The curing time for adhesives or sealants can vary depending on what type you are using. While UV adhesives/sealants do offer fast room temperature cures without the need to mix, measure, or worry about the pot life, you may find instances where you want to accelerate the curing process even more.

You probably already understand that for a UV adhesive/sealant to cure you just need to add light. What is going on behind the scenes, which most do not recognize, is that the light is breaking down a photoinitiator in the adhesive/sealant due to the generation of free radicals.

When you have a UV adhesive/sealant, this means the photoinitiator decomposes with UV light. For these types of adhesives/sealants you need a light source with a specific wavelength region of the electromagnetic spectrum (nm). Typically these adhesives/sealants will be activated with UV rays in the 350-380nm region.  Because of this, a full-spectrum bulb may not be your best bet since they are typically in a lower region of the scale with these. A better choice would be a black light or high-intensity UV lamp if you wanted to get fast, reliable curing.

If you’re looking for more advice on adhesive or sealant curing, be sure to keep your eyes on our blog or pick up the phone and call the experts here at 800-220-1966. We’re more than happy to share over 50 years experience in the industry.