Herman, is the Plexus glue so expensive? $80 for a cartridge of 380ml? Ans $120 for an apllication gun?
http://www.jamestowndistributors.com/userportal/show_product.do?pid=4885
Would you recommend Araldite 2031 for my application?
The fact that it’s black is a good one, but it is epoxy (not MMA) and i am a bit sceptical if it’s a brittle or not.
Here is the TDS:
http://www.filzring.de/FILZRING-DSL/Araldite-TDB/Araldite-2031.pdf
I would use the 3M Scotch weld DP490. It is an epoxy adhesive, but it is used to fix the fins to the diffusor in motorsports.
Do you know any distributor in Europe having it in stock?
Did a search and there seem to be very few distributors of this particular epoxy in the US.
It’s also much more expensive than the rest of the “less particular” adhesives.
The DP490 is a allround weapon. It can be used for everything. We bonded a aluminium insert in a wishbone wit the DP490. It had a diameter of 10mm and has been 10mm long. When we made the pull test we killed the ascoball joint!
Do you know if i will need any primer when i bond stainless steel to carbon?
The one site I saw with a price has it at 5x the price of other resins from 3m in the dp series! I thought it was a mistake.
I am considering switching to Plexus MA425 from the toughened Hysol I currently use for structural boding, but have never used it before. Does MA glue have a strong/dangerous odor? I only ask because the shop where i do this kind of work is not terribly well ventilated… thanks!
Also, anyone use Devcon 14320? This needs to be very strong… its more readily available and uses a gun I already own…thanks!
You don’t need a primer. Clean the steel with aceton and may be you can rough it a bit. For the carbon just release the peelply.
The price should be about 24€/50ml.
The only problem with plexus is that its difficult to get a nice finish.
You can use a rubber toughened epoxy adhesive like SP/Gurit 345 and put some black pigment in it if you are bonding to carbon. Tack the part in place to start with , mask up the area, sand, then fillet, a light coat of black pigmented resin then peel ply. When cured remove the peel ply and tape and you have a structural joint that looks proffesional too.
Thickening epoxy resin with fillers is just wasting time in comparison to structural adhesive epoxy.
If you look at the performance characteristics, you will see that it has a perfect sheer strength (36.1MPa for carbon), much better than any other adhesive i have come around.
http://multimedia.3m.com/mws/mediawebserver?66666UuZjcFSLXTtoXfc5Xs6EVuQEcuZgVs6EVs6E666666–
Nice idea, but the final bead will have the “roughness” of the peel-ply, right?
I contacted 3m directly and got a response that dp490 is not available in the states…
I was also told that dp460 and dp420 are equivalent.
Correct, it will have the texture of the peel ply but it will look a lot better than if you leave it straight off the fillet tool. I f your parts are gloss it looks very clean and tidy. I’ve just made a rear diffuser for a car this way. Anyway try a sample ,see what you think.
For Plexus MA425: It needs a (simple) primer, called PC-120 when bonding to aluminium, stainless steel or nylon.
Plexus MA425 can be replaced by Plexus MA1025, which is low odour and low shrinkage.
Nice, i will try it.
Just looked at the following link (bottom of the page).
A nice idea for a very basic “fillet tool”. 
http://www.jcrocket.com/quicktips.shtml
The difference with DP490 is its temperature capability. 460 and 410 are basically low temp adhesives as I remember with varying cure times. DP490 is an adhesive used for higher temp applications so, make sure that doesnt come into your requirements