Hi All
I will be gluing down large sheets of insulation foam down to my benchwork.
I would have to buy a couple of cases of the glue in tubes. If I can get glue by the
the gallon what should I get?
Thanks Tons
I’ve never had much luck gluing down foam. You can buy Elmer’s by the gallon at places like Staples but if air can’t get to it it never dries. I use Liquid Nails for foam or caulk. It is only a couple of dollars a tube and works well.
You must be building the mother of all layouts if you need that much caulk to attach your foam! White glue or carpenter’s glue probably won’t work as well as adhesive caulk or foamboard glue. So far I’ve attached the equivalent of three 4 x 8 sheets of 2" foam including one scenic section where if I’ve stacked some up pancake style to form a mountain, as well as laying about 20 strips of N scale cork roadbed. I am just at the end of my second tube.
You don’t need much when using caulk, especially if you are not using a plywood base under the foam. When attaching larger sheet-sized sections a bead spaced 12-14 inches apart is more than enough.
Frank B.
Dorval, Canada
My layout is 2 layers of 2" foam on top of 1/4" plywood. The glue between each layer is Elmer’s Carpenter’s glue (the yellow stuff). They key is to be pateient - since the foam isn’t very porous, it takes a while to dry. I only do one layer at a tiem - glue the first foam to the plywood, weight it down (I was using all my old MRs, but I will be getting rid of most of those since I got the 75 year DVD - I guess that’s a downside to going electronic). After that layer dries, I glue the top layer of foam on in the same way. I usually leave 2 full days between gluing layers, and it doesn’t totally dry for up to a week.
On my previous layout, I had the foam glued directly to open grid benchwork. ALso using yellow glue, or Titebond wood glue. Both worked, and were definitely secure - more than once I bashed my head against the bottom and it never came loose.
Latex caulk works too, also be sure to allow plenty of drying time. The Liquid Nails for Foamboard is the only product I’ve ever had a failure with - I initially built a test layout using 2 pieces of foam (2x 2x8 to make a 4x8), gluing the foam to some wood crosspeices to hold it together. After 3 days weights down, it literally fell apart trying to move it. The Liquid Nails was dried hard, but had no strength at all. Could be just me, but I also tried some other Liquid Nails product intended to attach thigns to tile, in this case attaching a toilet paper holder in the bathroom. 2 weeks later is FINALLY set enough that it held. And it was NOT near the show or tub that it kept getting damp. Definitely the right product, as it was one of the uses mentioned on the package. Twice burned, I just don’t buy ANY Liquid Nails brand products anymore.
–Randy
Latex caulk is not construction adhesive. Liquid Nails does make Panel and Foam Adhesive (LN-609) which is specifically designed for construction projects like attaching foam to wood. There is also Projects and Foamboard adhesive (LN-604) which is also designed for attaching foamboard to wood. There are specific installation instructions which may not include just laying down a bead and slapping the foam down. While we in the hobby have found alternate used for common adhesives, sometimes we find things don’t always work out well when used for alternate purposes. (BTW the LN-604 product has a 28 day cure time).
Randy, funny you should mention Liquid Nails, as I too have had no success with it either. I remember a few years back I bought a tube of the stuff after reading about it in MR and tried to secure some cork roadbed to my layout. Even after a couple of days it wasn’t holding properly. I was thinking that maybe the tube I had was a dud or perhaps I was doing something wrong. I pitched the tube out and now whenever I’m at Home Depot and I see Liquid Nails on the shelf I still wonder what it’s good for.
Frank
I glued down this sea of pink with about a tube and a half of PL300. It is on open grid. Now most of the track is laid I have started cutting parts out and lifting them up to build terrain. My foam mountains will be hollow. I found that covering the whole thing and removing the bits you don’t need easier than adding bits of plywood here and there because of a slight change in plans when doing cookie cutter. Any foam I cut out is used for mountain building and even doing that I have had to buy more. To remove it I cut out the piece with a knife, then get under the layout, give it a punch and it pops off.
