custard
Established Member
I was pleased to see that Workshop Heaven have started to stock Old Brown Glue, it's good to have an alternative option to the ready mixed Titebond hide glue. I'd previously been getting friends from the USA to bring me supplies of Old Brown Glue over whenever they visited so this will be much more convenient.
I've used traditional Scotch Glue for many years and I'll still brew some up now if I have a big enough job to warrant it. But in most circumstances it's too much of a faff to prepare Scotch Glue pearls in a double boiler and then clean it out afterwards, this is where Titebond and Old Brown Glue win out as you just squeeze it from a bottle exactly like you would PVA.
They're both plenty strong enough for cabinet making purposes but they both have three huge advantages over PVA; first they're reversible, second it's much easier to clean up any squeeze out, and third there's a much longer open time. Personally I find Old Brown Glue is slightly better than Titebond when it comes to clearing up and compatibility with finishes, but that's just my personal view and I've never run any detailed tests. Titebond has the advantage that it's thinner in the bottle, I normally keep the Old Brown Glue bottle in a pan of hot water to ensure it's easily spreadable.
Popular Woodworking ran a comparison between Old Brown Glue and Titebond Hide Glue which you can read here,
https://www.popularwoodworking.com/arti ... iquid-form
If you've never tried hide glue I can thoroughly recommend it, and with these liquid hide glues they're no more inconvenient than PVA. You can read here how hide glue's reversibility got Andy T out of a problem in his recent WIP,
small-walnut-side-table-with-drawer-t109429-105.html
I've used traditional Scotch Glue for many years and I'll still brew some up now if I have a big enough job to warrant it. But in most circumstances it's too much of a faff to prepare Scotch Glue pearls in a double boiler and then clean it out afterwards, this is where Titebond and Old Brown Glue win out as you just squeeze it from a bottle exactly like you would PVA.
They're both plenty strong enough for cabinet making purposes but they both have three huge advantages over PVA; first they're reversible, second it's much easier to clean up any squeeze out, and third there's a much longer open time. Personally I find Old Brown Glue is slightly better than Titebond when it comes to clearing up and compatibility with finishes, but that's just my personal view and I've never run any detailed tests. Titebond has the advantage that it's thinner in the bottle, I normally keep the Old Brown Glue bottle in a pan of hot water to ensure it's easily spreadable.
Popular Woodworking ran a comparison between Old Brown Glue and Titebond Hide Glue which you can read here,
https://www.popularwoodworking.com/arti ... iquid-form
If you've never tried hide glue I can thoroughly recommend it, and with these liquid hide glues they're no more inconvenient than PVA. You can read here how hide glue's reversibility got Andy T out of a problem in his recent WIP,
small-walnut-side-table-with-drawer-t109429-105.html
