Cory: have you used it? Or know people who have?
Whatās the chemistry of the curing agent? How thick a layer can you expose with the UV light? Can we 3D print with it?
My guess is on some bog-standard photoinitiator. These things are pretty much in everything thatās UV-curable, from dental resins to nail gels.
Depends on the absorption coefficient of the resin and on the intensity of the UV source. My wild-ass guess would be about half to one millimeter, if Iād be conservative.
ā¦a sexy chemical trick would be a photoinitiator thatād quantitatively degrade/bleach, and a resin that is itself UV-transparent. Then layers of arbitrary thickness could be photocured, as the hardened parts would become transparent and the unhardened parts below would get their chance to absorb the photons, only to become transparent themselves. But that itself would cause problems as it would not allow addition of certain photostabilizers thatād absorb the same photons. (Thought. What about something like a blocked dye? A precursor that in reduced form is UV-transparent, in oxidized form is UV-opaque, and is coupled with some antioxidant that scavenges oxygen preferentially? Then the resin would be UV-opaque out of tube, UV-transparent during and after curing, and some time after curing it would UV-darken itself.)
My guess is yes. If itād be too transparent for UV, or too scattering, and the beam would bloom around and smear the print, we can always add a dye/absorbent, as we are exposing the surface of the liquid anyway.
Also, you may like this, another UV-curable resin, formulated right for stereolithography:
More info. MSDS here:
https://cdn.shopify.com/s/files/1/0718/5861/files/MSDS-Bondic-English.pdf
According to it, the base monomer is 1-vinyl-2-pyrrolidone, and there are two proprietary (of course!) photoinitiators. (Paging anyone with a GC-MS access! My guess is that they will be fairly small molecules from the off-the-shelf photoinitiators group, no Extra Special Sauce here. The mass spectra should be even present in common libraries.)
Video showing use here:
My notes, from just what I saw in the videos and the Amazon link with other products, is that the refill looks worth the money while the UV LED is a standard $0.001-or-so 395ā¦405 nm LED with a coin cell and for $10 is a total ripoff.
An interesting trick could be using the 404nm violet laser instead of a LED. That could provide pretty much instant curing.
Edit: Also, what about trying the MakerJuice as an alternative? How would it behave if used in the same way as Bondic?
Honest question: what advantage does this have over JB Weld? And isnāt the UV light used in the curing process dangerous to skin and eyes?
Unless itās particularly intense, UV isnāt really something to worry much about. If you were going to be using this 8 hours a day, I would consider protective gear, but Iād be much more worried about the chemicals than the UV, regardless.
It sounds to me like its benefits relative to gorilla glue would be speed of curing and the ability to build up multiple layers, but it also costs a lot more than gorilla glue. (which Iāve used to fix everything from shoes to my car.)
I find the concept intriguing, but still dubious. As a younger chap I used many adhesives in a professional capacity, and invariably when there were problems it was never the fault of the āglueāāin my specific experience the adhesives were always much stronger than the base materials, which is what contributed to its failure.
But will it bond to Sugru?
Random thought. What about using a different initiator, and making the substance friendly to being cured with an electron beam or x-rays? Then it could be cured even when soaked into an opaque material (sandstone, woodā¦), or when gluing opaque materials.
A small xray machine is doable, and an electron accelerator as well.
Here is a video of a homemade Lenard tube.
For material curing (and polymer crosslinking) it would have to have more oomph, though. Actual numbers (voltage, beam currentā¦) are available as linacs are pretty common in various industries.
Would it harden in sunlight, which has a fair amount of UV energy?
Likely yes. The question is, how long would it take.
Some people do UV-exposure of circuitboards by sunlight. Comparing the exposure time in a UV LED-box with this method could provide a ballpark figure.
The big advantage Iād assume over other glues is actually staying liquid on the shelf. Iāve likely thrown away 80% of the glue Iāve ever bought.
Thatās also a major advantage of two-component epoxies/polyurethanes. The stuff keeps.
Heh, i have some epoxy that is easily ten years old (does anything destroy that stuff?!), as well as contact cement equally as old.
Maximum thickness of a layer is 1 to 1.5mm. Yes, you can 3D print, by detaching the light, and shining it on the Bondic as itās applied.
It strikes me a bit odd that the video says to activate the LED before you even apply the substance itself. Basically an excuse to run down the battery faster?
Noticed that too. Given the profit margin on the battery-LED assembly, Iād consider it a viable hypothesis.
Bondic was one of the products vying for investment capital on Science Channelās American Makers - Preview on YouTube, American Makers Clip. The inventor asked for $10M investment, IIRC. Good show about the DIY inventors- think Shark Tank, with a single investor shark, looking at 4 products made by ābackyard inventorsā, to invest in one or more. Products are reviewed by the other show hosts, then by a consumer focus group, and finally by either a marketing expert, or an industry expert. Some products are eliminated between the review steps.
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