How to Make Lego Tape Sticky Again
Review: LEGO-compatible Sticky Tape
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Advertisements for LEGO-uniform sticky tape have been everywhere - it seems there'south one in my Facebook feed every day.
Brickset has been sent some samples of one of these tapes - Peel-N-Brick from The BRICK Cave, which is available at Amazon.com.
I've spent the last few weeks testing it. Does the tape hold upwardly? Read on to detect out…
Brickset received four samples of the record, each ane metre long - in red and blue in the 4 stud width, and in pinkish and green in the 2 stud width. The red tape is not included in the pic just because well-nigh of it is still adorning the peak of my desk at work, where it is a source of marvel and conversation with my coworkers ("Is that actually LEGO tape on your desk?"). I have found that combined with i of those petty Creator creativity sets, it provides countless amusement for bosses and colleagues (none of whom will admit to liking LEGO, but somehow end upwards in my role regularly edifice with it).
The tape purports to exist 100 percent compatible with all building blocks, including LEGO, and that you tin used information technology on curved surfaces, around corners, other toys or upside down. Information technology also claims to exist bendable, flexible, cuttable and reusable, and the adhesive leaves little to no remainder and allows the tape to exist reused.
I solicited some ideas for tests for the record from the forum; I tried most of them.
The tape comes coiled in a sealed plastic bag, affirming the bendable and flexible claims. I besides found it very like shooting fish in a barrel to cut with a standard pair of scissors, even down to portions that were quite small. It feels rubbery in nature and the agglutinative is accessed by peeling off the newspaper on the back.
These are some of the tests I put to the tape:
- Sticking to a horizontal surface (right side upwards)
- Sticking to a horizontal surface (upside downwards)
- Sticking to a vertical surface (multiple surfaces)
- Building on the tape
- Placing the tape around a corner
- Placing existing builds on the record (different orientations)
- Temperature and stickiness
- Sticking to a concave surface
- Reusing the same piece of tape
Unless otherwise noted, length of the tests were at least a few days, and in several cases a couple weeks or more than. I used diverse builds of sets I've recently built as my test subjects.
Testing the tape
I tried the tape on a number of different surfaces, and besides tried the same record multiple times. Generally I establish that the tape tin be used many times over and still have a proficient level of stickiness to information technology. There were a couple instances where smaller pieces seem to lose their stickiness after five or six uses (and past "utilize" I mean leaving in identify for at least 24 hours, and sometimes several days).
There was a question as to whether the tape volition stick to human skin - that answer is not actually. It is viscid to pare, merely will not stick to skin like a Band-aid volition. There was also a question on how the tape sticks to a motorcar interior and left in the sunday. I didn't try this on my own car, but nosotros had the opportunity to travel to Arizona a couple weeks agone and I tried this in the rental car. The temperatures during our stay got up to 30-40C, and while at the finish of the day in the hot sun the tape got a little gooey, when it cooled again it did stay in place. It as well left no residual after apply. That's consistent with what I establish with whatever surface - no residuum left backside.
For the purposes of this review I only used LEGO products, so I can't speak to whatsoever other construction building blocks. The clutch betwixt bricks and the tape is quite good - especially if you're putting the record on a flat surface in an upright manner (for example, a desk at piece of work). As discussed later, at that place are different challenges when use the tape on a vertical surface or upside down. However, the record doesn't connect with LEGO bricks quite the same way as bricks do to each other. I found you have to press down quite firmly to get the bricks (or plates) to connect with the tape. The good news is that once connected, the bail is pretty strong. Builds on vertical or horizontal upside downward surfaces held quite well.
When using the record, I would recommend either performing the build from scratch or trying to attach small builds to the record. I had visions of trying to perform a test of placing the Venice Skyline to the tape and hanging information technology upside downwardly. That didn't piece of work out because there'southward no way I could line up the tape well plenty to be able to braze the entire Venice Skyline build to information technology. Or rather, I didn't have the patience for it. I'm not saying information technology tin't exist done - just that information technology takes more perseverance than I had. I would suggest edifice it on the record (without removing the paper exposing the adhesive if you want to hang it somewhere) and then sticking where you'd like. But would you be able to hang it? We'll cover that later.
