fun and games wth hide glue

[marcros]

Tonight, I have been trying to laminate oak boards together to mae a couple of table legs. They were dry fitted and the pieces were tight, with an invisible join. When I used glue- hide glue, they looked dreadful, and there was a noticable gap, even when clamped up hard. It was so bad that I actually pulled them apart before the glue fully gelled. I am guessing that the glue was too thick- It ran off the brush nicely, like warmed treakle, or was not quite warm enough, and so was starting to gel in the few seconds between application and putting the timber together. There was no squeezeout when applying the clamps.

I tried gluing 2 legs, consisting of 3 off 3"x1" boards each. On the first, i applied glue to both sides of the centre piece, and to the insde faces of the outer pieces. On the second leg, i only applied it to the centre piece, therefore trying to half the glue line. I may have applied it a little thick, expecting some squeeze out, but it wasnt ridiculously thick.

Any pointers? I will get a thermometer tomorrow which should help with the temperature issue, if that is the problem.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

Get to the 21st C maybe? Hide glue may be brilliant for some things, but there have to be better things for that purpose.

 

[deserter]

IMHO hide glue easily out performs any other glue in most situations.

It sounds to me like the glue hasn't been soaked long enough from pellet form. I normally leave mine over night.


~Nil carborundum illegitemi~

 

[marcros]

Get to the 21st C maybe? Hide glue may be brilliant for some things, but there have to be better things for that purpose.

Whilst I hear what you are saying, if I had experienced a problem with PBS and had to separate the joint, I would be In a worse position now. Likewise, if I had missed a bit on cleanup, the finish would highlight it. Hide glue has been used for centuries without an issue, so i don't see why it is an issue. It is like recommending to so reboot who is struggling to cut straight with a handsaw to use a table saw instead.

 

[marcros]

IMHO hide glue easily out performs any other glue in most situations.

It sounds to me like the glue hasn't been soaked long enough from pellet form. I normally leave mine over night.


~Nil carborundum illegitemi~

It has been soaking for 36 hours- I intended to do it yesterday. It was only heated this evening for long enough to melt it though. That was its first melt. It felt nice and tacky between 2 fingers. I am starting to wonder whether it was quite hot enough. Air temp was dropping when I did it which wouldn't help if it was borderline when applied.

How do I remove it from the boards- hot wet cloth or sand it off?

 

[Dangermouse]

For hide glue you need to have a warm workshop and preferable warm wood too, that gives you more setting time. If the workshop or wood is cold then you have next to no time to clamp up before hide glue starts to set.

 

[marcros]

For hide glue you need to have a warm workshop and preferable warm wood too, that gives you more setting time. If the workshop or wood is cold then you have next to no time to clamp up before hide glue starts to set.

That may have been the issue then. I will get the heater on and the hot air gun out for next time. Is it worth trying to make a liquid hide glue by adding salt or urea? That tends to work at a lower temp doesn't it? I must get that book on hide glue really since I want to master the stuff!

 

[Dangermouse]

Never tried salt or urea, or even heard of doing that, so cant help.

 

[Phil Pascoe]

:? Your second post makes it seem like you've experience of it .......your other posts makes it seem you've never used the stuff before. :?

 

[marcros]

I have used it for hammer veneering several times before, and on small edge joints. Not on something with a large glue/surface area that is thicker than a bandsaw veneer. If it was a bit cool under the veneer, a hot iron has sorted the problem, without me fully realising that it was an issue. The few times I have used it for edge jointing, it didn't cause me an issue.

 

[AndyT]

I've read a bit about hide glue (probably some of the same stuff) but have not got round to trying it. The simple reason is that I have started using Titebond's Liquid Hide Glue and have found it so convenient! It lasts ages in the bottle (some years past the marked date IME); allows plenty of time for assembly; makes a disappearing glue line and is very easy to clean up by planing, chiselling or sanding. Of course it does not give the instant set of hot glue, but at the pace I work that is not a problem!

 

[MIGNAL]

Use it fairly thin. It should be the consistency of something like Sunflower Oil. Beginners often mix it too thick, thinking more like PVA.
Be careful of warming the wood too much. It should be fairly gentle. Things can start to move when too much heat is applied. Keep the workshop warm. Adding Salt/Urea will extend the open time but at the expense of some strength. It's rare that you need the longer open time. Most glue ups and there is usually a technique that will get you around the problem of needing long open times. Keep practicing. Hide glue is a wonderful product.

 

[custard]

Never tried salt or urea, or even heard of doing that, so cant help.

Salt is why hide glue has such a bad reputation for rusting tools.

 

[marcus]

If I have understood what you are trying to do correctly I would say that hot hide glue is probably not really suitable for this. It will gel too quickly, and once it has gelled you will not get it to squeeze out out without heat and a lot of pressure being applied, and it will be difficult to provide the necessary heat if the timber is thick. You wouldn't be able to just iron it as with veneer, and even hot cauls would probably not provide enough heat to reactivate it through all that thickness. You could try heating the timber itself before glueing up, but how? I can't see a hot air gun keeping it all hot enough for long enough....

