I'm sure there's many many posts about gluing hinges but here's another. The vert stab on the spacewalker AFT has the rudder attached except for the bottom hinge. It glues to the fuselage when you attach the vert stab. My question is would it be better to drip some epoxy into the slot, or thick CA? These are pin hinges, so I didn't think the install and wick thin CA would work.

TIA,
Andy

I would use 15min. epoxy for pinned hinges. It allows time to line everything up and provides good strength. IMHO>>
Bill.

I use 30 min epoxy for the pin-style hinges. Lightly sand the hinge leaves and the epoxy bonds to them better.

Before applying the epoxy... grease the hinges. I usually take a size 0 paint brush an apply vaseline. do not get the grease on the main areas of the leaf... just the portion that is supposed to be able to move. the grease will prevent the epoxy from bonding to the area where you apply it. (never glue a pin type hinge into a fixed position again.)

Epoxy or Poly for pinned hinges, I prefer epoxy. I use the grease method described by FHHubber to help prevent the hinge joint from being glued... works well. The hardest parts with pinned hinges are alignment and getting the epoxy in. There are tools available for alignment, for both the slot type and round (robart) pinned hinges. As for getting the expoy in the slot/hole, I use a syringe to squirt the stuff in, which seems to work well. You can find large syringes at various places, I typically find mine in the wallpaper section of a paint store. Just ask for wallpaper repair syringes. Ditch the needle and just shoot the epoxy out the end of the plastic orifice. You may need to increase the diameter of the orafice for better flow, just drill it out some. After, if you expel all the epoxy and clean with alcohol, you can reuse the syringe about 10 times before they buy the farm.

I like the epoxy for hinges. I use chap stick to coat the pivot point. Works great. Don't try to clean the epoxy that oozes out of the slot immediately. You'll just smear it around and have one good mess. Let the epoxy firm up until it's in a rubbery state then peel it off with a knife.

A J Clark

Chapstick? That's a new one on me. Hey, if it works....

I disagree about clean up. Granted, if you just try to wipe the excess epoxy away with a rag you will just spread it all over. BUT, if you dampen the rag, paper towel, etc in alcohol (I use methanol found in the solvent area where paint is sold), it works really well for removing excess epoxy and is a lot easier than picking the stuff out after it kicks off. If you don't have access to methanol, the peeling up of the expoxy works.... I've done it before. The key as A.J. mentioned is that you must get to it while it is rubbery, i.e. the epoxy has kicked, but is not fully cured.

Chapstick is mostly a wax... so it would be an excellent thing to grease the hinges with to prevent epoxy from sticking. Neat idea as it should be easy to control where you apply it. [8D]

Thanks for all the replies..... hopefully I'll get around to gluing stabs in today, wanted to get pushrod tubes in place first and attach
control horns. No way it's flying this weekend.....

Andy