, none of the adhesives already suggested are appropriate and you will need to use an adhesive that works with wet wood. The only type that does is one of the polyurethane glues.

The vast majority of wood glues are formulated to work on dry wood. 'Dry wood', by definition is wood at or below 20% MC. Slainte.

 

[Boatfixer]

I use West epoxy regularly in my boat repair work but for this job I agree it would be overkill. If you do decide to use epoxy, especially at this time of year you need to be aware of temperature and humidity as per the manufacturers recommendations. I keep my resins in the house so they never drop below 10 degrees and make sure I have local heat sources directed at whatever I am joining. It is crucial with epoxy that you mix the two components in exact ratios. You cannot speed things up by adding a bit more "hardener" as you will just end up with a weaker joint. For small amounts I use a set of digital scales to measure the amounts but be aware that some brands of epoxy use different ratios when measuring by weight as opposed to volume.

All in all for this job I would tend towards cascamite or a good exterior PVA myself.

 

[deema]

I don't think you will go too far wrong with Cascamite, it's got a good open time, easy to sand when you have left it to fully cure.....it's like glass. As long as the wood is not green and has been either air dried or kiln dried.

Used it for gates, doors and windows without problem.