I use caulk to stick layers of foam together for terrain because it is easier to cut through when carving, it stays soft. Carving through hard glue can be a real pain. Also if you bump your masterpiece it just wiggles and saves some damage.
If you use PL300 it says to put glue on, press into place, then lift off to vent. I could not lift it off to vent. Once that sucker was pressed into place it was not coming off. no way no how.[(-D]
Brent[C):-)]
I use cheap latex caulk to glue foam to foam and foam to wood. Works fine for me. I also use it to glue down the cork roadbed and to fasten the track to the cork.
guess everyone’s mileage varies with conditions
I’ll go along with Bob, cheap latex caulk works fine for me. You do not need to coat the whole piece either. Just a bead, spread out. along the edges and a few beads in each direction. I don’t spread the beads as thin as I do between cork and foam or cork and track. You have time to align the pieces properly, unlike contact cement. I let mine set overnight before doing any major work on it, but a clamp or two would hold it in place if you needed to do additional carving or the like sooner.
Good luck,
Richard
Another vote on the inexpensive latex caulk bandwagon:
Product: DAP Alex Plus Acrylic Latex Caulk with Silicone
Application need: Caulk gun
Working/Dry time: 45 minutes/8 hours or overnight
Works on: Foam to foam , foam to cork, cork to cork, cork to track, wood to track, wood to wood, etc.
Results: Holds VERY well. However, with the aid of a broad putty knife, glued pieces can be “gently” pried apart with little to no damage to foam.
Odor: Virtually none
Cost: $2/tube (Home Depot or Lowe’s)
I use this for holding down my track and cork roadbed and have been VERY happy with the results.
Tom
I have had great results using foam safe pl300 on foamboard.
When having to glue roadbed down I use a latex caulking and when I have to glue track to the roadbed I also use the latex caulking like mentioned above.
We all probably have our favorite “go-to” solution for adhesives. I use Liquid Nails for gluing subroadbed (California Roadbed/homasote over plywood) and also use it to secure flextrack on top of the homasote.
Some people use caulk. I use liquid nails. Never had a problem with it (other than it setting up too fast occasionally). It’s always been my go-to adhesive.
You can use white glue (Elmer’s) or yellow carpenter’s glue to secure foam. But it isn’t very strong.
I use either construction adhesive or latex caulk, both come in tubes and you apply it with a caulking gun. Both hold well, go one easily, and dry overnight.
You want to be careful about what type of construction adhesive you buy. Plain Liquid Nails and it’s competitors are solvent based and are said to eat foamboard. There are other types which will say “Safe for Foamboard” right on the tube. I used a product called PL300 with excellent results. Latex caulk also works very well and being latex it is always safe for foamboard. I’d say both products are about equal for sticking down foamboard.
I can’t believe all the great help here. FANTASTIC!
Any way, I didn’t really mean I was going to need 2 cases of glue it was just my feeble way at trying to be funny. And the gallon thing I had seen some YouTube videos from Trainmasters store layout and they were using some glue that was being poured and spread on with an applicator.
I will give the PL300 a shot I should really only need 3 or 4 tubes.
I will post up some picks when I get it down.
Thanks Again
Duane
High All:
I was able to glue my foam to the bench work yesterday. I got all the books and other things to weigh it down while it dried.
I used Corning 2" Formular 150 and gluing it down with PL 300.
The surface isn’t flat anymore it’s got a slight waviness to it every few inches the full length of the foam. Will it go back to being flat again as time goes? It has been a little over 24 hours drying time before I removed the weight.
I also when applying the foam did slide it around a little to flatten the glue beads out a bit before putting it into final position.
I am really hoping this will not effect things when it comes to the track laying.
This is really at a point of no return and not cost effective for a redo at $26.00 a sheet and I had to buy two.
Thank you for putting up with my crazy questions.
Duane
I think you should not have any problems at all.
I used the same stuff you are using and my layout is still good after 5 years…I used an open grid of 1/2" maple/birch plywood for the framework.
You will find slight variations in foam sheets …even with the same brand…sometimes it can work to your advantage.