I keep all my various adhesive & lubricant tubes standing on their nose or tail in a can, so as to avoid smashing them underneath something else.
This one got opened for a project (the previous tube’s contents having turned into gum) and wound up on the Electronics Workbench overnight. That was long enough for a few drops of glue to leak out of the (I thought) securely tightened cap and wick along the length of the tube against the workbench.
You can’t tell by looking, but that tube is glued down tight.
I managed to chop the tube off the workbench using a stiff scraper, at the cost of a small nick near the top. Even though it’s now sealed with some flexible caulk, it’ll be gum before I need it next… but it won’t leak, because it’s sitting on its tail in a can.
Drat!
FWIW, the workbench surface is leftover laminate flooring from the kitchen / laundry room reflooring project. Works great and should last basically forever.
The Smell of Molten Projects in the Morning 
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10 responses to “Sideways Cyanoacrylate Glue: Bad Idea”
Keep your cyano-acrylate in the fridge (+4C or so), and it won’t turn into gum or set…
and it won’t turn into gum
I’ll give that a try with the open tube, which still seems to be liquid…
The trick will be remembering to not open another tube!
Yeah, I picked up this hint from a client a couple of years ago and it’s amazing how much it helps. Seems to work on RTV, too.
I keep several glues in my lab’s mini fridge, along with flux, paint sticks, other chemicals.
other chemicals
Caffeine delivery systems…
I worry about having a fridge in the lab, and about keeping chemicals in it. There’s a reason for explosion-proof refrigerators. My dad was working on designing gas chromatographs once upon a time, and their refrigerator, filled with bottles of acetone (for dilution and running through the GC) and pesticides (the actual samples) exploded one day when the compressor powered up. It wasn’t a pleasant thing to be involved with, he said.
wasn’t a pleasant thing
I occasionally worry about the shelf of solvents a few dozen feet from the oil furnace, but … an explosion-proof storage cabinet doesn’t actually bottle up the vapors.
Well, that’s why they’re supposed to have positive remote ventilation, by code…
Mmm, maybe I could tie this into the radon vent…
explosive *and* radioactive! what could possible go wrong?