Cheap (local) epoxy for mosaic pins.

[Paul Gibson]

Just a little nugget of experience that I thought I would share. Stop me if you've heard this one...

I did about 10 test attempts at creating mosaic pins, with little luck.

The problem always seemed to be with my epoxy being too thick. Since I didn't want to wait around for an order of "the good stuff" to get to me, I bought every type of epoxy I could find locally - all with terrible results. Until I tried the cheap no-name stuff from Hobby Lobby. It is called "Ultrafast Epoxy Cement" and was $3. (http://www.craftsetc.com/store/item....at=10&Search=Y)

It is cheap, has very low fumes, is very fluid, takes color well (I used india ink) and it sets in what I call "a useful way". For the first 2 or 3 minutes, it is very fluid. Then over the next 1.5 minutes it turns very hard, very fast. Within 15 minutes, it felt like stone. I let it sit 24 hours anyway just to be sure. But since it sets so fast, it makes keeping the epoxy in place after you get it sucked in the pin a lot easier. You can basically draw the epoxy through the pin like normal, then put your thumb over the tubing end and wait one minute. Then you're done.

I also found a nice trick. I used the standard vinyl tubing as a straw for drawing the epoxy up the pin, but I made one modification. Instead of just slipping the tubing on one end and putting the other end in the epoxy, I first put a wrap of electrical tape around the top and bottom of the pin. In addition to the 6" "straw" that most use, I put a small length (about 1/3") of tubing on the bottom of the pin. So the pin is kind of suspended in between two lengths of tubing. The electrical tape and extra tubing save you from having to clean or cut off the ends, giving you more usable pin!

Not as good as the expensive stuff I'm sure, but useful if want to play around making some pins and don't want to order anything. (assuming you have a Hobby Lobby near by)

They also carry K&S metal rods and tubes you can use for the pin itself!