Curtain hanging solution notes and questions about glue
Posted: Fri Feb 04, 2011 12:57 pm
So one of the few cheap improvements I tried on our boat last year was to hang curtains. This was out of necessity since we were living on the boat at a marina and needed some privacy. I knew drilling holes was out of the question. I also had no sewing machine. I also was living in a place with one Home Depot, a KMart, and Ace hardware and little else in the way of large chain stores with home goods departments. What I finally came up with was the following. Don't laugh.
I bought some of those teeny tiny thin curtain rods, you know the ones that are a quarter inch thick, adjustable and made of some kind of brass like material. They come with hardware consisting of these tiny hooks that go through a hole on the teeny tiny curtain rod, and are fastened with some teeny tiny nails. I bought two for each cabin window. The question was, how to hang them? I picked up some nice wooden paint stirrers, that can be had for free at the Home Depot. Ace hardware had them too, but the Home Depot stirrers were of a higher quality and had a nice grain. These are thin enough that you can cut them into squares with a box cutter or utility knife. I cut them into squares, glued two of them together to create a thicker block, sanded them with fine grit paper. I then mounted the teeny tiny hooks on them with the teeny tiny nails that weren't long enough to go through both blocks. After that I placed them around the windows and affixed them with glue, four to a window for two curtain rods each.
I bought some panels of curtains at Kmart, I forgot what they are called, but they are those short panels, about 14 inches high, and these happened to have sleeves on both top and bottom edges. Valances? Yeah, I think that's it. I know they don't fit perfectly, but we needed a quick temporary solution.
The only problem was, the glue didn't hold. It held up while we were living in the boat, but when we visited the boat after the hot summer 4 months later, most of the glued blocks had fallen off the wall. I used the kind of glue that foamed a little when you first used it, and then dried clear. I can't remember what kind it was. It was supposedly for gluing plastic, wood, etc.
If anyone has suggestions what kind of glue to use to glue a piece of wood to a slickly painted cabin wall, I'd greatly appreciate it. I'll try to find some pictures.
I bought some of those teeny tiny thin curtain rods, you know the ones that are a quarter inch thick, adjustable and made of some kind of brass like material. They come with hardware consisting of these tiny hooks that go through a hole on the teeny tiny curtain rod, and are fastened with some teeny tiny nails. I bought two for each cabin window. The question was, how to hang them? I picked up some nice wooden paint stirrers, that can be had for free at the Home Depot. Ace hardware had them too, but the Home Depot stirrers were of a higher quality and had a nice grain. These are thin enough that you can cut them into squares with a box cutter or utility knife. I cut them into squares, glued two of them together to create a thicker block, sanded them with fine grit paper. I then mounted the teeny tiny hooks on them with the teeny tiny nails that weren't long enough to go through both blocks. After that I placed them around the windows and affixed them with glue, four to a window for two curtain rods each.
I bought some panels of curtains at Kmart, I forgot what they are called, but they are those short panels, about 14 inches high, and these happened to have sleeves on both top and bottom edges. Valances? Yeah, I think that's it. I know they don't fit perfectly, but we needed a quick temporary solution.
The only problem was, the glue didn't hold. It held up while we were living in the boat, but when we visited the boat after the hot summer 4 months later, most of the glued blocks had fallen off the wall. I used the kind of glue that foamed a little when you first used it, and then dried clear. I can't remember what kind it was. It was supposedly for gluing plastic, wood, etc.
If anyone has suggestions what kind of glue to use to glue a piece of wood to a slickly painted cabin wall, I'd greatly appreciate it. I'll try to find some pictures.
