My first sign tray, but what glue?

[Martin Pearson]

Alistair, I wouldn’t have thought a lot glue gun would be suitable as its not going to get into the folds, just sort of stick to the upright edge if you see what I mean. I have used contact adhesive which seems to work well and also Penloc which is a 2 part adhesive sold by Eurobond.

[Peter Normington]

Alistair, that’s a neat way to do corners, but to hot weld would be difficult anyway, as there is very little "exposed " plastic, I would use evo stick serious stuff , I have heard bad reports about the sticks like..
I would use a joining plate though, to overlap the section.

Or any two pack epoxy would be equally acceptable

Peter

[Kevin Flowers]

Hi
i make my corners in the same way it allows you to put the joins on the least noticeable sides. I then back it with a off cut & a bit of VHB tape if its a large tray i use a few 1/8 rivets as well. I also place some 50mm strips of aluminum angle at regular intervals along the folded edge fixed with VHB tape.

Kev

[Richard Urquhart]

hi as you know i dont make the corners in this way due to the fact that i think its much neater the way i do it as when its glued and folded then touched in it looks like a welded joint
however if it works for you then thats the key part

i use a 2 part bonding glue which we have used for years its made for glueing
car panels i.e roof skins rear 1/4 panels etc etc
its made by terason and you can get it from most autobody supply shops
rich

[Andy Gorman]

I use gripfill. Once the sign is fitted the edges are held in place anyway, by the fixings through the sides.

[Alistair Richards]

Hi All,

Thanks for all the help. This is my first tray Rich, gonna try the other corner method next time and see which I prefer.

Cheers again for the help. 😀

[Richard Urquhart]

Andy has a point and is correct i just like using a fast setting glue and angle brackets and the tray is ridged and the angles stay at 90′
but as andy said once the tray is fitted things stay put
i think you have done very well
did you take a few attempts setting the depth up first ??
i find going through the ali and most of the plastic works well however if you do take to much of the plastic away the front will crack

any way very well done

rich 😀 😀 😀 😀

[Alistair Richards]

Yeah, couple of test cuts first to get correct depth. left about 0.5mm of plastic intact. 😀

[Bill Hughes]

I have never made one of these but used to make lots of fish-tanks not the same I know but they have to be waterproof and water is so heavy that some of them hold over a ton of water and they are held together by nothing more than a bead of silicon along each edge, could silicon work for sign trays ?

[Dave Harrison]

Be very careful when using grip fill, sticks like sh** etc etc on composite boards like dibond / reynobond. These types of adhesive can be used on joints and corners etc, but whatever you do don’t use it on lap joints or laminating areas to another surface !

When the adhesive drys and shrinks it pulls in the dibond etc and deforms the surface. I’ll post pictures ASAP but I wasted a sheet doing exactly this last week !