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G'day all,

Question is basically the title. I bought some styrene sheet (evergreen scale models variety) for the stormtalon conversion I'm doing and I was wondering if the plastic polystyrene cement like this...

http://www.testors.com/product/136942/8872C/_/Liquid_Cement_For_Plastic

...will work well on it? Better than superglue? (ie. will it melt panels together rather than just holding them on the surface)

I ask because I currently don't have any to test it myself and don't want to waste the time/money if it doesn't and just use superglue instead.

Is that normally what people use when making plasticard models? I'm making a template that folds up in to the shape I want, but the way styrene sheet works, that means I just have a tiny little edge to glue and I don't want the model to be overly delicate, so if the polystyrene cement "welds" them together I assume that would work best?

It works good on styrene plastics.. I actually prefer Bondene Cement from Plastruct. Its a wonderful product but takes a few trys to learn how to use it correctly since it is very fluid like water..

Yes. Go for it.

Cement is much to coarse to be using in model making, instead try using some form of plastic glue such as the revell contacta.

I simply cannot let this one pass by.

You are asking whether styrene cement is good for styrene?


@frarikanz

You do realize that polystyrene cement is NOT like cement made from gravel, sand and such, right?

Cement has no gravel or sand, it is the mixture of sand/gravel with cement which is used to make another material called concrete; Neither, however, are sutible for plasticard.

Steelmage99 wrote:
You are asking whether styrene cement is good for styrene?

It's a valid question, not all plastic is the same. I've actually found that plastic glue which works great on GW kits barely works at all on the plasticard I have.

frarlkanz wrote:
Cement has no gravel or sand, it is the mixture of sand/gravel with cement which is used to make another material called concrete; Neither, however, are sutible for plasticard.

But 'plastic cement' is not cement! Plastic cement is just glue, it's not related to building cement at all.

Some plasticard is ABS rather than polystyrene. I don't know if standard polystyrene cement works on ABS.

A liquid product such as Proweld is best. It welds polystyrene, ABS and acrylic.

Thick cement like the GW stuff can be too "blobby" if you want to stick two plates together flat.

 JohnnyHell wrote:

frarlkanz wrote:
Cement has no gravel or sand, it is the mixture of sand/gravel with cement which is used to make another material called concrete; Neither, however, are sutible for plasticard.

But 'plastic cement' is not cement! Plastic cement is just glue, it's not related to building cement at all.

Well the definition of cement is not something which holds stuff together, it is "a powdery substance which sets with the addition of water" so unless he has some powdery plastic glue I don't think he should have said cement.

frarlkanz wrote:

 JohnnyHell wrote:

frarlkanz wrote:
Cement has no gravel or sand, it is the mixture of sand/gravel with cement which is used to make another material called concrete; Neither, however, are sutible for plasticard.

But 'plastic cement' is not cement! Plastic cement is just glue, it's not related to building cement at all.

Well the definition of cement is not something which holds stuff together, it is "a powdery substance which sets with the addition of water" so unless he has some powdery plastic glue I don't think he should have said cement.

...except that a variant of plastic glue is CALLED 'plastic cement'. Another popular name is 'polystrene cement', that's what I've ALWAYS called plastic glue because it's generally written on the label. Again, no limey powder involved, it's just the name for the product. You may just need to accept this! :-)



<-- My favourite poly cement, incidentally.

Don't feed the trolls...

 JohnnyHell wrote:

frarlkanz wrote:

 JohnnyHell wrote:

frarlkanz wrote:
Cement has no gravel or sand, it is the mixture of sand/gravel with cement which is used to make another material called concrete; Neither, however, are sutible for plasticard.

But 'plastic cement' is not cement! Plastic cement is just glue, it's not related to building cement at all.

Well the definition of cement is not something which holds stuff together, it is "a powdery substance which sets with the addition of water" so unless he has some powdery plastic glue I don't think he should have said cement.

...except that a variant of plastic glue is CALLED 'plastic cement'. Another popular name is 'polystrene cement', that's what I've ALWAYS called plastic glue because it's generally written on the label. Again, no limey powder involved, it's just the name for the product. You may just need to accept this! :-)



<-- My favourite poly cement, incidentally.

I know what plastic glue is...I even sugested using your 'favourite' earlier in this thread...

 Peregrine wrote:

Steelmage99 wrote:
You are asking whether styrene cement is good for styrene?

It's a valid question, not all plastic is the same. I've actually found that plastic glue which works great on GW kits barely works at all on the plasticard I have.

You are right. I have found that some of the products from Plastruct cannot be glued with poly cement because they are not made from styrene.

The joke came about because the OP is well aware that he has bought styrene sheet.


@frarlkanz
Just admit you misunderstood and go away.
Better yet....just go away.
I should have remembered rule 1: "Do not engage a person with a non-capitalized seemingly random name on a written forum"

Steelmage99 wrote:
@frarlkanz
Just admit you misunderstood and go away.
Better yet....just go away.
I should have remembered rule 1: "Do not engage a person with a non-capitalized seemingly random name on a written forum"

I didn't misunderstand, some people use materials which are not normal used for model making such as epoxy resins and even blue tac.

