Adhesives
Always have the essentials on hand when Metalsmithing or creating Metal and Polymer Clay projects. Adhesives help in many kinds of jewelry making and craft projects, especially in the design phase. Use industrial strength adhesive to attach just about anything to just about anything else: glass, paper, metal and gemstones.
What adhesive to choose
Sadly there is no one adhesive that works in all situations. Which is why we at cool tools offer many different options.
We do have a few guidelines that can help with the success of your choice.
- Prepare the surface, whale a smooth surface can be glued, the bond will be stronger on a textured surface one which the glue has something to ‘hold.’
- Wash away any oils and dust. This can be done with an alcohol pad. Make sure the surface is dry before applying glue.
- Degrease the surface. If an alcohol pad was used during the last step, skip, as the pad will have degreased the surface.
- (Optional) Alteration of the surface; some metals are hard to bond such as stainless steel. There are many ways to accomplish this, chemical primers, scorching, grit blasting are just a few. Scorching the surface is easy to perform.
