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Thread: Can CA glue be tinted?

  1. #1

    Can CA glue be tinted?

    I'm looking to make a yellow roughly the color of satinwood (yellowheart).

  2. #2
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    You may be able to colour it with a powder pigment. Water borne colour will accelerate the cure and solvent borne colour will weaken the bond. It won't take long to get a result from experimentation just to be sure. Cheers

  3. #3
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    It might help if you said what you wanted to do. Typically people want to fill something such as a crack or inlay a groove with a contrasting color?

    If so, you can make some sanding dust, fine, coarse, chips or mixed depending on the look desired, stuff it in what you want to fill, then apply a tiny bit of CA glue with a capillary tip on the glue bottle, or better, on a pipette for more control. I don't use accelerator. Repeat as needed. That works with powdered metals too, such as brass. Be advised that CA is not necessarily flexible so if used to fill a crack in a piece subject to movement with the seasons the fill may eventually break loose from the wood, especially if the fill is deep and wide. I've seen this several times in older pieces - they probably looked and felt great at first.

    If you want to try filling some minor tearout, John Lucas taught me a trick: apply a drop of thin CA to some fairly coarse sandpaper (say 220) and wet sand the area. Some of the fine sawdust created will fill in the tearout and if lucky it will be invisible. Repeat as needed. (Wear protective gloves or have some debonder handy.) Shouldn't be subject to the movement problems mentioned above.

    If you want to color the CA to apply as a finish, I don't know. I'd use a different method.

    JKJ

  4. #4
    I did a quick test last night using Mixol. It got thick almost immediately. I then tried mixing the glue with a little debonder. That made it workable. I put some on a flat piece of wood. It seemed to turn out okay. I need to adjust the color some. I don't think it has much bonding power, but all I'm trying to do is fill in some gaps on an Intarsia piece a made with satinwood. I have a mason jar full of satinwood dust from sanding and that with CA fills the gaps but darkens too much upon drying. That's where the yellowish color I'm looking for comes in.

    Realistically, I should toss the piece.

    And John, I found this meme this morning and laughed.
    20181115_101513.jpg

  5. #5
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    Quote Originally Posted by Michael Costa View Post
    And John, I found this meme this morning and laughed. (wood id)
    I cut this out of the paper once:

    cartoon_wood.jpg

    JKJ

  6. #6
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    Fastcap has some tints for their 2P-10. I have never used them myself, but I have been looking at the 2P-10 for some other things recently. https://www.fastcap.com/product/2p-10-colorant

  7. #7
    Why do you need to tint the CA? Why not just dye, THEN glue?

  8. #8
    I think John is correct in that I should have probably said what I wanted to do.

    While cleaning and upgrading my garage shop this summer I came across an abandoned "sun face" intarsia project that I decided to complete.

    I did two things horribly wrong when cutting out the face pieces. First, I decided to use my bandsaw with a 1/8" blade. It's satin wood and I didn't want to struggle through it with a scroll saw.
    Second, instead of cutting pieces of the face in various parts of the wood I just slapped the entire face pattern on and went to town.

    Combining the saw kerf with how I cut the pattern ended up making some unsightly gaps in the pieces when glued into place.

    2018-11-16 20.55.11.jpg

    I save a mason jar full of the dust from sanding and attempted to fill these gaps by putting CA into the gaps and then sprinkling dust into the gaps. But when the glue dried it got dark and looked awful as you can see in the photo.

    This photo shows the gaps filled in with the dust. There's nothing holding it place. It doesn't look bad. I would love to spray glue on it to hold it in place but the air pressure from spray adhesive would just blow the dust out.

    I'm not sure what to do with it at this point. I don't want to toss it. The rays came out nice.

    20181116_203703.jpg
    Attached Images Attached Images

  9. #9
    The second picture didn't upload.

    20181116_203616.jpg

  10. #10
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    I'd vote for dry pigment or sawdust in the CA glue. I tried Transtint once and the glue started to cure immediately, and the smell nearly knocked me down.

  11. #11
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    Quote Originally Posted by Michael Costa View Post
    ...I save a mason jar full of the dust from sanding and attempted to fill these gaps by putting CA into the gaps and then sprinkling dust into the gaps. But when the glue dried it got dark and looked awful as you can see in the photo.
    Perhaps too much glue for the amount of sawdust. I always do it the other way, whether with sawdust, powdered metals, or slivers of bark: fill and pack the space then add micro drops of thin CA glue to the filler, working down the space. I used to use capillary tips on the glue bottles, but I've switched to sucking a little glue directly from the bottle with a disposable pipette, then putting a capillary tip on the pipette. This gives me more control. This is the method described by Ted Sokolowski in his DVD on metal inlays.

    I use these, good for lots of things in the shop: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00207CO7I
    And these: https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000H7H4NW

    To keep the fill from looking to uniform and artificial, you can selectively add tiny bits/streaks of a slightly different color of sawdust before adding the glue. I've done that with good success with sawdust (tedious) and with slivers of various pieces of bark to fill an empty bark inclusion in cedar (easy).

    JKJ

  12. #12
    These gaps go straight to the bottom, and you know that's 3/4" inch. I tried building it up in layers. You think filling it completely and then micro dropping CA would work even at that depth?

    This idea also crossed my mind but I'm nervous to try it. Spray adhesive from a height so that the air pressure won't be a problem and sort of just let the glue mist it's way down onto the piece. However, the entire piece will be thinly coated with glue. I have those Klingspor flap type sanding wheels that you assemble and mount on a drill press or whatever. I'm thinking this could remove the surface glue. But if it doesn't, I'm going to end up with satinwood kindling.

  13. #13
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    Quote Originally Posted by Michael Costa View Post
    These gaps go straight to the bottom, and you know that's 3/4" inch. I tried building it up in layers. You think filling it completely and then micro dropping CA would work even at that depth?
    I would probably do something like I do when I need to fill a deep gap between two concrete things, such as my garage floor slab and the separate small approach slab: stuff something down in the groove then put the filler in the now shallower gap at the top. For concrete they make a squishy foam product like a long 1/2" thick spaghetti strand. I don't know what would work for between the wood pieces. String or yarn? rubber o-ring material? Inject silicone caulk with a syringe? Might make a test piece with a 3/4" board and experiment.

    JKJ

  14. I dont know intarsia, but couldn't you cut a thin wood piece to the correct shape to fill the gap? Then dye or stain it a contrasting or complimentary color. I am asking.

  15. #15
    Michael,
    If it was me, I'd avoid filling with glue + sawdust. I'm never happy with the way that turns out. I've been brainstorming and I came up with one idea. I haven't done this, so I can't guarantee it will work.
    1, Glue the entire smiling sun to a backer board. That gives you a "bottom" to the gap as JKJ mentioned. You could use a piece of colored poster board, 1/8" plywood (find it in the cabinet section at BORG), or even masonite.
    2. Inject clear epoxy to fill the gaps. This can be tedious. Experiment on scrap to find a way that works for you. For example, maybe you spread epoxy on the "gap side" of each part before pressing it onto the backer board.

    Good luck!
    Fred
    "All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."

    “If you want to know what a man's like, take a good look at how he treats his inferiors, not his equals.”

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