I have a small project which involves expoxying some brass threaded inserts into some (high value) wood. Specifically, these are cylindrical inserts with wood screw threads on the outside and 10-20 machine threads on the inside. The wood threads have loosened and I'm going to try to fill the voids with epoxy. However, the inside (machine screw) threads must remain epoxy free so that screws may be installed/removed repeatedly.
If I just coat the outside of these inserts and install them, the central machine threads will (undoubtedly) fill with the excess squeezed out. Even if I insert a machine screw (dry), the epoxy could be squeezed into the inside threads. So, I figure the way to go is to coat that screw with some sort of grease that the epoxy will not adhere to. Once the epoxy is cured, I can clean the grease off the inside threads with solvent.
What's the best grease (or other coating) to use? It should be viscous enough that it doesn't migrate to the outside of the insert and interfere with the desired bond.