Sally hanson

[Randi 0]

OK I've gotta ask...hear alot of people talking about Sally hanson hard as nails for head cement,do I do any thing special to it or is it ready just as it comes

[Kentuckysteve 0]

Its ready straight out of the bottle.Some people like to thin it a little but i never have.I have an old cap that i took the brush out of the end and stuck a toothpick in its place and it works great for me for applying it to the fly.The brush can get messy.Sort of like a built in bodkin.

[Randi 0]

Thanks I went to the fly fishing show in new Jersey and it seemed all the people that were tying were using it I guess I was missing the boat lol

[Gene L 0]

Any clear nail polish works fine. SHAN is mentioned often because it has a neat acronym. But any will do; if you can find cheaper stuff, go for it. If you keep it long enough it needs to be thinned, which you can do with nail polish remover, which is acetone.

[FlaFly 0]

There are lots of alternatives. Sally Hansen is IMHO just as good as the "official" head cement brands I've used. Most, myself included, seem to use it only for sticking foam and other parts of a fly together, or securing the head wraps. You can also get Krazy Glue in a bottle with a brush now.

If we want a real head, we can use lots of things such as hot melt glue, epoxy, UV resin, Aileene's fabric fusion, Loctite Go2 Glue... you get the idea. they all are viscous, and make a more-or-less hard and transparent head.

If you think you might try fingernail polish, you can get gel polish which is a bit better at head forming (but takes a while to dry, like epoxy, whereas UV resin sets up almost instantly). You can also get nail polish in black, or red, instead of clear, and make shiny black or red heads.

[SilverCreek 0]

Acetone will thin nail polish but it really not the best solvent for nail polish.

The composition of Sally Hansen in order of concentration is Ethyl Acetate, N-butyl Acetate & Alcohol, Isopropyl Alcohol, Nitrocellulose. Nail polish is a nitrocellulose lacquer.

http://aoi.ou.edu/images/msds/080606-C.html

Rather than acetone, I recommend a thinner such as the Beauty Secrets Nail Polish Thinner. It is the house brand at Sally Beauty Shop and sells for about $4.50 for 4 ozs. The ingredients are Butyl Acetate, Ethyl Acetate, and Heptane.

The relative evaporation rate for acetone is 5.7, higher than 4.1 for ethy acetate and 1.0 for butyl actetate.

Both ethyl acetate and butyl acetate are the two primary solvents used in nail polish; and the relative proportion of the ethyl and butyl acetates controls the evaporation rate. Both evaporate more slowly than acetone and so the head cement will last longer and they both are less toxic than acetone. Since they are less voloatile than acetone, there will be less in the air you breathe.

[DrLogik 0]

Straight out of the bottle. It's great head lacquer no doubt. Wally Mart sells two different bottles. One is nice and feminine and the other is a more "industrial" looking bottle. You choose! Oh, and it comes in lots of pretty colors to, imagine that! ROFL

 

The best deal is go to a good woodworking store and buy a pint or quart of high quality brushing lacquer. Will set you back around $6 - $15 depending on size and will last a lifetime. Find some old empty glass bottles (Ace hardware sells new ones) and divvy it up for your take-along kit to. Don't get the water-based lacquer though...not as good as the solvent based (my opinion).

[Bugsy 0]

While I have used plain acetone in the distant past, I had better results with lacquer thinner, including a variety sold in the beauty section. As stated above, about $4 for 4oz. Look at the ingredients, as some are a mix of various solvents (including alcohol) and may not contain butyl acetate.

 

I would not use nail polish remover, since they contain moisturizers.

[Piker20 0]

I have been using acetone and not overly happy with result, I'll look at the thinner you suggest Silvercreek.

[Gene L 0]

I use store brand nail polish remover and it works fine for thinning.. The primary ingredients in order of importance are acetone, water, propylene carbonate, dimethyl glutratarate, dimethyyl succinate, glycerine, and fragrance.

 

How good does it have to be with SHAN? This stuff was designed to thin/remove nail polish.

[Bugsy 0]

To me, the objective is to replace evaporated solvents to restore the lacquer to a lower viscosity, not introduce additional items not part of the original formulation.

 

If you're pleased with polish remover as thinner, that's great. I wasn't. Since I don't polish my nails, I have no need for polish remover. Lacquer thinner is the same money, is available from the same sources, and performs a multitude of [more manly] functions.

[Dave G. 0]

Well yeah that's true but my wife keeps a pint sized bottle, if not quart of nail polish remover right at her computer station. I don't have to order or go buy anything.

 

On the other hand, buy the thinner, to keep the correct properties of the SHAN or other brushed on lacquer finish. I don't mind the faster drying rate on the fly, it's more about evaporation from the bottle and then having to re thin again and about flow out properties. Proper thinning is about flow out of the lacquer. If you want to keep the proper flow of a brushing lacquer ( as apposed to spraying lacquer) to which SHAN obviously is the brushing variety, then it stands to reason you want to thin it properly. Part of that is viscosity which you can test against the original purchased product by a drip test off of a needle ( hint , always use the same needle), the other part is the agents in the product. Mess with the agent properties enough and you change the product so that it no longer has the same flow properties LOL. You can get it to pass the drip test off the needle but not flow out at a proper rate over and around wraps. IE, it's changed even though the same thickness which is directly related to drying rate I'm sure..

 

I used to refinish automobiles, in this case spraying and you would be surprised what is mixed into the paint for proper flow and elimination of surface imperfections in the new finish. As such I used to have gallons of lacquer thinner and enamel reducers on hand, not anymore though. I've used the acetone in Sally's a few times but I think it's worth buying a container of thinner.

[JSzymczyk 0]

Cut about 2/3 of the bristles off the included brush. Cut them off right at the base of the bristles. Makes it a LOT nicer for applying it to heads and wraps. I've been using Hard-as-Nails as head cement and thread sealer for 30 years ? or thereabouts. Use Ethyl Acetate to thin it if needed, but really, for some things thicker consistency is ok, and for $3 or whatever just go buy a new bottle every year. I make sure to CLOSE the bottle lid every time instead of just place the lid back on the bottle. I've seen many tyers just place the lid on their cement bottle while they are tying, then complain that the cement needs thinning often. Big surprise, solvents evaporate.

[Poopdeck 0]

If you have a bottle of sally Hansens long enough to thicken you need to tie more flys. For 3 bucks a bottle just replace it.

[mikechell 0]

As was stated earlier in this thread, Sally Hansen's Hard as Nails is a good nail polish, however, it IS just a nail polish.

For a buck a bottle, you can get clear nail polishes at Dollar Tree. I recently got three different kinds of clear and tested them on a piece of paper.

The "rapid dry" product soaked into the paper the best (which is why it's my choice for the head cement).

All of them produced a nice shine after several coats.

None of them built up much of a thickness, so they are not suitable if your looking for a UV coating type finish.

 

At a buck a bottle ... if it gets too thick, I will replace it.