The Small Pressure Sensitive Adhesive Bonding Compendium by Lohmann

Tips for the selection and application of PSAs

It is often difficult to find the right adhesive tape for an adhesive joint. A multitude of influencing factors must be taken into account. For this purpose, Lohmann's Bonding Engineers have created the small compendium for pressure-sensitive adhesive bonding. It is aimed at users of the adhesive tapes of our DuploCOLL® product family and serves as a guide for the selection and application of different types of pressure-sensitive adhesives.

On this page you can learn more about the selection and use of our adhesive tapes or just download the PSA compendium directly:

Bonding Compendium (en) 


The correct surface preparation

The correct preparation of the surfaces to be bonded is an elementary component in the application of adhesive tapes. The surfaces must be clean, dry and free of grease so as not to disturb the bonding process.

Users of Lohmann adhesive tapes may use a variety of cleaning agents:

Contamination Hydrocarbons Alcohols Ketones, Esters
Cutting oil 0 0 +
Preservative oil + 0 +
Waxes + 0 0
Lubricants + 0 +
Resin + + +
Adhesive (not cured) - 0 0
Finger prints - + +
Silicone oil - - -

+ = suitable // 0 = limited suitability // - = not suitable

All solvents must evaporate without residue before bonding, the solvent resistance of the material to be bonded must be tested beforehand.


Surface energy

Pressure-sensitive adhesives are materials that simultaneously exhibit characteristics of liquids and solids. This special property is called viscoelasticity.

Wetting means the formation of a maximum contact area between the pressure-sensitive adhesive and the respective substrate. The figure shows the relationship between the wetting property of a liquid and its formation of a contact area to a substrate surface.

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A first insight into the surface energies of various plastics is provided by our  Bonding Compendium (en) 


Bonding of different materials

The most frequently bonded materials include plastics, metals and glass. Plastics are divided into thermoplastics (e.g. polyethylene), thermosets (e.g. epoxies) and elastomers (e.g. rubber). When applying pressure-sensitive adhesive tapes to plastics, their surface energy, thermal load capacity, behavior under mechanical stress and compatibility with the pressure-sensitive adhesive system must be evaluated.

Metals are generally easy to bond. To prevent their oxidation, metals are often coated. The bondability of this coating must be evaluated before bonding. Glass can also be bonded well, but here it may be necessary to pretreat the glass bonding surface.


Factors influencing the bond

Various factors need to be considered for the selection of the right adhesive system. Including:

  • Planned service life
  • Weather (temperature, UV radiation, humidity)
  • Aging (chemical influences, time, mechanical influences)

The optimum result can only be achieved if all aspects are considered and examined equally. Our Bonding Engineers are always available to help you choose the right adhesive tape.


The factor time

The different adhesives have different initial adhesive strengths and reach their final adhesive strength after a certain time.

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PSA families

Lohmann offers various adhesive systems, mostly based on acrylates and rubbers. Basically the adhesives differ in their properties as follows:


Storage of the adhesive tapes

Our adhesive tapes should be stored at room temperature and normal humidity (i.e. 50-70%). They ought to be stored in their original packaging and away from heat sources as well as protected from dust and light.

The product-specific storage conditions can be found in the respective technical data sheets.


Interested in finding out more?

Then contact us. We will be pleased to help.