Results of Epoxy/Micarta Bake-Off

[ddavelarsen]

A few days ago I asked whether Micarta and epoxy might withstand the bake time for Gun Kote. Matt Shade, feet firmly planted on the ground, suggested the obvious: do a test.

Okay, so even my Mom never called me a genius.

I prepared two small pieces of the Micarta in question and a piece of O1 as if I were gluing up a handle. On one side I used my standard 90-minute epoxy and the other JB Weld. Clamped the assembly for 24 hours like I would any other handle.

Gun Kote cures at 325 for one hour, so that's what I did with the test piece. I used an oven thermometer to ensure I had the right temp.

After an hour I took the test piece out of the oven and set it aside to cool.

The JB Weld side popped off immediately. The epoxy side came out soft but still firmly stuck together. After cooling to room temp there's no getting it off short of grinding or a chisel.

The Micarta did not change color or shape.

Despite the good results from the epoxy I think I'm going to follow my original plan and do the Gun Kote, then assemble and carefully finish the handle. I've already shaped the guard/handle intersection and it's ready to take down and go to the sandblasting shop. This knife is almost done! Yay!

Update: Sitting here playing with my test piece I finally pushed hard on the epoxy joint and it popped. So the moral is don't bake epoxy! Or JB Weld.

 

[Dan Gray]

Update: Sitting here playing with my test piece I finally pushed hard on the epoxy joint and it popped. So the moral is don't bake epoxy! Or JB Weld.

this was gone over a lot before if you recall Dave
what these things were used for??.
Mechanical bonding and use the other, epoxy, JB Weld or what have you for keeping dirt and Moisture out. with time they can fail, I can't recall ever not Mechanical bonding some how..

 

[ddavelarsen]

I agree Dan, I just wanted to see what effect the heat would have on the bond and whether it'd effect the Micarta. I think I'd have been able to pop them off if they were pinned too, though that would help the shear.

 

[Matt Shade]

A few days ago I asked whether Micarta and epoxy might withstand the bake time for Gun Kote. Matt Shade, feet firmly planted on the ground, suggested the obvious: do a test.
.....

My feet's the only thing I ever planted that didn't die right away


Glad you didn't ruin the handle though. I'm sure you can attach the handle after putting the gun kote on. For my donation knife, I had to attach the scales after I browned the whole thing. I finished everything 99%, then browned it and boiled it. Then I epoxied and pinned the scales on, cleaned up the overflow with acetone. Once it set up I had to grind and peen the pins and finish the scales. I put masking tape around the tang, and on the blade and everything came out fine.