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bonding metal to wood

I use one of 3 things. Elmers F26 is a tan colored adhesive that stays flexible. It is very good for bonding metal to wood. However it is hard to spread and if it runs over the edges it's hard to clean up.
contact cement works very well for small pieces where woodmovement isn't much of a problem. It does stay somewhat flexible and it's easy to spread and somewhat easy to clean up.
Clear Silicone caulking. This is easy to spread, easy to clean up but everything must be clamped or weighted until it drys. I use it every week to glue mirror glass to wood and it has never failed. It is really slippery and slides around easily so the pieces need to be held very carefully while clamping.
 
metal to wood

John, thanks for the reply. This is to bond copper sheeting to walnut and turned for a peppermill. Do you think contact cement will work?Clear silicone sounds good to use also. Thanks, Max
 
Are you glueing them together as a lamination. If you are I would scratch the metal like crazy to provide a tooth and then use epoxy. I use a scratch awl and scribe a ton of lines. That has worked well for me although I did have a mirror come apart that had a metal wood lamination.
I was worried about the wood and metal movement so I glued it up. Then I let it sit in my moist cold basement so the metal would shrink and the wood would expand. Then I left it in my car for a few days of heat so the wood would dry and shrink and the metal would expand. It held together perfectly. However I kept it for a year to see how it did and one day picked it up and it came apart.
contact cement would probably work if you have enough area left after turning to give a good bond. I have not turned F26 to see how well it would hold. The only way I've turned contact cement was on smaller items so I can't comment on something like a pepper mill.
 
Max has showed me what he wants to do which is using a thin metal lamination sandwiched between layers of wood for small items like pepper mills and bottle stoppers. For something like that, I do not think that silicone sealant or contact cement would work very well. Epoxy tends to be brittle so that could be a potential problem under some circumstances. However, if the metal is sufficiently scuffed and then thoroughly degreased and all oxidation removed, the epoxy might be more reliable. There is a flexible CA adhesive that might possibly work. I think that having an adhesive that does not get brittle is an important consideration.

There are some sealants used for aircraft wet wings that sticks to everything it touches and never lets go -- in other words, it is horribly messy, but effective.
 
With the unequal dimensions, the metal is likely being placed on the bias, e.g. for a Celtic Knot blank, so it engages partially end grain. For any adhesive, especially for repeated cutting, I'd allow each bond to fully cure, maybe a few days for each cycle.

For metal wrapped around a wood form, springback should be allowed for, by bending to a smaller diameter than final before bonding.

13. Wear proctologist's gloves.
 
Joe Greiner said:
.....
13. Wear proctologist's gloves.
Click to expand...

Hey, we're talking about woodturning. 😱

I think that I have a better idea for Max. One of our club demonstrations showed how to use soft metal wire such as copper, brass, silver, etc. as an inlay for jewelry. After the wire is glued and pressed into a tight-fitting square groove using epoxy, the part that stands proud is turned away with a skew. Making the groove might be a challenge if it is used for something like a Celtic knot.
 
That's not how Celtic knots are made. Google [celtic knot woodturning] for the straight poop. I re-invented the technique before I learned the name of it, and then learned some better gluing arrangements.
 
Metal to wood

I just finished Christmas presents of ice cream scoops and used quick-set JB Weld to put the hardware together with the handle. If your sheeting is on a large area, you would have to spread it thinly and quickly, with only about a minute of open time. It is thick; you need a popsicle stick to apply it, but it bonds solid in four minutes.
Check the website for all-things-glued: This to That
http://www.thistothat.com/
 
Joe Greiner said:
That's not how Celtic knots are made.
Click to expand...

What's not how Celtic knots are made? -- nobody has even described a technique for making them. Your post was the only one to even mention them. The question being discussed is a method for gluing thin metal strips to create thin lines as a design element -- not necessarily a part of the knot design. By the way, Max is already making and selling peppermills with Celtic knots.

Joe Greiner said:
I re-invented the technique before I learned the name of it .....
Click to expand...

... and, I wish that folks would just learn how to pronounce Celtic. Woodturners almost universally incorrectly give the "c" an "s" sound rather than the correct "k" sound. After that hurdle is cleared, we can let everybody know that it is just a rip-off of the Greiner knot (which will lead to the inevitable hard or soft "g" controversy). 😉
 
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Bill Boehme said:
What's not how Celtic knots are made? -- nobody has even described a technique for making them. Your post was the only one to even mention them. The question being discussed is a method for gluing thin metal strips to create thin lines as a design element -- not necessarily a part of the knot design. By the way, Max is already making and selling peppermills with Celtic knots.



... and, I wish that folks would just learn how to pronounce Celtic. Woodturners almost universally incorrectly give the "c" an "s" sound rather than the correct "k" sound. After that hurdle is cleared, we can let everybody know that it is just a rip-off of the Greiner knot (which will lead to the inevitable hard or soft "g" controversy). 😉
Click to expand...

You mentioned the challenge of making the groove. That will be the easy part. The wire intersections or crossovers will be a mess.

And I didn't claim to have invented anything. Merely RE-invented it; happens all the time: Search the patent office database for "wheel" in the title field, and get more than 15,000 patents. The Wright brothers spent years defending their patent; you can read their book about the ordeal. And while you're in the mood, learn about Richard Pearse of NZ.

Grumpy mode off. It's all part of the fun.😀
 
I have having some idle schemes on how to make a Dremel router follow a non-circular path such as a Celtic knot -- not that I would ever actually try to implement it, but Rube Goldberg might be proud of some of my "inventions". Since I can barely find my tablesaw under the clutter, I just decided it was much easier to buy a peppermill from Max. He is really making some excellent peppermills -- I suppose that I need to photograph some of them so that he can post them in the gallery.
 
In my experience JB Weld won't hold to wood and metal any better than regular epoxy. It's also gray or black which doesn't work very well for wood. I use it for all sorts of things but for wood to metal it isn't anything special.
 
John It will but I haven't used it enough to see what it's down side is, other than clean up. You can't get that stuff of your hands no matter what. I don't know what the long term use of Poly holding metal to wood. Anyone else know.
 
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