Having given upwardly on putting a larger build, I tried the tape with several smaller builds, both on vertical surfaces and upside down. I had mixed luck. I plant that in full general for smooth, flat surfaces, the record works great. This is a pic of the four stud record with multiple little builds on it. The surface is a glass table meridian in my living room and it'due south been similar this for the final few weeks. (The Venice Skyline is non stuck on tape, I just didn't move it.)
Nevertheless I plant limiting on vertical or upside down builds was the size of the build itself - at that place is a signal where the weight of the bricks will overwhelm the stickiness of the tape and the whole creation will come crashing downwardly. I didn't accept picture of those attempts. Ultimately, I think if you lot were to endeavor building the Venice Skyline on the record and and then hanging it upside down, it wouldn't be intact for very long.
Another concept I had visions of was LEGO dragons climbing the walls, then I wanted to see if a LEGO dragon could stick. I used Merina the Water Dragon, of the smaller Elves dragons. I get-go tried with the 4 stud width tape, only I had problem (read: ran out of patience) trying to get all her feet on one strip of tape. And then I cut some smaller pieces and attached 1 to the lesser of each foot. Did that permit Merina the H2o Dragon to climb the wall?
It did - for about well-nigh a minute - or about five seconds longer than it took to take this picture. Simply fifty-fifty then, information technology wasn't that the LEGO came away from the tape - it was the adhesive that came unstuck from the wall.
In full general, I had bang-up difficulty getting the tape to stick to walls. Fifty-fifty sticking a plain piece of tape (no bricks attached) to the wall would not stay in place for more than than a few minutes. As you might have noticed in the offset movie, the walls in my firm have a flake of a texture, and I idea that might have been an issue. And then I took some tape into piece of work where the wall are simply flat drywall, and had the same event. A plain piece of tape would not stay in place for longer than nigh an hour.
Still, when I stuck the tape to the outside of a fridge, information technology worked fine. These accept been adorning my fridge for the last couple of weeks.
The but thing I've observed is that the tape with the builds on it has come abroad from the fridge surface in the middle. You lot may be able to run across it in this movie.
I found that sticking the tape around corners also worked well on multiple surfaces. The just thing to watch is to make sure that each surface has at least four studs worth of record on it. If at that place was a shorter end, and so I found it had a tendency to come unstuck.
Finally, I tried the tape on a concave surface. The same living room table with the drinking glass top likewise has stainless steel concave supports, then I decided to meet if Merina could stick to that.
My domestic dog Watson was quite unimpressed to have a dragon at eye level. Merina stayed stuck in identify for several hours, but eventually cruel off likewise. Once again, it was the agglutinative that failed, and non the clutch betwixt the tape and the brick. I tried this with the tape I'd used on the wall, and besides brand new tape with the same result.
Overall thoughts
In full general, the Peel-N-Brick tape does exactly what it says information technology does - stick to just about any surface (with the exception of walls) and provide a solid base of operations for building. It volition stick quite well to just about whatever clean, flat surface. It will support small builds vertically or upside downwards without any issues. Your experience may vary with respect to the weight it can hold.
I found the tape to be very easy to use, and easy to cut and customize. The adhesive sticks well, and simply in a few cases degraded with connected use. The agglutinative as well did not exit whatsoever marks or residue on the multiple surfaces I tried (glass, forest, pressed board, drywall, etc.). If you're interested in hanging larger builds, you may want to consider supplementing the adhesive on the back of the tape with a stronger glue, though that would negate the reusability of the tape.
The record costs $17.99 (US) for 1 metre of the four stud width (in red, blue, green and black) and $9.49 for 1 metre of the two stud width (in red, blueish, green and pink). The BRICK Cave is offering a coupon lawmaking to Brickset readers. If you lot lodge from its store on Amazon y'all can receive 10% off your order by entering the code BRICKSET at checkout.
Thank you to Shantel Biangel at The Brick Cave for providing the samples of Skin-North-Brick; this review is a summary of my own experiences and opinions.
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Source: https://brickset.com/article/28697/review-lego-compatible-sticky-tape