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Building my second sea kayak this year, I have just discovered the joys of a hot-melt glue gun. It was a huge outlay - $5.40 at the local hardware store plus about $2 or so for a pack of 24 glue sticks. The great thing, I have discovered, is that the PVA glue sets almost immediately it’s out of the gun nozzle – certainly within 20 or 30 seconds. It’s then hard, but not as glass-like as cured epoxy, more like a hard rubber, so when using it for temporary holding or locating purposes it can later be very easily cut off with a sharp razor knife.
So far I’ve used it to temporarily secure bulkheads and hull forms, hold down those pesky Shearwater sheer panels that want to keep spearing me, fix the rudder pin bearing in-place while the epoxy around it cures, and a cuppla other tricky construction purposes where tape or wire stitches might otherwise be used. Mindful of not overdoing things, I’m just using a tiny ‘dab’ or spot of the glue at any given point, but it sure does make life easy! With apologies to those who saw the light years ago – but also hoping this might be a useful tip for others. Wordsmith4 replies:
RE: The joys of hot-melt glue...
Here's an interesting article about hot glue and some of its applications to kayak building:
http://www.laughingloon.com/shoptips2.html
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Ogata (eric)
RE: The joys of hot-melt glue...
my daughter and i used the hot glue gun
to place the vertical cedar strips
and then the cockpit combing on her petrel
a couple of months ago--
a process that looked impossible
became very fun and easy!
RE: The joys of hot-melt glue...
I am also hooked on the hot glue I used it to stich the seams before using any epoxy and again on the shearline where the boat was built to later come apart to glass the interior. It made taking the wires out that much faster, everyone raise their hand that has been stabbed by one of those.
RE: The joys of hot-melt glue...
» Submitted by MrKim - Wed, 5/6/09 » 8:48 PM
Well by golly. My mom has one and I never thought of using it. Thx for the tip.
Kim