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I have some exhaust pipe things that come in two halves, and I've just noticed that they're not all perfectly aligned. They're not far off, so it's not the end of the world, but I've been meticulous with everything else, and paid huge attention to detail, so I don't know how these slipped through the net and I also want them to have the same quality as everything else.

Plastic glue actually melts the glue and makes the two pieces bond together. There really isn't any unsticking of parts.

If you've used plastic glue, they're stuck.

Ya see, plastic glue doesn't "glue" really. It essentially melts down a very thin layer of the plastic surfaces that it comes in contact with, thus letting them merge together to form 1 single plastic piece.

Your only option will be to cut it. A jewelers saw or a razorblade with some patience, a steady hand, and a cut resistant glove is what I'd suggest if you still want to separate them.

Otherwise, I'd say do your best with some Greenstuff and cover up the OOPS as best you can.

 Ifurita wrote:
Plastic glue actually melts the glue and makes the two pieces bond together. There really isn't any unsticking of parts.

Ninja'd XD

This is the worst offender, what do you think?

I'd say, personally, that I'd add some GS to the top to smooth out the circle, shave the bottom of aforementioned circle to make it circular on that side (hobby knife, carefully. Or a file), a little GS on the bottom end (with the hole and 4 prongs), some sanding to smooth it out, and slap some primer on it.

Overall it's not too bad, and I don't think you're aiming to win any modelling contests with this piece, so no big deal. And I may suggest swapping over to Loctite superglue instead, so that pieces stick well, but not THAT well.

Don't consider this a mistake; consider this an introduction to conversions

You can try sticking it in the freezer overnight. I know people usually just say do this with superglue, but it works with plastic glue too. I guess it sort of weakens the melted plastic or something.

I did it with my aspiring champion because I wanted to change his loadout and didn't magnetize, I nearly broke his arm trying to take it off so I put him in the freezer. Next morning I took him out and the arm came off easily.

I won't be winning a modeling competition, but I want this to look as best as it possibly can. It will be a display piece for me, and the guys in my local GW have said that if I continue doing well they might even display it in the shop.

I'll stick it in the freezer, thanks.

 ZultanQ wrote:
You can try sticking it in the freezer overnight. I know people usually just say do this with superglue, but it works with plastic glue too. I guess it sort of weakens the melted plastic or something.

I did it with my aspiring champion because I wanted to change his loadout and didn't magnetize, I nearly broke his arm trying to take it off so I put him in the freezer. Next morning I took him out and the arm came off easily.

I did this with mine. For seven nights, no break. Didn't work

Well if it's Games Workshop Plastic Glue, then a gentle breeze should be enough to make it fall apart

On a more serious note, I've noticed that the more crystalline of glues (not sure if this is what you've used or a polycement like Revell Contacta) comes apart fairly easy after said piece has been immersed in Fairy Power Spray (Oven Cleaner). I'll leave this method to your discretion as oven cleaners, and their effects, may vary, but I just sprayed FPS straight on an ebay-acquired Land Speeder (Can't remember why, because it was unpainted so I wasn't paint stripping ) which had the effect of weakening all the joints, enabling me to disassemble it (Possible the reason I started spraying it?) Anyway, seeing as your piece is fairly small, unpainted and oven cleaner is easily acquired, this may be of some use.

No solvents, like those mentioned above, nor the freezing method will work. Polystyrene cement actually melts the two pieces into one piece. They are now welded. If you want to separate them, you will have to do it physically. i.e. cut the pieces apart.

 ZultanQ wrote:
You can try sticking it in the freezer overnight. I know people usually just say do this with superglue, but it works with plastic glue too. I guess it sort of weakens the melted plastic or something.

I did it with my aspiring champion because I wanted to change his loadout and didn't magnetize, I nearly broke his arm trying to take it off so I put him in the freezer. Next morning I took him out and the arm came off easily.

If it's poorly glued I can see how that might work, as there'd be air bubbles in between that can expand and contract as you heat and cool it.

