I know some glue melts (especially plastic) together. But what about normal glue (or double sided tape)? How does it stick to something and can even sometimes be perfectly removed afterwards?
In: Chemistry
You ever cook spagetti and notice how all the spagetti noodles are tangled together and if you stick your fork in it and pull, all the noodles move? Imagine small molecular sized spagetti noodles flowing into all the nooks and crannys of the 2 surfaces you are gluing together, and then how the spagetti is all tangled together that the 2 surfaces are constantly pulling on each other when the other moves. It’s kind of like molecular velcro.
Removable glues are just so much more tangled together that they “stick” to themselves much better than they stick to the surface you are applying it too. Oftentimes the spagetti noodles are not only tangled together, but physically connected to each other through a process called crosslinking where the molecular spagetti noodles form chemical bonds between each other. This can effectivly make the glue 1 giant molecule, or so inter-tangled and knotted up that you cant untie it or pull it apart without breaking noodles. If you use the right type of spagetti noodles, you can pull it off surfaces without ripping the noodles apart and having residue on left on the wrong surface.
There are also a lot of different types of spagetti noodles. Some stick better to plastic, or to metal, or to dirty surfaces. Some are applied as liquids and only form spagetti noodles after some time. Some are meltable and are melted and then left to cool to harden back up.
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