Find CA glue and all the pen turning supplies you need at Penblanks.ca
Looking for your Cyanoacrylate glue to go the extra mile? We get it. CA glues are absolutely necessary when it comes to pen turning, but they aren’t always cheap. That’s why we’ve got the best tips to make those bottles of precious glue last as long as they can without sacrificing the quality of your finished wood turned projects.
1. Opt for CEC Corp glue
We carry various sizes of CEC Corp C-BOND glue, ranging from 20g up to 120g bottles, allowing you to purchase the exact amount you need for a pen turning project. Because CEC Corp supplies their CA glue in smaller sizes, you can feel good exploring new viscosities without committing to the higher ticket price of other brands. Overall, we find the 60g bottles to be the most desirable size with pen turners.
If you use your CA glue sparingly on your turning projects, opt for the smaller sizes to ensure your glue is as fresh and workable as possible. Smaller bottles also mean you have the chance to sample a larger range of their products without breaking the bank. The brand is also made in Canada, so you can feel good about supporting your local economy when you buy!
2. Starbond precision tips
Most CA glue brands come with one standard lid and cap, but not Starbond. This is the only brand that offers precision tips with their products at no extra cost. Our Starbond precision application tips are fine enough for you to direct your glue exactly where you need it and nowhere else. So if you’re working on small detailed areas like a burl with voids or fixing a mishap in your pen blank while pen milling, you can apply smaller amounts of glue in a precise area without worrying about wasting your glue or dousing your project.
3. Compare prices between our 3 different glue brands
You’ve got lots of choice at Penblanks.ca.
We carry Starbond, E-Z Bond and CEC Corp in a variety of quantities, so you can find you brand you like at the price you want to pay. Each brand has a slightly different formula, which you may notice in the viscosity of their thin, medium and thick glues. For example, CEC-Corps “Extra-Thin” glue pours similarly to Starbond’s “Thin” glue. The overall thickness of this brand tends to work well for a CA finish on exotic wood pen blanks, since it creates a thicker more durable layer when cured in between layers of accelerator.
Starbond and EZ-Bond tend to be very comparable when it comes down to usage, but Starbond offers their glue in larger bottles, up to 16oz. These bottles include spare 2oz bottles, caps and precision tips, unlike their competitors.
Purchasing the larger 8oz or 16oz bottles rather that many 2oz bottles over time will typically save you money in the long run, as long as you’ll use up your glue before it’s expiry date. These glues have a typical shelf life of around 12 months. If you’re assembling pen turning kits on a regular basis, this shouldn’t be hard!
All of these brands consistently perform well with exotic wood pen blanks, stabilized wood pen blanks, acrylic pen blanks and fusion materials.
4. Store your glue in the fridge
Speaking of expiry dates, you’ll want to extend your glues life as long as you can. You can do exactly that by storing it in the refrigerator rather than out in the open. Keeping your CA glue cold will prevent it from thickening and hardening, but make sure you keep it far away from foods or in a separate fridge all together. Always keep the labels on your CA bottles, especially if you plan on storing in a fridge where others have access.
If you do decide to store your glues in the fridge make sure you allow it to come back to room temperature before working with your pen kits or blanks. Opening the bottle while cold can increase the polymerization (thickening) process. If you don’t allow the time for your glue to reach temperature, you could risk failure of your pen turning hardware.
5. Replacing Caps
EZ-Bond and Starbond brands both offer replacement caps from as low as $0.79 per piece. This small investment will pay off when it comes to using your glues to the fullest. Replacing the caps on open bottles of glue not only ensures that there is a tight seal to prolong the shelf life of your product, but ensures there is no dried glue in the threads preventing you from opening the bottle. It also eliminates the massive frustration that is trying with all your bodily strength to break into a bottle that’s hopelessly sealed shut (Which almost always ends in a massive catastrophe of glue everywhere. Glue doesn’t differentiate wood pen blanks from fingers)
Before you seal up your glue bottle for the day wipe any excess of the nozzle and squeeze as much air as possible out of the bottle and simultaneously put the cap on to prevent your glue from drying out. This will lengthen the life of open glue even more.
6. Lay down a “line” not a “puddle”
When coating your tubes in CA glue, lay down a line of glue rather than a puddle in order to cover the entirety of your tube without pouring and wasting extra product. We like to lay down our brass tube on a piece of tin foil and run a line of glue the exact length of the tube before rolling it in the thin CA. Saving little bits at a time will add up!
Whether you’re gluing up brass tubes into your wood pen blank or creating a flawless CA finish on your pen kit, you can find CA glues in all sizes and brands at Penblanks.ca along with all the wood turning accessories you’ll need.
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