Diluting copper paint in cyanoacrylate (Retitled by moderator)

[SpencerC]

So I'm thinking about diluting some copper paint in cyanoacrylate the water thin kind, so that when I glue the copper plates down it will seep out the sides making it look welded/soldered. How should I do this? Should I use enamel? Acrylic? How much do I put in? Do I dilute it in water first or just dilute it in the glue? Any advice would help on what the best way to do this would be

[johnegert]

Spence--- This question should bring the glue wizards out in force! It sounds like a recipe for a mess to me..... I'm not a big fan of ACA anyway, and mixing paint into it sounds like some heinous, coagulating gelatinous scum. Further, copper plates on wooden ships were not soldered or braised , but rather nailed or screwed, overlapping each other a bit. This caused a whole set of galvanic corrosion problems which were solved by changing the fasteners to copper as well. These were the first real corrosion laboratories--- a fascinating topic in its own right---- starring my hero Sir Humphrey Davy...... another story. With my luck lately, you'll probably hear from a bunch of folk who do this all the time, and will call me a brainless fool, but I'm just not buying the idea.

john

[SpencerC]

Hmm. Interesting. Well mostly what I'm worried about is having little gaps in between the plates so does anyone know if this would even work?

[johnegert]

Go to the planking and plating topic in the forum directory, and look at what the other crazies are doing. On most of their builds, they are either using Caldercraft or Amati commercial plates or using some variety of stained glass coppering material. The few tiny miniature degenerates like me have used copper shim stock, or even painted paper. But your gap question is only going to be answered by "don't make any damn gaps!!", I'm afraid. This work is not as hard as it seems, and is harder to explain than to do. The two Big Deals are to lay them in a proper lines, and to get the brickwork-like stagger pattern correct. There's a ton of good info here and at other sites---- search "coppering model ships" and you'll get a bunch of hits. THEN, ask our resident authorities any question you need, and they will tell you more than you ever wanted to know. You will soon be an old hand at this.

john

[dafi]

Why don´t you simply paint the wood underneath with copper paint before gluing the plates onto it?

 

The mixing of CA and paint will not work imho.

 

XXXDAn

[Blue Ensign]

I'm with Daniel, don't go there, ca makes a mess of copper plates and needs to be removed from the surface asap to avoid marring the surface, particularly if you want the copper to take on a natural patina over time. Any residue will show up.

 

B.E.

[normanh]

Acrylic will cause problems with CA as its water based and will react. Futhermore thin CA is really not suited to bonding plates to to the hull,I used a Medium viscosity which works well but even thats not totally foolproof. I never had a problem with gaps coppering my Snake - biggest problem was the odd plate just refused to stay in place and took a couple of tries on the keel for those I used a Unibond Powergrip adhesive , not a water based or contact.

 

 

Norman

[src]

Hmmm Interesting idea. Like the others it sounds like a recipe for disaster but then I am not a real big fan of CA myself; I use it but very sparingly. 

 

There are a couple of chemists here, if they dont respond here in a couple of days try searching the user names, at least one of them has chemist in his name. Give him a PM, I have not interacted with him but he seems like a very friendly decent person. 

[normanh]

CA is widely recommended by kit manufacturers such as Caldercraft but not thin - low visosity.

 

Never mix CA with water based products it just doesnt work as I said above.

 

Norman

[PierreJean]

Sorry but this sounds really weird - I've mixed cyano glue with paint as an experiment and it turned out as a failure. Try it yourself and let us know - you might have better results!

Pierre!

[SpencerC]

Well I trust your guys' opinions. Looks like this is one of my worser ideas

[mtaylor]

Water will cause CA to instantly cure and it will turn right in the process.   Since acrylics are water based, I'll leave the result to the imagination.  I'm not a chemist, just someone who's screwed up more than once.