This section is from the book "A Practical Workshop Companion For Tin, Sheet Iron, And Copper Plate Workers", by Leroy J. Blinn. Also available from Amazon: A Practical Workshop Companion For Tin, Sheet Iron, And Copper Plate Workers.
Finely powdered iron sixty-six parts, sal-ammoniac one part, water a sufficient quantity to form into paste.
Dissolve one part of isinglass and two of white glue in thirty of water, strain and evaporate to six parts. Add one-thirtieth part of gum mastic, dissolved in half a part of alcohol, and one part of white zinc. When required for use, warm and shake up.
The best cement for this purpose is made by mixing one part of sulphur in powder, two parts of sal-ammoniac, and eighty parts of clean powdered iron turnings Sufficient water must be added to make it into a thick paste, which should be pressed into the holes or seams which are to be filled up. The ingredients composing this cement should be kept separate, and not mixed until required for use. It is to be applied cold, and the casting should not be used for two or three days afterwards.
Boiled linseed oil and red lead mixed together into a putty are often used by coppersmiths and engineers, to secure joints. The washers of leather or cloth are smeared with this mixture in a pasty state.
Melted brimstone, either alone, or mixed with rosin and brick dust, forms a tolerably good and very cheap cement.
Plumber's cement consists of black rosin one part, brick dust two parts, well incorporated by a melting heat.
The bitumious or black cement for bottle-corks consists of pitch hardened by the addition of rosin and brick-dust.
Take the curd of milk, dried and powdered, ten ounces; quicklime one ounce; camphor two drachms. Mix, and keep in closely stopped bottles. When used, a portion is to be mixed with a little water into a paste, to be applied quickly.
A mixture of India-rubber and shell-lac varnish makes a very adhesive leather cement. A strong solution of common isinglass, with a little diluted alcohol added to it, makes an excellent cement for leather.
Take plaster of paris, and soak it in a saturated solution of alum, then bake the two in an oven, the same as gypsum is baked to make it plaster of paris; after which they are ground to powder. It is then used as wanted, being mixed up with water like plaster and applied. It sets into a very hard composition capable of taking a very high polish. It may be mixed with various coloring minerals to produce a cement of any color capable of imitating marble.
Shellac dssolved in alcohel, or in a solution of borax, forms a pretty good cement.
White of egg alone, or mixed with finely sifted quicklime, will answer for uniting objects which are not exposed to moisture. The latter combination is very strong, and is much employed for joining pieces of spar and marble ornaments. A similar composition is used by coppersmiths to secure the edges and rivets of boilers; only bullock's blood is the albuminous matter used instead of white of egg.
 
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