I just got my hands on one of the few remaining Lanier Lasers. Not much wood in the thing, mostly foam and plastic. I was reading through the instructions and they say to use CA in spots to bond plastic to plastic, in other spots it says to use this "Air-o-cement" that came with it. The stuff smells like MEK, and it's really thin. My question is, what's everyone else use to bond ABS? I'm not a real CA fan when it comes to plastic. I think my SPAD adventures did that to me. Where the instructions said to use their cement, I toyed with PVC glue. It seems to be holding fine so far, but it's only been a couple days and maybe 10 flights. (I only used the PVC glue to glue the wheel pants and cowl together, and to hold the canopy on). Will the PVC cement hold as well as the stuff they packaged with the 'ARF"?
I can understand why Lanier went out of business. I bought a couple Stingers about a month ago. The plastic warps and nothing is straight. I tried to straighten out the turtle deck on one of them with a heat gun. It looks like crap, but it's straight now. This laser is even worse. It says right on the box "No covering necessary", then 3 lines down it says that the tail Vertival stab, rudder and elevator need to be covered in my favorite covering. LOL I think they must have been inhaling a little too much of that glue...

Your absolutely right, it's MEK. Don't feel bad, I just bought a Lanier Jester on ebay, what a waste of money. These were the first early ARFs. I've seen some pictures of another Jester, looked great, but was not very close and didn't show detail. Live and learn.

When I glue ABS parts together, I use the PVC pipe cement. It will dissolve the plastic and weld it together. You do have to be careful not to deform the plastic.

One technique I've found that works quite well is to just glue enough spots to hold the joint in alignment. Then cut some strips of .5 oz fiberglass cloth wide enough to span the joint and give about 1/4-1/2 inch overlap. Brush a layer of PVC pipe cement on and then put the cloth over the cement before it dries. Now brush another layer on top. The glue will penetrate the glass fibers, and when it dries, it leaves a hard plastic impregnated into the fibers, as well as bonded to the original part. Makes a flexible, yet durable joint. I also use this method to repair cracks in ABS parts (cowls for example).

Brad

I've never thought about glass cloth. On the Laneir models I bought, the parts needed to be cut out. I was using strips of the scrap to span the joint.
As for wasting money on the Lanier models, I thought I was getting a deal ... at first. I got 2 .40 size stinger kits for $35 each. Of course, none of their kits come with any hardware, and the only plastic piece you don't have to glue together is the turtle deck. The Laser ARF seemed to follow suit. I think the ARF was $50, had no hardware, and still has to build the tail. It came "Already covered". I now know that this meant that the wing was sheeted with ABS, the fuse was plastic with plywood riveted to the inside. I pretty much got what I paid for, but knowing now what I do, I should have pooled my money and got another SSE.