proseal hardening time

jwilbur · #1 03-09-2012, 10:15 AM

I'm just getting started with proseal. All my fears have been justified....

How long is it supposed to take for the stuff to harden?

Temps in my area have been mostly in the 40's through 60's over the past week and the proseal I mixed last weekend is still tacky. I can touch it and see my fingerprints. Last week I mixed it with a scale at 10:1 and then after application wet my finger with MEK and touched it to get it to flow a bit and make a nice smooth surface.

JonJay · #2 03-09-2012, 10:22 AM

Your doing fine. At those temps it may take a couple weeks to fully cure, or longer.

NovaBandit · #3 03-09-2012, 10:23 AM

Funny you ask...

I just did my 10's rudder trailing edge this week.

I heat my garage, but it drops to the 40's when I'm not in there, and I have it at 68 when I am there. I gave my rudder 2 days to set and it worked out great.

http://www.edandcolleen.com/short-bu...-proseal-time/

http://www.edandcolleen.com/the-rudder-is-done/

jwilbur · #4 03-09-2012, 01:14 PM

Thanks. That helps.

Another question I have is mixing this goop. The first issue is getting the stuff out of the can and putting it some surface. I have to be careful when I add the hardener not to contaminate the can if I have to go back for a second scoop. As a result, the white stuff and the black stuff is seperated from each other on the surface. Then drag them both to the center and deal with a smear of white/black on either side of the surface and do my best to mix it all up to include the black/white smears. I've tried a dixie cup as the mixing surface, a splotch of butcher paper, a disposable plastic container and all I can say is each one is slightly worse than the other. In the end half the stuff I mix gets wasted because it's just stuck and smeared all over the surface of my mixing substrate.

Advice/suggestions please?

Thanks,

NovaBandit · #5 03-09-2012, 01:25 PM

Can't help you there. I used the 3.5 oz "mix in the tube" pro seal from Vans. Had a bit left over that got chucked, but it was easy.

rzbill · #6 03-09-2012, 01:38 PM

I made a 10 to 1 balance for Proseal that worked great. At the end of the quart of white stuff, I was at the end of the black stuff. This was after mixing many small batches.

A balance is not the only way but it made another aspect very easy.

That aspect is to use THE mixing container as the measuring container.
I used a paper food cup (as a prior Sweetheart and SOLO engineer, I just can't say the word Dixie... Ughh)

and a tongue depressor with a binder clip to hang it on the balance.
Put the empty cup and depressor on the appropriate ends of the balance and adjust for tare.

Glob white stuff into the cup (with tool other than your black stuff depressor). Scoop a little black stuff onto the tongue depressor. It will stay there, don't worry.
Hang it on the balance and adjust black stuff qty if needed.

Remove cup and stick and mix in cup. You get ALL the white and ALL the black together this way. No scraping losses to move from here to there.

This can be done with digital scale but the tare process is a little more tedious. The balance was almost automatic.

Good luck. Proseal takes forever to harden. Don't bother cleaning your clecos until a few days later.

And my Navy mech son says spit works great for fillets. YMMV

rockwoodrv9 · #7 03-09-2012, 02:09 PM

I am at the point where I could rivet and glue my rudder together. I do not have proseal. I looked in the Vans catalog thinking about ordering some, but they have a substitute and not actually proseal - if I remember correctly. Has anyone tried anything that may be available locally other than proseal? I asked Vans and they said their stuff worked so good, they never tried anything else.
Having never seen proseal, I have nothing to compare it with but would silicone or polyseamseal work or just order it from Vans and not worry about it?

thanks

DonFromTX · #8 03-09-2012, 02:32 PM

I think the actual product everyone is using is called "flamemaster" or some such thing. I and others still call it ProSeal, but same stuff essentially.

WenEng · #9 03-09-2012, 02:38 PM

Here's how I did the proseal thing. I used the clear plastic solo cups. Weigh one tongue depreser ( use craft popsicle sticks small or large. They both work). Buy a package of each. So, say the empty cup and one popsickle stick weighs 14 grams. I want to mix 55 grams proseal (5 black 50 white). Use the popsicle stick to scoop out some black and weigh the cup,stick,package. It might weigh 17 grams now. You'll smear some of that black off in the cup, get some more with that same stick and keep going till you get to 19 grams (14 for the cup/stick and 5g of black.) Now use a clean stick and smear the white stuff in a separate area of that mixing cup and then weigh again (without the white stick in it). Keep using that white stick to add more until you get to a total weight of 69 grams. There's your 10:!. Use the black stick to work the mixture into its gray state and have fun. 55grams did one rib for me. You probably don't want to mess with more than one at a time at this stage. Never mind trying to zero the cup and stick before you start. The scale will often auto shut off while you are trying to get white goop and you will have lost your zeroed out weight. Just weigh th e working cup and stick and jot it down and add it to your total weight goal.

There's a chance you did not add enough black to cure it normally. That's probably why you're still tacky after one week, but it will cure. Also, regarding your difficulty riveting the nut plate that your squeezer wouldn't reach, see if you can use your c-frame to set that rivet. Think 470 female on the bottom and flush die on top. Practice whacking some scrap. You can also use your rivet gun on the top of the c frame if you have a long rivet set. Usually the one in the C frame is somewhat mangled on the hammering end but you might be able to grind it down to size to fit in the rivet gun. Being a nutplate rivet, I have used pull rivets to set them in awkward places. The AD-41H pull rivets have a completely sealed inside. I used them on the aft end of the tank ribs per plans on my -6A . Enjoy.

JonJay · #10 03-09-2012, 02:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by NovaBandit

Can't help you there. I used the 3.5 oz "mix in the tube" pro seal from Vans. Had a bit left over that got chucked, but it was easy.

Absolutely. I did it the "old" way out of the can before the "tubes" where available, or at least I didnt know about them. After using the tube, I would never go back.