Steelmage99 wrote:
I simply cannot let this one pass by.

You are asking whether styrene cement is good for styrene?

I of course realise the apparent silliness of asking whether a glue called "polystyrene cement" works on a product called "styrene sheet".

However I asked because I'm all too aware of the huge variation you can get in a family of polymers and I wanted to know if it was a good idea/is it what people use on styrene sheet/is there something better for gluing together those really fine edges that have very low contact areas. I wasn't aware if the structure of this styrene was the same as those that model kits are made from and if it would "weld" to the same degree or maybe it is a tighter structure and wouldn't weld as well or maybe it's a looser structure and would melt straight through it. Many foams are polystyrene but I sure as heck wouldn't be recommending polystyrene cement for them, unless your objective is to have a giant hole in them

I had no doubt it would, to some degree, melt styrene sheet, I just didn't know if it would be appropriate for my gluing needs.

The back of the evergreen scale models sheet packs have a bunch of info, including 'cementing'. It includes 'testors plastic cement', specifically worded. Out of all the different plastic glues you somehow randomly found the exact one it says on the plasticard package (you know an awful many buzzwords for being clueless as well)? What're the odds.

 Johnno wrote:
The back of the evergreen scale models sheet packs have a bunch of info, including 'cementing'. It includes 'testors plastic cement', specifically worded. Out of all the different plastic glues you somehow randomly found the exact one it says on the plasticard package (you know an awful many buzzwords for being clueless as well)? What're the odds.

That is quite a coincidence considering my evergreen sheets didn't come with anything written on the packaging, it was just in a big stack on the store shelf with "evergreen styrene sheet, 0.030"" written on it The reason I picked testors plastic cement was because it's the one I used back home for the past 15 years so it was the first one to come to mind

Rather than backbiting each other and indulging in analysis of the etymology of the word "cement", could we please concentrate on helping to answer the original question with useful information?

frarlkanz wrote:

Steelmage99 wrote:
@frarlkanz
Just admit you misunderstood and go away.
Better yet....just go away.
I should have remembered rule 1: "Do not engage a person with a non-capitalized seemingly random name on a written forum"

I didn't misunderstand, some people use materials which are not normal used for model making such as epoxy resins and even blue tac.

please open up your google, and search "stephen fry kinetic typography". When you are done, come back to us with your puritan views on the word cement. We have been referring to plastic adhesives as plastic cement for a very long time.

Yes, most plastic cement will work, but you may find the bond isn't as strong as the ones you find in the plastic kits. My suggestion if you are doing anything, anything at all fiddly, is to use pins+superglue. When and if I stop being lazy, I will upload photographs of my work building magnetized missile launchers onto space marine tank hatches. The connections required thin bits of plasticard, and the glue on its own simply was not strong enough for the fiddly work. If you are building larger things, plastic cement is fine.

 poda_t wrote:
[please open up your google, and search "stephen fry kinetic typography". When you are done, come back to us with your puritan views on the word cement. We have been referring to plastic adhesives as plastic cement for a very long time.

I love Stephen Fry, he has such a way with words, I could listen to him for hours regardless of the topic he's talking about, lol.

Yes, most plastic cement will work, but you may find the bond isn't as strong as the ones you find in the plastic kits. My suggestion if you are doing anything, anything at all fiddly, is to use pins+superglue. When and if I stop being lazy, I will upload photographs of my work building magnetized missile launchers onto space marine tank hatches. The connections required thin bits of plasticard, and the glue on its own simply was not strong enough for the fiddly work. If you are building larger things, plastic cement is fine.

Cool, that's basically what I wanted to know, so it probably won't be sufficient to run a bead of plastic cement along the back of a panel which is only joined at a fine edge and trust they'll weld together as if I were welding sheet metal.

AllSeeingSkink wrote:

 poda_t wrote:
[please open up your google, and search "stephen fry kinetic typography". When you are done, come back to us with your puritan views on the word cement. We have been referring to plastic adhesives as plastic cement for a very long time.

I love Stephen Fry, he has such a way with words, I could listen to him for hours regardless of the topic he's talking about, lol.

Yes, most plastic cement will work, but you may find the bond isn't as strong as the ones you find in the plastic kits. My suggestion if you are doing anything, anything at all fiddly, is to use pins+superglue. When and if I stop being lazy, I will upload photographs of my work building magnetized missile launchers onto space marine tank hatches. The connections required thin bits of plasticard, and the glue on its own simply was not strong enough for the fiddly work. If you are building larger things, plastic cement is fine.

Cool, that's basically what I wanted to know, so it probably won't be sufficient to run a bead of plastic cement along the back of a panel which is only joined at a fine edge and trust they'll weld together as if I were welding sheet metal.

no that will work just fine. I'm talking you'll need to pin stuff if you're working with something like.... 4-6 mm of surface area and need it to support more than just it's own weight.