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Can I glue wood to metal with gorilla glue?

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Diamond
Joined
Jun 2, 2005
Location
North Central Montana
I have a project where i need to glue wood to metal. A carpenter friend says gorilla glue is very good for this purpose. I have been using two part epoxy but would love to get away from mixing goop. Anyone have experience here or opinions?

Thanks,

Ted
 
Gorilla Glue quiet honestly will hold almost anything (havnt found something it wouldnt hold but someone else might) together from my experances with it.


Dimitri
 
Wood shrinks & expands with humidity, metal shrinks & expands with temperature. They are fighting each other all day long everyday. Success with a given adhesive depends on the size of the parts. Gorilla glue is not that great a glue strengthwise, but it does allow some flex, so might be good here. Depending on the formulation of the current epoxy you are using, and what metal is being glued. I use Durathane (urethane rubber) mixed to about 70d hardness to bond wood to metal (bronze & ductile iron) with the proprietary metal primer, in my infill planes. But I also include mechanical fasteners just in case :D .

smt
 
Ted
I have glued wood to metal with it. It works amazingly well on porous to non porous surfaces. I've glued steel plates to wood beams, I couldn't remove the plates with a 4' crowbar. I used lag bolts as well for insurance, the cabin hasn't sagged, I've seen sagging with just lags. I've had real success glueing leather to steel. Gorilla glue is hard to work with, it expands and runs out of the joints. If it doesn't I figure I didn't use enough. Wetting the wood with water prior to applying the glue helps alot up here, but the humidity is very low. It stains your skin for days, my fingers are stained as I type this. Be very careful if you have a dog. Dogs are attracted to gorilla glue and will eat it, it then it hardens in the dog's stomach with often fatal results. Weimeraners seem most attracted(absolutely true story based on my own observation)
Tom Rose
 
Thanks guys....must smell like a bratwurst to them german hunting dogs..... ;)

This stuff definitely sound like a good try. I'll test it compared to the epoxy I've been using.
 
I have used Gorilla glue for wood to aluminum and gave the al a good sanding first, it worked very well. They oversell Gorilla glue in general in my opinion, it is not all that great for general use since it is messy and if you can't clamp it really really well then it is useless.
 
Stephen Thomas said:
I use Durathane (urethane rubber) mixed to about 70d hardness to bond wood to metal (bronze & ductile iron) with the proprietary metal primer, in my infill planes.
Durathane sounds very interesting. Who makes/sales it? Any websites? I've Googled it but I didn't find anything that matched what you are describing.
 
I tried Gorilla on some aluminum to steel. It came apart way too easy. I then used some Goop brand with a couple of screws for good measure, no problems with that method.
 
try "PLIOBOND" contact cement. You can get it almost anywearthey sell gorilla glue. My main objection with gorilla glue is that it expands, and makes a heck of a mess.
 
Gorilla Glue is just a polyurethane glue. You can get the same stuff more cheaply under other brands like Elmer's. In woodworking circles these are mostly appreciated because they are weatherproof.

It is messy stuff, and it does stain your fingers (although in my experience the stain is gone in two days). With wood it will bond more tightly than the strength of the wood itself (like many wood glues). Attaching to metal is a different issue. If I wanted to firmly attach metal to wood I would use screws. I can scrape any glue off clean metal pretty easily. American machine tool manufacturers used screws to attach metal to wood throughout the last century. Screws are what I would suggest if it's a bond that has to be strong.
 
You could use 3M 5200 in either regular or fast cure variant. The stuff is flexible yet immensely strong, and sticks to just about anything except polyethylene. Way better than gorilla glue!

Available at any marine outlet, and some hardware stores.

Graham
 
Gorilla glue is pretty messy. Have you tried System 3 or West System's epoxy? They're way better than hardware store epoxy. Make sure to clean off the metal with lacquer thinner first.
 
Quote:"Durathane sounds very interesting. Who makes/sales it? Any websites? I've Googled it but I didn't find anything that matched what you are describing."

Err, uh...there's a good reason for that. Probably due to all the industrial solvent fumes my system has ingested in a younger life, i seem to be making up new product names for some I've used, or at least running a few different ones together.
:eek:

Went down cellar and pulled the product out, it is Devcon Flexane 80 (castable). It can be modified with additives for duro between about 60 and 80. This is the one I use. To develop a good bond on metal, the metal should be abraded or sandblasted, and primed with the proprietary primer. There are primers for other substrates as well, i believe. Possibly i should be using one for wood, too, but for my handplanes wood/metal app there are no fail/safe consequences.

I started using it about 15 years ago to cast urethane rubber rollers for small 20" import wood planers. Made a set for myself, then a couple buddies wanted them. Then when i started making the hand planes a few years later, it seemed, like "I've got most of a gallon can on hand, why not try it". Since the planes only take a dab or 2, still working out of the same (formerly) gallon. Am always careful to purge the container with argon anytime it is opened. It ain't cheap these days. But handy for certain things like making urethane rubber parts.

They also make a flexane 94, for rigid rubber parts up to, you guessed it, 94 duro.

Sorry about my poor memory for product names!
smt
 
There was a thread on one of the knife making boards that reviewed various glues and glueing technics for holding scales (slab handles on full tank knives) on the blades:

http://www.knifenetwork.com/forum/showthread.php?t=27463&highlight=adhesive+comparison

Real long and you have to register to view it, but in the end they found Gorilla glue as the best, as long as the item is clamped tight during the drying. If there is any gap, the glue foams up and strength goes to nil.
 
Stephen Thomas said:
I started using it about 15 years ago to cast urethane rubber rollers for small 20" import wood planers.
Sounds like you're just the man to talk to. I have a future project that requires urethane tire on a roller that carries about 6k pounds on a 3.5" diameter X 3" wide wheel. The tire would be around .5" thick. Do you think Devcon Flexane 94 is up to the task?
 
i have used gorilla glue very successfully. I don't recall using it to glue wood to metal tho'. It is messy :rolleyes: and foams a lot during curing. place the glued object over newspaper,etc. b/c that stuff wants to go/drip everywhere. ;) clean-up is less than fun after curing.
 
The guys who use Gorilla glue that i know say that it's as strong as a foam cup.If you examine the foam that the glue makes as it oozes out,it is about like a foam cup.I don't use it myself.Just passing on info.
 
Low alloy: in my apps, the idea was for a flexible, comformable, "grippy" solution. I do not know the answer to your question, but can take a guess. First, why not call Devcon, and see what they say? (Yeah , I know they are hard to get a hold of, but they should know their own products)

The guess: Most companies these days sell a range of urethane tired import wheels in the range you describe but not as wide. Grizzly is one of the cheaper re-sellers, and I have some of their wheels on machines, one in the ~2500lb range. Their 4" dia wheels (smallest listed dia for the type wheel we are thinking of) have tires that are 1.95" wide and aobut 1/4" thick.

Just out of curiosity since you brought it up, I stuck a recording durometer in one, taking 4 readings at different places around the circumference. All were pretty much right on 95A duro. The wheels are rated for 550lbs each.

extrapolating, perhaps a 3" wide wheel/tire would be rated ~825lbs?

Although the question remains, is the rating on these based on the wheel & caster capacity, or the tire?

Might be best to call ITW industries and ask an engineer about the Devcon.

smt
 








 
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