Teardrops n Tiny Travel Trailers

What adhesive do you folks use when attachng your wood trim to the exterior of your woodies. I am using CPES on all sides of the plywood and wood trim boards. I will be using mechanical fasteners but also want to use an adhesive to help hold and fill any gaps between the trim board to provent water from getting in between. When done, I plan to use a spar varnish so I was advised against silacone. Gorilla Glue seems to expand more than I want and makes a mess. I guess at some time Doug mentioned a marine seale?. Any idea what that product may be? Any other options to consider? I was hoping for something clear or possibly wood color. Any construction ashesives to consider?

Next question is any recommended spar varnish? I know the marine sites have tones on this but lookeing to see if anyone here has had good luck witth a particular product. I can get marine spar from my local hardwar for about $50 a gallon and Pettie through a marine catalog is about $100. If it is that much better, I would rather spend it now rather than later.

Thanks

Jay

That would be woody TRIM adhesive!

I seal the sides with epoxy first....and have them mostly finished. Cut and fit up all the trim...ease all the edges on it. Epoxy coat it all out all sides of the trim first...then I thicken up a bit of epoxy and butter up the back side and install it. I use a forstner bit to cut plugs and shoot screws in them. Use your finger to smooth the "squish" to form a fillet.

Once cured, pull the screws and fill the holes with a bung plug. Top coat them with epoxy. Once the entire side is all done and sealed...scuff sand it and apply your clear top coat, whatever you decide to use.

By not sealing the back side....on my very first build, I found that moisture would get in the back side and cause the epoxy to pop a bit, mostly down low where it got a lot of road spray.

The marine adhesive mentioned before is 3M 5200....not recommended for this type use.

Just what I did...others opinions may vary. Doug

We did use the marine 3m glue for our "eyebrows" which were applied a year after our build. But, as Doug said, we epoxied all sides, varnished all sides, and it was glue finished side to finished side. Glued and screwed from the back side



As for Marine Varnish, the one I would not recommend was Helmsman. I had a horrible time with it, it orange peeled and dripped. After sanding off maybe three coats, I bought some Man-o-war and what a difference. I also purchased some from Raka off the internet was very happy with that as well.

Oh, and you are exactly right about silicone. My father, a master carpenter who started out refinishing pieces, has been warning me about silicone for 40 years. Once you have silicone on finished wood, it is impossible to get off, and it will pit your finish. You have to remove the finish down to the wood, or any new finish, like a touch up coat in a few years, will pit.

Gotta agree with not using Helmsman... Mine peeled up in sheets after a couple of years. Now that might have been the Minwax stain too. I used epoxy and some brad nails to hold the piece up for drying.

Thanks for all your input. Staying away from the silacone. I just found a west marine product I think it was called Six10. It is a 2 part epoxy in a caulk gun tube. You use a standard calk gun and it has a mixer tip so you can lay a nice beed of expoy. Dries a cloudy yellow/clear. Other than the $22 per tube, this sounds perfect and the West Marine rep suggested using a Pettis spar varnish.

Caulk gun epoxy would be handy. Be sure you have all your pieces ready to go because at that price you don't want waste!

So right you are and I need to purchase 4 tubes-Ouch! They say one tube will pay a 40' 1/8" bead. It seems most all epoxy products would be quite expensive.