Will elmers glue work to glue down my cork roadbed to blue polystyrene foam. I have countless bottles and just looking for a way to use it up. I know many have used DAP or an alternative to that; but will the elmers glue do just as well?
Probably not too well!
Use the Clear Latex Caulk everyone is talking about!
Just the Elmers Glue thinned down with water and use it to Glue the ballast down.
Thats what I do!
BOB H - Clarion, PA
Probably, but I do know that some glues that dry ‘smooth’ will more easily pop up off foam. Why not do a test section? Give it an honest drying period so that you don’t compromise your own testing, and then see how easily you can pry off/up the roadbed? If it takes a good chunk of effort, I’d say go ahead and make good use of all that standby glue you have lying around.
I have used Elmers and Titebond glue to attach Midwest crok roadbed to my layout. I have a combination of MDF, blue foan and Woodland Scenics foam and risers. It worked equally well on all 3 materials.
Roger Huber
I have removed the plastic film on the foam, which I assume will also help with tack… Would you just paint the bottom of the cork with glue, then lay it?
I use WS foam roadbed. I find that white glue works fine holding the roadbed to pink foam, and track to the roadbed, too. But, that’s foam roadbed, not cork.
It might, but not nearly as well as caulk. One tube of caulk is more than enough to glue down all the cork AND all the track on a 4x8, and then some, so it’s plenty cheap.
–Randy
I would go ahead and use it, they are both porous materials, just be sure to weight it down, cause it will take awhile to dry.
Frank
BTW: Spread it with a cheapo paint brush, to get it uniform.
Elmers Glue loosens up when rewet. I would be careful using it to lay down roadbed and later coming back and ballasting the track with diluted glue. It might seep in and loosen up the original bond. Acrylic caulk is water resistant when dry. Save the Elmer’s for ballast and holding down ground foam.
It will work but it will take much longer to cure, dries hard, and remains brittle. As mentioned, it will loosen up if re-wetted. Elmer’s wood glue would actually be “slightly” better because it contains binders but it dries just as hard.
Unless you are out in the middle of the Sahara, just run on down to your local hardware store or home center and plunk down $2 for a tube of DAP Alex Plus Acrylic Laxex Caulk with Silicone. You’ll be much happier and your cork will be adhered to the foam overnight or less. And, should you decide to remove the cork roadbed a later date because your layout design changed, it will be a much less distructive process if you use the DAP.
Tom
It takes quite a bit of water to loosen dried white glue. I built my modules using blue and pink foam in 1X5 pine frames and the only glue to touch any of them was white glue. Undiluted white glue on the frames, foam to frame, cork to foam, and even track to foam before ballasting. Years of traveling around New England in every concievable weather condition. Never had any glue bond broken but the scenery had cracked where the wood frame butts against the foam from expansion and contraction. One module flew through a parking lot because it was torn from my grasp by a wind storm. Luckily only the foam got dented but the trackwork was fine. Soaking in windshield washer solvent has been the only way I had found to loosen the dried white glue. I accidently glued a couple modules together with diluted white glue. It is ammazing the amount of force it takes even with softening to separate them.
Pete
Elmers glue will work perfectly, from gluing the cork, then later when gluing the ballast. wetting and then appling 50-50 mix of water/glue will not affect the Elmers glue bonding the cork, unless your using a 5 gallon bucket of “wet” water, and if that’s the case, you are doing it wrong.
This stuff really isn’t that difficult guys.
My opinion,‘‘exactly’’
Frank
white glue will work fine. that is how i did it. directly to pink foam board.
Good luck!
Christian
What tstage said