If you didn't glue it tremendously well, you might be able to just pry them apart, maybe cut in to it a bit and then pry. People are correct in saying they're "welded", but just like welding metal together, if the weld isn't perfect, you can often break the part at the welds. But you'll probably do more damage than you had orginally. If you glued them thoroughly, you aren't going to get them apart without cutting it.

I can offer this much at least: if you used GW plastic "glue", give it some time to dry and try to break it apart.

When I first started painting/modeling, I used GW plastic glue because that is what the guy at the store said to use and I didn't know any better. I assembled probably two dozen space marines and a couple of vehicles with that glue before I came to my senses, tossed out that overpriced bottle of garbage, and started using a high quality plastic cement. Recently, I began to refurbish some old models that were assembled but not painted (I also didn't care as much about mold lines back then apparently) and I have been able to take apart about 95% of every joint that was glued with the GW glue, including many that I had over glued. I also found that using a metal sculpting pick made disassembly of a lot of parts easier, so that may be worth a try. So far I have been able to take apart a Rhino, a Vindicator, a drop pod, a Land Speeder Storm, and about 24 marines.

What ScootyPuffJUnior Said - if it's GW glue, just pull it apart.

Utter crapola, as my Devs and Grey Hunters can testify.

I've tried pulling, no luck. It's also been in the freezer for 24 hours now, and again, no luck.

GW Glue is utter poodoo, give it a week and it'll crumble in pieces, it crystallises and then becomes as brittle as a dried leaf.

Again, the only way to separate that join is to cut it.

I am very much aware that plastic glue melts plastic together. Also, I am suspicious that people who make comments like "lol GW plastic glue is fragile" don't know the difference between glue and their tale ends.

If you use the glue correctly, GW plastic glue, thin or thick variety, will make your miniatures stuck together so hard you WISH this nonsense was true when you wanted to disassemble a miniature.

All I'm saying is put them in the freezer, you might get lucky. I have done this before with miniatures that wouldn't come apart nigh the apocalypse, I put pliers to them and the arms wouldn't come off. So I stuck them in the freezer and presto, I have a detached arm in my hand.

That's not to say the plastic glue didn't work. It did. When I pulled the aforementioned champion apart, the arm and torso had a mass of melted plastic and a large pit where the glue had held them together, and I can testify that this pit was hard to pull apart because I tried it with fething pliers and nearly broke my marine apart. If GW glue is too "fragile" for you, you are doing it wrong.

Put yo minis in the freezer first dawg.

Zulta, ive assembled thousands of models over the years.
GW plastic glue really does not work as other polystyrene cements do.

Im not sure if its a fault with the more recent ones, but they seem to actually crystallize instead of weld the 2 plastic parts together.
Initially its a strong bond, but after a week or 2 then its very fragile.
Ill throw up an article on here later on and show this issue since it comes up alot recently.

But long story short, the bond breaks after a week or so and your left with 2 parts that need to be scraped and then re-glued again.
No sign of any actual melting with either piece.

 ZultanQ wrote:
I am very much aware that plastic glue melts plastic together. Also, I am suspicious that people who make comments like "lol GW plastic glue is fragile" don't know the difference between glue and their tale ends.

If you use the glue correctly, GW plastic glue, thin or thick variety, will make your miniatures stuck together so hard you WISH this nonsense was true when you wanted to disassemble a miniature.

All I'm saying is put them in the freezer, you might get lucky. I have done this before with miniatures that wouldn't come apart nigh the apocalypse, I put pliers to them and the arms wouldn't come off. So I stuck them in the freezer and presto, I have a detached arm in my hand.

That's not to say the plastic glue didn't work. It did. When I pulled the aforementioned champion apart, the arm and torso had a mass of melted plastic and a large pit where the glue had held them together, and I can testify that this pit was hard to pull apart because I tried it with fething pliers and nearly broke my marine apart. If GW glue is too "fragile" for you, you are doing it wrong.

Put yo minis in the freezer first dawg.

