Hot gluing - guns

Gluing is sometimes better than screwing due to the positive aesthetic effect of such a connection. Traditional bonding is a long process, however, because bonding is very slow and our work is prolonged. Therefore, it is sometimes worthwhile to opt for hot melt adhesives applied with special electric guns.

If we use a suitable hot-melt adhesive applied with a special gun, we will quickly obtain a durable bond. The glue is applied to it in a solid form, heated and then applied in a liquid form to the glued surfaces. When it cools down, it hardens immediately. Commercially available adhesives come in the form of easy-to-use, thin rollers. In the melting chamber, the front of such a cylinder is heated to the temperature of around 200 degrees Celsius, then it is pushed out of the nozzle and applied to a selected surface.

The most important parameter of a glue gun is its heating power. If it is too low, it will take a long time to heat up the glue in order to prepare it for work. We will not glue a large element with a low heat gun, because some of the glue applied will start to harden when we still have to apply the glue in another place. The minimum sensible power of the gun is about 200W. Better gun models have a special mechanism to maintain temperature, so you can heat the glue a few degrees when you need it and thus cross its melting threshold. It speeds up the work very much.

Wireless guns

The most comfortable are, of course, the guns that allow you to work without having to be plugged into an electrical outlet. Such guns consist of a docking station where they heat up and the gun itself applying the glue. After the gun has been fully heated, it can be used for about 2 minutes before the need to reinsert the gun in the docking station. There are, of course, also battery packs where there is no need for a docking station, but the disadvantage of such guns is their low power, which means that their performance is low and their working time is limited.

Larger docking stations are sometimes able to work in hybrid mode, i.e. allowing us to connect the gun to the cable, so that when the maximum amount of glue is needed, it will work like a wired device, and when it is more important to manipulate freely, the cable will disconnect itself at the expense of performance.

Docking station

Dock stations are generally very convenient because they allow you to safely put the gun down and collect the adhesive droplets that usually come out of the gun right after work. If we do not have a suitable docking station, but only a gun holder, we must ensure that there are no elements in its environment that could be damaged by glue.

One of the most useful functions of modern glue guns is automatic shifting of glue inserts. You don't have to use any knobs or push the glue with your thumb. This is not only a matter of convenience, but also of accuracy and efficiency.

Typical spray guns are suitable for use with standard 11 millimetre glue inserts. The length of the adhesive rollers and their colors is equal. It should be remembered that hot melt adhesives have a low resistance to moisture, so you should avoid gluing in places where water may appear.