Fixing mosaic

[pramsay13]

I've got a mosaic that has slipped off the sticky board. It is the small plastic coloured tabs that are pushed onto little plastic spikes which is on a plastic square and it is quite big so there are quite a number of these squares. These have all been taped together by the customer and it's these plastic squares that I need to fix onto a board to float the picture.
I'm thinking it will probably need to be silicon sealant, but is that okay?
Does anyone have any other suggestions?

[Roboframer]

How about Staples?

[pramsay13]

How about Staples?

I tried to sew it but couldn't get the needle through.

[prospero]

Sticky Fixers™?

[easypopsgcf]

Try and get hold of the Turin Shroud, then unravel it and use it to lace the artwork

[Roboframer]

I always strive to come up with a fastening method before considering adhesive, nothing to do with conservation/future removal, just that fastening something in place is more secure/reliable than sticking and you can have as many attempts at it as you like without any risk of getting sticky goo where it's not wanted, be that on the 'artwork' or what it's mounted on. But if adhesive is the way I'd be looking at the best for the job and I don't think silicone, sealant or otherwise, would be my choice, it takes so long to go off and works best in blobs and beads, which take even longer.

Adhesive methods can fail in 3 ways - the mounting surface can fail (e.g. surface paper of mount board can come away) the surface of the object can fail and the adhesive itself can fail, by drying out, etc.

There is a letter in the current edition of Art Business Today (available free on line once the next issue is out) warning about silicone sealant - a subbuteo pitch was stuck to correx with it and, basically, it melted it (the correx). The plastic you have may not react in the same way or at all, but silicone sealant wasn't designed for this sort of application anyway, use something that is.

Any photos?

[pramsay13]

Here are the mosaic pegs. The whole thing is approx 600mm and the backing is made up of around 25 small plastic squares.
I have floated the mosaic using a sticky board and this was done as the customer wanted it done to match a much smaller one. In hindsight I would have probably framed it normally and overlapped the window mount.
It is now slipping as I feared because of the weight of the piece.
Any ideas how to fix it?

[Trillian]

Not sure if this would work, but is there enough space between the rows and columns of tiles to insert some fine, nylon fishing line or invisible mending thread? For example, every 10cm or so , horizontally and vertically, (or enough to secure each square). This could be passed through small holes in a backing board/undermount, and secured behind, with tape. The backing board could then be stuck onto another undermount or backing board for extra support. If the mosaic ever needs to be removed, the lines could be cut. May be a bit fiddly, but worth a try? I would also consider cutting a foam board sink mount, with a mountboard face. You would lose the visual depth of the mosaic, but it would be extra support for the whole piece.

I'm not sure if that makes any sense, but someone else may be able to explain to better!!

[Not your average framer]

This problem is caused by "elastic creep" within the adhesive firm on the self adhesive board. The adhesive is just not strong enougth.

If these plastic squares are capable of initially bonding to self adhesive board, then the easy answer would be to use a self adhesive product with a much higher grab and a stronger bond.

I would soften the bond of the self adhesive board, by heating the board from the reverse side and carefully easing the squares apart from the self adhesive board. Any adhesive residue remaining on these plastic squares would be best removed if possible and then stick all the squares in place onto a new non-adhesive board using tapestry tape.

Tapestry tape is strong stuff! A new roll of tapestry tape would probably be better than one that has been kicking around in your workshop for the last 5 years as self adhesives do deteriorate with age. Don't forget to apply enough pressure to ensure a really strong bond!

[pramsay13]

I have tapestry tape and think it is fairly strong, especially when I stick my finger by mistake. I think part of the issue is that trying to get good pressure is difficult because there is a bit of give because the pegs are just pushed onto the points.
I'm going to see if I can get some kind of fishing line in but I think they might be a bit tight.
I'll report back soon.

[Roboframer]

I think that if you were to use a fastening method, like fishing line, you'd have to fasten each piece individually and that would be a bit of a nightmare as they all have to butt up to each other. If I had to do that, and I doubt if it would be on this, then I'd probably cut a piece of mount board, ever so slightly smaller than each piece, fasten each piece to those and then glue those to a mounting board, all butted up nicely.

But I don't think, for something like this, I'd even suggest that, I'd probably glue it, just not with silicone, or carpet tape. Something liquid, just a blob near each corner of each piece; while still wet, butt them together and let them go off under weight, oh, and probably first score and remove an area of surface paper of the mounting board slightly smaller than the overall area.

[Not your average framer]

But I don't think, for something like this, I'd even suggest that, I'd probably glue it, just not with silicone, or carpet tape.

I tend to think the same, but it's difficult to recommend a suitable glue without know more about the type of plastic these things are made from. In this particular case and without being able to examine and test the item concerned, I think that this probably is the best solution I can suggest.

My logic in suggesting the tapestry is that the self adhesive has grabbed onto the plastic and the bond has not totally failed, but has instead suffered the "elastic creep" type partial failure. So a substantially stronger self adhesive product should cope with the same weight and the same area of bond without suffering the same problems.

It's all to do with the strength of the adhesive grab and characteristics of the self adhesive adhesive employed. Self adhesive mountboards are almost certainly coated with an acrylic self adhesive media, but Tapestry tape is coated with a synthetic rubber solution based adhesive, which I know will normally have a substantially much higher degree of adhesive grab and load bearing performance.

[Not your average framer]

Here's a very interesting family of universal bonding adhesives, which I want to buy some of to try for myself, when the time is right.

http://www.bisco.com/catalog/ple_bisco_ ... &iCat_Id=1

http://solutions.3m.com/wps/portal/3M/e ... 545&rt=rud

These adhesives etch into difficult to bond to surfaces. I don't think that they are cheap to buy, but the technical performance of these types of adhesives are very interesting indeed!

Although these are dental adhesives, they are not limited to just dental uses and they are designed for high strength, high reliability and long service life uses. There are even adhesives for military applications based on similar types of adhesives.