[Elecraft] Loctite

[David Toepfer]

damn, that sounds like the stuff that leaked out of the alien in Alien (the
movie) and ate through like 3 floors of the ship, just in slow motion.

dt
.

--- Ron D'Eau Claire <rondec@easystreet.com> wrote:
> Loctite also has some nasty effects on certain plastics. 
> 
> I had an old Optivisor with a screw holding the old-style lens plate that
> kept falling out. This was back about 1985 or so. I was working in a Land
> Mobile radio repair shop and grabbed some loctite to secure it and end the
> problem. I don't recall, but in my haste I may have smeared some excess onto
> the surrounding plastic and simply wiped it off. 
> 
> For the next six months, the plastic hood of the Optivisor slowly
> disintegrated, starting from where I had put the loctite on the screw. The
> plastic grew brittle, then weak, then simply fell apart. I was able to grab
> some epoxy to refill the gaps left by the breaks, but the disintegration
> continued around the edges. 
> 
> Finally, after about 2 inches of the plastic disintegrated, the process came
> to a natural halt. I still have that pair down in the shop, patched with
> pieces of PC board epoxied over the gaps in the original hood! 
> 
> I have never used loctite on anything again! 
> 
> I HAVE used a drop of thin "super glue" on threads of screws I don't want
> coming loose. The thin stuff is best so it "wicks" along the threads and
> doesn't get on the surrounding surfaces. It holds the nut just fine, but it
> isn't so strong that I can't remove the nut with a little tug from a wrench
> to break its grip.
> 
> Ron AC7AC
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> A word of warning to anyone who uses Loctite (tm).  My experience in auto
> mechanics has tought me  to use BLUE loctite on the threads of something you
> may need to remove (service).  NEVER use RED loctite on the threads of
> something you ever want to remove (never overestimate your desire to "never"
> want to remove something).  I can not speak to using RED loctite it as a
> "drop lock" on trimmer caps or resistors or how it compares with using
> superglue in similar situations.
> 
> dt
> .
> 
> 
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