5,200 Uses for 5200

July, 2015:

I thought about simply playing these photos like a montage.   I believe it will tell the story just fine.  It’s easy to see what happened, how I tried to fix it with only the most permanent marine adhesive known to man,

and how epicly (that’s a word today) it failed.  Let’s see how far we get.  Let this play in the background:

Then: “Roll that fabulous footage!”

Now, here’s where things get interesting.  (Not to say that busting out the 5200 to try and glue your cheap, Chinese-made wedge heels back together isn’t interesting─especially considering the three dental picks we demolished trying to punch through the dried glob in the neck of the tube and all the white sticky streaks I got on my hands, nails and hair in the process (yes, something AGAIN in my hair).  But, it gets even better …

Once I stuck the shoe flap to the wedge bottom, I then thought it would be good to stand on it to maintain the pressure while I worked on the second shoe.  But, standing in a shoe is not something you really think about, it’s just something you do.  Every time you wear a shoe, you’re standing in it.  It’s like looking at your watch─you always turn your wrist to do it, without really thinking about it. And, what do you often do when you’re standing?  You shift around!  Not three seconds after I stood on the shoe did I pick my foot up to take a small step to shift my weight.  There goes that cup of coffee in your lap as you check your watch. I did it without even thinking about it.  And that 5200 must take more than three seconds to dry, because the wedge bottom remained planted on the floor while my glue-covered sole came up and planted back down on the teak.  Yikes!

Let’s just say the Captain was not pleased.

Thankfully I stopped myself short and barely touched down, but the toppling of the wedge and my teensy toe touch did result in some 5200 on the cabin floor.  Many more yikeses!

With some quick wipe action, we were able to get it up, but can you imagine explaining a shoeprint of 5200 on the floor to all newcomers on the boat?  “Uhhh, yeah, that’s from when I tried to glue my crap shoes back together with super-bondo-death adhesive.  Just ignore it.”

What a mess.  And, what a waste!  Sadly, the floor-toppling incident lead to a hideous amount of 5200 on the actual “pretty” part of the shoe which I’m sure would have never come off.  I had given it a hearty go, but it was time to scrap it.  These shoes would never be boogeying again!

And, I’m not sure I’ll ever “bust out” the 5200 to glue anything again either.  Trying to get some fresh glue out of the tube was a nightmare.  We had only used that tube once before.  It costs $20.00 and you only get one use?!  Bollucks!  A fellow boater recommended to me to keep the tube in the freezer in between uses, so we’re going to try that next time. But, beyond that, it’s Butyl tape for me.  Yes … even on the shoes!

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