We often sing the praises of HDU, but a material like 30 lbs. Precision Board HDU has plenty of compression strength, it doesn’t have very much structural strength. Our submarine door white board needed a handle and we knew that it would get used on regularly. So we cut some 5/8" steel rod and welded up a 'T' shape to hide inside an HDU handle. Using a die grinder, we hollowed out the inside of each half of the handle.
After a quick test fit we used Coastal Enterprises one part urethane glue PB Bond 240 we glued the steel inside the HDU handle.
Once the glue was dry we used the die grinder once more to clean up the edges and also add a little 'wear' to the piece. This was an old submarine after all.
Back on site we drilled a hole in the centre of the door and glued in the handle.