What properties necessitate the seemingly endless array of adhesives available? It seems like one good glue should be fine for everything. Can someone help me break them down into categories?

Question

I do construction and the number of adhesives is mind boggling. Really, the only glue that seems to bond anything is plumbers goop.

I guess I somewhat understand the concept of “solvent welding” in that certain glues melt some of the parts their bonding. But often, say with general construction adhesive, it’ll just not stick to plastics at all and you can peel it off after it dries.

Is there an easy way to understand all these things without pouring over the fine print of all the sundry tubes of stuff?

In: Chemistry

Answer 1

The main problem with plastics is that though we classify them as “plastics” in general there are a ton of different varieties. For eg. PVC,PC,PPE,etc and these are just the families with varieties existing inside them as well. Plus some applications use blends of two or more different plastics. What works for one particular material doesn’t always work for others. Generic ones which claim to work on all usually only manage a very weak bond and hence you see the peeling off often