An adhesive, or glue, is a mixture in a liquid or semi-liquid state that adheres or bonds items together. Adhesives may come from either natural or synthetic sources. The types of materials that can be bonded are vast but they are especially useful for bonding thin materials.
Adhesive tapeis one of many varieties of backing materials coated with an adhesive. Several types of adhesives can be used.
Tape Range holds a vast and varied range of self adhesive tapes.
Adhesive tape is a strip of cloth, paper or other material coated with an adhesive substance that allows it to adhere to various surfaces.
Heat Activated:
Heat activated tape is usually tack-free until it is activated by a heat source. It is sometimes used in packaging, for example, a tear strip tape for cigarette packs.
Painter’s
- This blue tape comes in a variety of widths and is similar to masking tape. Painters utilize it to cover spaces they don’t want to paint. When painting walls, painter’s tape covers trim doors or outlets. It comes off easily without peeling away the existing paint. It can also be used to make patterns or lines on walls to create an appealing effect with the paint.
Duct
- Duct tape is one of the more commonly used types of adhesive tape. Usually, it is gray or silver but also comes in a variety of colors. Duct tape was previously used for air ducts but is no longer suitable because of changes in duct materials. Duct tape is incredibly strong and is used often by the movie industry for various purposes. According to the California Energy Commission, astronauts on Apollo 13 used duct tape to repair the space shuttle.
Teflon Tape
- Teflon tape is not incredibly sticky, but it adheres closely to grooves and surfaces. Plumbers and mechanics use it to seal leaks in pipe joints by wrapping it around screws or valves and reinserting them. Teflon tape also works for screws or nuts that won’t quite fit for a quick fix.
Masking
- Masking tape comes in a variety of colors and widths and can be used for many purposes. It is a very lightweight adhesive tape and leaves little or no residue on surfaces. Great for glass or metal, masking tape cannot support much weight.
Double-sided
- Double-sided tape has adhesive on both sides. Great for hanging posters or flyers, double-sided tape doesn’t show and comes off cleanly. For fragile or rigid foam posters, use double-side foam tape so that there’s room between the hanging item and the wall for easier removal.
Water activated
- Water activated tape, gummed paper tape or gummed tape is starch, or sometimes animal glue based, adhesive on a paper backing which becomes sticky when moistened.
A specific type of gummed tape is called reinforced gummed tape (RGT). The backing of this reinforced tape consists of two layers of paper with a cross-pattern of fiberglass filaments laminated between. The laminating adhesive had previously been asphalt but now is more commonly a hot-melt atactic ploypropylene.