I'm going to have to disagree with you on that one. The GW plastic glue is well known to be of poor quality, it's discussed quite often here and plenty of us (myself included) have had horrible experiences with it. Go up a little further up and read all of the models I was able to take apart that had been glued with the GW plastic glue. Out of all of them, there were three SM bodies that I was unable to remove the head from, everything else took little to no pressure to remove. Like Jackal said, the glue just seems to crystalize with no evidence of the welding that a true plastic cement does. Unfortunately, I'm at work for the remainder of the night or I would gladly snap a few pictures of all of my disassembled models to show you what we are describing.

It seems like you could pry it open by sticking a few rods down the center to eventually wedge it apart.

Other then that you will need to cut it apart or just get the bits online again.

 ZultanQ wrote:
I am very much aware that plastic glue melts plastic together. Also, I am suspicious that people who make comments like "lol GW plastic glue is fragile" don't know the difference between glue and their tale ends.

If you use the glue correctly, GW plastic glue, thin or thick variety, will make your miniatures stuck together so hard you WISH this nonsense was true when you wanted to disassemble a miniature.

All I'm saying is put them in the freezer, you might get lucky. I have done this before with miniatures that wouldn't come apart nigh the apocalypse, I put pliers to them and the arms wouldn't come off. So I stuck them in the freezer and presto, I have a detached arm in my hand.

That's not to say the plastic glue didn't work. It did. When I pulled the aforementioned champion apart, the arm and torso had a mass of melted plastic and a large pit where the glue had held them together, and I can testify that this pit was hard to pull apart because I tried it with fething pliers and nearly broke my marine apart. If GW glue is too "fragile" for you, you are doing it wrong.

Put yo minis in the freezer first dawg.

Don't want to get into a slanging match with you, but wtf? I have been in this hobby for since single digits some 32 years, in all that time I have built countless models with many different types of glue to say I don't know the difference between my backside and the glue I use to build models is just insulting. I don't know what GW glue is like in the states but here in Europe it's the biggest crock of poodoo and has ruined many many models. I have a friend whose Space Wolf army needs re-glueing every time he gets it our of the case until one day lo and behold he got some Revell Contacta (on my recommendation) and guess what... no more ruined models only after he and I spent over 6 hours one evening cleaning off all the crystallised crap that the GW glue left behind. There are pages and pages of complaints in just about every single forum that deals with GW and their respective glues thick or thin, hell even the staff acknowledge it. With my local GW refunding all bottles I have ever used and giving me replacement models to make up for the ones ruined by their glue. Oh and just FYI I didn't go from being able to build models to not being able to build them (when using GW glue) to being able to build them again once I started using other brands recommended by the people on this good forum.

I've got rhinos I purchased in the 80's still assembled and study and rhinos assembled a couple of years ago that have fallen to bits with a crystallised mess left on the model where it was supposed to fuse them together. I have included a pic...

If you haven't read any of my posts before you will not know that I'm actually pro GW, I used to work for them and I'm happy with their models and the majority of their pricing (but I don't want to get into that) so this isn't me bashing GW but if I can stop people using their junk glue then I will, at the end of the day, if you spend £100's on models you want them to actually stay together and not ruin your paint job and frankly GW glue (Super or LPS) is not fit for purpose.

At the end of the day this discussion doesn't serve the OP, but if he has stuck it with GW glue then chance are he should just wait a few days and it'll probably fall apart a point Scooty and I were trying to make.

To those of you having problems with GW Plastic Glue - did you clean the plastic of the release agent before you glued it?

I suspect that there is a chemical residue still on the plastics from the molding process that is causing the glue to fail.

fursphere wrote:
To those of you having problems with GW Plastic Glue - did you clean the plastic of the release agent before you glued it?

I suspect that there is a chemical residue still on the plastics from the molding process that is causing the glue to fail.

No, that is not the cause of the problem. The issue is that the glue is of poor quality.

I have had no problems with any other brand of glue (plastic cement or cyanoacrylate) or primer/paint adhering to any unwashed plastic GW model.