You could try a rub joint, but with pieces as wide as a table leg I would again expect it might be asking a bit much for the excess glue to squeeze out before it gelled. You could try though, I might be wrong about that.

You could certainly make it work cold by adding urea, but you loose a bit of strength doing that, and this is the sort of joint that simply mustn't fail. It would ruin the table and be very difficult to fix.

I'm a hide glue evangelist, but on this occasion I would probably use cascamite!

 

[MIGNAL]

Pretty much ALL glues used before 1940 were Hide or Bone Glue. PVA wasn't really in commercial use and the only other possibilities were Casein and wheat Glues. I wonder how they made all that wonderful furniture in the 17 th, 18 th and 19 th century. No doubt some of them had rather complex glue ups. We know what they used.
It's all about technique. I once found a method of gluing 24 very small strips of veneer together using Hide. Prior to this I had been using Cascamite. Brushing the Cascamite on took over 10 minutes. Over 15 minutes by the time I had all the strips in the clamp/jig and the brush clean. Even in a hot workshop 10 minutes is about 7 minutes too long to use Hide Glue. Eventually I got the whole process down to just under 3 minutes. A seemingly impossible task.

 

[marcus]

Pretty much ALL glues used before 1940 were Hide or Bone Glue. PVA wasn't really in commercial use and the only other possibilities were Casein and wheat Glues. I wonder how they made all that wonderful furniture in the 17 th, 18 th and 19 th century. No doubt some of them had rather complex glue ups.

Well there's always a way, though I've never heard of thick structural components being laminated up in the way you are talking about before the advent of resin glues. I think (correct me someone?) it is a technique that only really came about as timber became scarcer and more expensive and new types of glue came along that made it more practical.

Another consideration is that hide glue, much as we love it, can fail if left in damp conditions for a while. Not such a problem if it's used in joints that can easily be taken apart and re-glued, but potentially disastrous if large structural components are held together with it. If someone were to store your table in an outhouse or cellar for a while the legs would probably start to delaminate — a laminated joint in thick timber is under great stress over it's entire area if the timber wants to cup or bow in opposite directions. It would then probably not be economical to repair. For a start the timber would have moved enough to no longer be the nice neat fit you have at the moment. I doubt you could just stick it straight back together.

All the same if you find a way to do it with hot hide glue then I salute you!

 

[MIGNAL]

Thick structural timbers? The OP is referring to a table leg 3" x 1" . Just line the damn things up, stick your glue in a bottle with a few marbles in it and run a bead down the centre of each lamination. Applying the glue will take about 20 seconds. I could glue that up and go for a cig break before getting the clamps on!
Do a test for me Marcus. Won't cost you much. Glue two pieces of wood together using Hide, let's say 1" x 1 " x 8 ". Leave it in your Bathroom for a few months. Then try to pull it apart. It can't be done. I repair musical instruments. Nearly all done with Hide. If they fell apart when subjected to a bit of moisture I'd be jumping for joy. You would have to subject your fine furniture to some pretty bad conditions over a long period of time for it to start falling apart.

 

[marcus]

Glue two pieces of wood together using Hide, let's say 1" x 1 " x 8 "

Unless I'm misunderstanding, the legs are not 3"x1", the pieces are 3"x1" and the legs are 3"x3", hence the difficulty of squeezing the excess out from a 3" width (when the timber is too thick for any flexibility to help you) at the length of a table leg before the glue gels. This is quite a different situation to working with the smaller and more delicate pieces found in musical instruments — try it!

Do a test for me Marcus. Won't cost you much. Glue two pieces of wood together using Hide, let's say 1" x 1 " x 8 ". Leave it in your Bathroom for a few months. Then try to pull it apart. It can't be done.

Look, I love hide glue, and use it for almost everything, but like anything else it has its limitations. It will be fine in a bathroom, but it is subject to failure when stored in really damp conditions for a long time, and I have seen enough fine furniture needing repair from being stored in such conditions to know that people sometimes do silly and thoughtless things with their furniture (more so, I would guess, than with musical instruments). Which is why I would want to be extra safe in this case....

 

[MIGNAL]

I have done. I've been using Hide for over 30 years! Not just on musical instruments. Given that I was also involved in making Hi-Fi furniture for the best part of 6 years.
Doesn't really matter if they are 3 x 1 or 3 x 3 . Hide glue will not gel unless the temperature falls to a certain level or it's moisture evaporates. I see nothing difficult about gluing those sections of timber with Hide glue. Nothing at all. Maybe you need to practice more.

 

[marcus]

Maybe you need to practice more.

Maybe I do, there's always more to learn!

I see nothing difficult about gluing those sections of timber with Hide glue. Nothing at all.

The OP was having a lot of trouble with it, he wasn't finding it easy at all. So how would you advise him to proceed? What is he doing wrong and what advice can you give him to solve his problem? Clearly just applying the glue hot and putting together and clamping as fast as he could was not working, so what can he do?