Has anybody found a good substitute for Dave’s Flexament?
I do not use it fast enough and the thinner will not bring it back to the right consistency.
sorry cant help. i’ve never used it.
Hi David,
You have to use quite a bit of the thinner to get it to be as fluid as it comes new in the jar. Unless it’s super dried out, it should easily become runny again after adding more thinner, a little at a time. Toluene is about the easiest to get and best sub for Dave’s thinner. I’ve got two bottles that I’ve been using for years that have never gotten to the point where it doesn’t thin out. It does take a lot of the thinner though. If your not going to be tying or using it for a while, put some scotch tape around where the cap meets the bottle for a better seal.
There are all kinds and types of cements and nail polishes out there that you can use in place of it too. It would help if you mention what your tying. I actually use Tuffilm and Sally Hansons way more than Dave’s Flexament most of the time.
Regards,
Mark
Like Mark said, Toluene works as a thinner (in a well ventilated area). Thinned Shoe Goo/Goop is pretty much the same as Flexament if you’re looking for a cheaper substitute.
Regards,
Scott
I make my own with Toluene and Goop and actually last time I had part of a tube of Marine Goop and used it to make about a pint. Last long time like that. Works like a charm. However I also like Softex a good bit for some things that either can be used for.
Skip
David,
They make a coating for tool handles that you can find at most hardware stores called Plastidip. Comes in several colors including clear. Works about the same, and you can thin it with Toluene to ge teh consistency you want. It also comes in a spray.
You can get a similar type product by thinning down Goop or similar products.
But, you mentioned that your problem was that it was hardening up on you before you could use it all…doesn’t sound like you are using much of it, so:
Here’s a ‘tip’ for keeping the Dave’s Flexament ‘good’ for as long as possible.
Buy a fresh bottle and a fresh bottle of thinner. Get an eye dropper someplace. You’ll also want some thicker plastic sheeting. Something from packaging or off a roll of plastic film. 2 mil or therabouts.
After the first ‘use’ of the flexament, when you are done with it for that session. Take the eye dropper and add a few drops of thinner on top of the stuff, just enough to ‘cover’. If you tap the bottle against the bench top before you do this to level it out, it won’t take much.
Use the top of the jar to trace out and cut a piece of the plastic sheeting to ‘fit’ the jar. Carefully slide this down on top of the liquid and gently press on it until all the air is out.
Tightly cap the flexament and put it in a cool, dark place.
It will last longer this way, but it won’t last forever. This stuff does seem to cure in the bottle.
Buddy
I have brought many a bottle of almost solid “flexament”…[read that Shoo Goo/ Goop]…back to thin by adding toluene…as stated above…Often has to be left sitting for several days and toluene added accordingly.
I usually buy Marine Goop for whatever repairs or projects… and when it eventually gets thick/harder in the tube I will cut the tube open and salvage it in a jar and add toluene…I pretty much have an endless supply of it …of various consistencies…sitting around in bottles .
No point in spending the $$$ for the small bottle of Dave’s…IMO
Plastidip as mentioned seems to be the substitute for Softex…hard to come by in the clear color.
What they said…Shoo Goo or Goop and Toluene. Be sure to work with this stuff OUTSIDE.
"
Toluene: Risk to Human Health
[i]Low to moderate levels of toluene inhalation can cause confusion, tiredness, weakness, nausea, loss of memory, loss of appetite, as well as color vision and hearing loss. When exposure to toluene is discontinued, these symptoms typically disappear. On the other hand, unconsciousness, or even death, can result to inhalation of high concentrations of toluene.
Ingestion and swallowing can cause abdominal pain and spasms and other symptoms akin to those of toluene inhalation. Direct skin contact can cause irritation and toluene can be absorbed through the skin. Toluene causes severe irritation with redness and pain when it makes contact with the eyes.
There have been reports of anemia, bone marrow disorders, and decreased blood count due to constant exposure to toluene even in small concentrations. It also has a defatting capacity which results to redness and drying of the skin as well as dermatitis. Toluene is also known to aggravate existing medical conditions such as those with skin disorders and kidney or liver disorders. Alcohol consumption is known to enhance the toxic effects of toluene. It is also very harmful to pregnant women.[/i] "
Duckster,
You’re right. I got the Softex and the Flexament mixed up.
Won’t be my first mistake today.
Buddy
Xylol (Xylene) works as a thinner too if you cant find toluol (toluene). I keep the mixture capped all the time when using it except when applying it.
I was told xylene was the preferred solvent for Plastidip…not sure it makes much difference…
Goo Gone Xtreme also works as a thinner for Shoe-Goo and the “Goop” products.
