This is driving me crazy. I have been to every hardware store in a 10-mile radius and CANNOT find
Clear Adhesive Latex Acrylic Caulk.
I mean… I can find:
Clear Adhesive Silicone Caulk…
Adhesive Latex Acrylic Caulk in bright white…(or other colors…almond, anyone?)
and I inadvertently bought a tube of Clear Latex Acrylic (with Silicone) Caulk…but it WASN’T ADHESIVE!!!
Okay everyone, all together now, say:
D’OH!!!
Very good. No seriously, where can I find it? Who makes it? It’s almost as if there’s a conspiracy out there to keep it hidden from me.
I hope this isn’t one of those commodities that people in the hobby swear by but is hard to actually find from common sources (i.e. homasote, hydrocal)…
Yes, I have a HD nearby, a Lowe’s a few miles away, some smaller local hardware stores.
See my original post on what I found there. I can definitely find the stuff, but none that are CLEAR.
Any brands for me to look for? Are you guys finding the squeeze-tubes or the ones where you load in caulking guns?
Also, alot of them are “LATEX ACRYLIC” BUT they also have Silicone in it. Is that still acceptable?
The only issue with silicone is that it doesn’t hold paint, if you are putting it somewhere where you plan to paint it. It is also a little harder to cleanup. Otherwise it should be fine. DAP makes a lot of laytex caulk and I find Home Depot carries it. I personally use yellow glue to fasten my track.
What are you going to use the clear latex caulk for? Laying track?
If you are going to lay track with it AND ballasting over that, then technically it doesn’t matter what color your caulk is. (Thankfully it doesn’t come in hot pink. [tup]) Find a nice neutral color and lay the stuff down.
If you want it to fasten track down, use the gray color instead of clear. I use Red Devil or DAP, available at most Home Depot, Wal-mart, Ace, or independent lumber yard/home imrpovement store.
I have purchased DAP Clear Latex Adhesive Caulk from Walmart, Home Depot and Lowes. I live in a small Kansas town (pop 3,500) and our small WalMart has it. JIM
The reason why I ask is that just about all the “LATEX ACRYLIC” ones have Silicone in it, as if they think you need it. I can’t seem to find any without Silicone.
If you are laying track on Owens-Corning foam, clear caulk WILL come out hot (or lukewarm) pink.
I personally found clear caulk (goes on white, dries clear) at both Home Depot and Wal-Mart. Some that I tested on a ceiling tile held better than the fibrous stuff the tile is made from, so now I have a piece of (yard sale brass rail) flex that looks like a shoe after a stroll through wet clay.
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964 - with caulk-glued ties, both wood and plastic)
go to a “paint store”. get paintable latex caulking with silicone. paint will stick to it. its the 100% silicone caulk that nothing will stick to. they should have it at walmart or ace or any hardware store. dap makes it. I use it all the time. I,m a house painter.
glenn
If you have silicone caulking and need to paint it use a alcohol primer on it. it drys so fast it dosen,t have time to fish eye. use light coats.
I got mine at the local Home Depot. It’s PolySeamSeal brand. Right in the section with all the various kinds of caulk. It does NOT say ‘adhesive’ on the label. There is no silicone in it. Says on the tube “Guns out white, dries clear”
I suspect Lowes would have another brand that is probably the same stuff, made by the same company. My Home Depot has caulks by DAP, GE, and this PolySeamSeal stuff. There was a DAP brand that was latex only, dried clear but it was 5 cents a tube more and I’m cheap [:D]
DAP Alex-Plus or for a stronger hold, Phenoseal can be found at Home Depot or Loews both in clear and translucent. Phenoseal is a great product but it starts to skim fairly fast and shouldn’t be used for laying flex. The DAP or Polyseam would be a better choice.
These latex/ acrylic caulks don’t have to say adhesive caulk to hold flex. The origional DAP tub and Tile and Phenoseal are true Adhesive Caulkings. These are more suited to be used for bath vanity tops, pedestals, etc.
Phew! I think I actually found it. It’s clear, it’s arylic, it’s adhesive - but doesn’t say latex, oh well.
It’s made by none other than GE (well if they make locomotives, then… :)). It’s labeled “Adhesive Caulk” and says “Special Projects” on it. I found it at my local Orchard Supply Hardware (a California hardware chain famous for distributing train calendars each December :))
In the August 2003 MR Chuck Hitchcock recommended the use of DAP All Purpose Adhesive Caulk. This caulk comes out white, dries clear, and features water cleanup. Unfortunately by the time the article appeared DAP had largely phased out that product and it is now entirely discontinued. DAP Alex Painters Caulk and Phenoseal as well as KwikSeal are suggested by the DAP people as acceptable substitutes but I have not tried them.
So long as the product is safe for all surfaces (including foam and plastics) and has water clean up I am not sure latex is all that crucial.
I prefer the clear drying to gray because I also use it to bond ballast. I spread it thicker than Hitchock recommended (he suggested a very thin coat so the track could be removed with a thin spatula), pressing the track down into the caulk so that it rises up between but not over the ties, and then I tamp down ballast using an old piece of cork roadbed while the caulk is still white. That is also why I like it to come out white rather than clear, as in DAPs KwikSeal, so I can see where I need to apply more ballast.
In fact for those in the Milwaukee area I will be giving a clinic and demo on how I weather and lay flex track this Sunday Dec 3 at the NMRA WISE Divisional meet here in Milwaukee. As always it is free and all are welcome to attend. http://www.wisedivision.org/timetable/dec.htm
I have also seen a black caulk at the store but have not experimented with it.
OSI makes an all purpose adhesive caulk that also comes out white and dries clear and features water clean up. I get mine at Ace Hardware stores. In my opinion it is nearly identical to the DAP product (back in 2003 the DAP customer service people were kind enough to send me 3 tubes of the DAP product Hitchcock reommended in his article – that is the advantage of getting a customer service representative w
I said before, and I say again, I have never seen simple adhesive latex caulk in clear. All clear that I have seen is either silicone or siliconized latex. I would not use that as paint and glue do not adhere to it well. Why not use white or almond? I assume you will cover the caulk with paint and/or ballast. Again, it is possible that there is something out there that I have missed, but I’ve bought a lot of caulk in my time and I’ve never seen it.