Mato:
Your comments are well taken, but the risk of drinking water also needs to be considered. Excessive dilution and /or elimination of electrolytes from the body due to excessive consumption of water can also be fatal. The use of either toluene or xylene in the area around your tying area should pose absolutely no harm at all, other than from fire. Both are quite flammable!
Now for a quick Organic Chemistry 101 lesson. The simplest of the so-called aromatic compounds is Benzene, which you can no longer buy. The next on the list is Toluene, which is less “reactive” than Benzene. Next comes Xylene, which is less reactive than either Benzene or Toluene. All three are well known organic solvents and what one will dissolve, the other two can reasonably be expected to also dissolve. Toluene and Xylene are both readily available, but my personal preference is Toluene, as it is the more reactive of the two. In other words, it “works” faster. On the down side, it evaporates faster than Xylene. Both are excellent wax solvents and de-greasers, as well as paint solvents. Hence their use by painters. Finally, renaming them Toluol and Xylol is apparently a marketing gimick. The chemicals are unchanged.
I’ve been assuming Toluol and Xylol were brand names.
Chemically, Toluene is known as methyl benzene, and Xylene is known as di-methyl benzene. The “OL” suffix infers that they are alcohols, which they aren’t. The change may have come about as a way to divorce them from benzene, which many people are scared to death of. All of these chemicals are relatively benign if handled using common sense. As long as you don’t use any of them as a mixer, as a bath lotion, or saturate cotton pdas with them and place the pad in a brown paper bag and “sniff” the fumes, they are no more dangerous than the gasoline that we put in our cars, motorcycles, jet skis and lawnmowers.
Peace!
Where does naptha fall in the line? I still buy it in the hardware store as a cleaning agent to remove fingerprint oils from modelmaking parts prior to painting.
Hi Ray,
Naptha is somewhat of a generic term, and it is used to refer to a number of different things.
There are light aliphatic napthas that are like petrolium ethers, and have a boiling point well below that of toluene. These are made up primarily of saturated hydrocarbons (paraffins, or alkanes) in the pentane (5 carbon atoms) to heptane (7 carbon atoms) range. Solvents of this type would be a very marginal solvent for flexament, as the solvency properties for paraffins is at the bottom of the scale for hydrocarbons.
Another meaning for naptha is a particular distillation range of hydrocarbons off of a refinery crude unit. This is where the crude oil is first distilled. This material is a mixture of all types of hydrocarbons, and thus has paraffins, olefins, and aromatics. This material is of intermediate solvency properties. It will be hard to buy this type of naptha now, because it has relatively high sulfur content, and so refineries further process it to get rid of the sulfur before it is made into consumer products.
Another type of naptha is a heavy aromatic naptha, which has a boiling range a little above toluene. This material is probably composed of some toluene, ethyl benzene, the three xylenes, some higher boiling aromatics, and various other cats and dogs. It likely also contains some paraffins. (This is from 7 carbon atoms, to possibly 9 carbon atoms, or so.)
This aromatic naptha has the highest solvency properties of the napthas, because aromatics are the best hydrocarbon solvents. This stuff should work well for a flexament solvent, but will be slow to evaporate.
Toluene, and xylenes work well for flexament solvents as well, because of their excellent solvency properties. I personally use toluene. It will evaporate faster than the xylenes, because it has 7 carbon atoms (and hense a lower boiling point) than do the xylenes which have 8 carbon atoms.
There are other solvents around, some of which work very poorly for flexament. lacpuer thinner is likely a poor choice, and I think MEK will not work well either.
Based on your comment of using naptha for cleaning off finger print oils, it seems likely that what you have is the petroleum ether type, because that type will evaporate quickly. To find out for sure you can type in the name of the material on the net under “search” and the name of the manufacturer. When the MSDS comes up it will list what is in it, although you will have to do some looking to find it. I supect it will take quite a bit of your naptha to dissolve much of the dried out flexament. It is also possible that the can of naptha that you have lists the ingredents right on the can. If it lists things like pentanes, hexanes, and heptanes, then it is the petroleum ether type.
Regards,
Gandolf
I had a bottle of dried up Flexament, and a can of acetone used to take road tar off of my vehicles. Decided I didn’t have anything to lose, so poured some acetone into the bottle, and voila, nice liquid Flexament! It seems to be working so far.
I was afraid that the acetone might fade colors, but so far it hasn’t.
That’s interesting O.
I tried some acetone on goop once… normal consistency …all I got was jello…