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Update: Glueing joinery without clamps (failure photo)

5K views 49 replies 24 participants last post by  DrDirt 
#1 · (Edited by Moderator)
A recent thread discussed at length the various ins and outs of clamping pressure but I saw no mention of clampless glueing. It has been practised for centuries and is still in common use by many fine furniture craftsmen.
Here is a link to one such application


This is a photo I took a while back of failures in rub joints made with hot hide glue.
One is edge to face and the other face to face,

Wood Rectangle Material property Tool Hardwood
 

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#2 ·
Very impressive and interesting…

I also remember your posts on using Hide glue…

Thank you for this Link… Very good!
 
#4 ·
Bought some veneers last week, building a veneer hammer this week and then going to teach myself to use hide glue next week to hammer veneer. Wish me luck.
 
#6 ·
Paul, I've recently had a conversation with my friend Ernie Searing about this, and we both agree that not only is clamping unnecessary, but that in most cases, even with an edge joint, that devices such as biscuits, dowels, dominos, etc. are also superfluous, with the exception of gluing end grain together such as in a miter joint, but even in that situation, the case could be made that if you sealed the end grain with a thin layer of glue and let it dry, that the second application would bind it sufficiently

Coincidentally I've switched over to using hide glue in most applications with the exception of joints that will be exposed to lots of moisture or high heat.

I find it to be as strong as the polyurethane glues to any reasonable point, IE, the wood will break before the joint will. It has the added advantage of being reversible for repairs, it's more forgiving in terms of slower set up time before grabbing.

Thanks for the post, most interesting!
 
#7 ·
Interesting for sure. Old habits are hard to break and It would be hard for me to not rely on clamps in some situations but I do see that it is possible to apply too much pressure. I have used hide glue some but again just reaching for a bottle of Titebond for the convenience and expedience is hard to get away from.

On a side note, awhile back I began to notice this really nasty smell in the shop and realized that I had left some hide glue in the pot and it went bad. That was fun to clean up.
 
#9 · (Edited by Moderator)
I tried a rub joint on 2 piece at right angles when I first started experimenting with HHG a couple of years ago in preparation for a hammer veneering project. You can see the test joint in this blog. I stumbled upon the test piece in my scrap bin a couple months ago and tried to break the joint and even using a vice grip to get more leverage I still I could not get it to break. Pretty amazing stuff.
 
#12 · (Edited by Moderator)
The video would have been more worthwhile if the guy had waited for the glue to dry and then put the piece in a vise and broke it apart. Properly clamped PVA glue will not break at the joint. I don t know about this demonstration. He could have done the same demo with hot melt glue and we all know how strong that is.

- ArtMann
+1

In addition, the open time of hide is often times a real pain. I usually use aliphatic glue, but sometimes I need the open time you get with a PVA. I shudder to think about what I'd do if hide glue were the only option; probably give up woodworking.
 
#16 ·
The video would have been more worthwhile if the guy had waited for the glue to cure and then put the piece in a vise and broke it apart. Properly clamped PVA glue will not break at the joint. I don t know about this demonstration. He could have done the same demo with hot melt glue and we all know how strong that is.

- ArtMann
It would not have broken on the glue line. Trust me. This joint has held furniture together to this day that was built for Louis XIV. I know of no 250 + year trials of pieces done with pva glue and clamps. This is not to say that the pva won't last 200 years, only that HHG can.
 
#18 · (Edited by Moderator)
PVA joints might last 200 years but it is also likely to experience creep. For day to day usage, PVA is fine but if the goal is to make furniture that lasts, HHG Is what I would choose.
 
#19 ·
It would not have broken on the glue line. Trust me. This joint has held furniture together to this day that was built for Louis XIV. I know of no 250 + year trials of pieces done with pva glue and clamps. This is not to say that the pva won't last 200 years, only that HHG can.

- shipwright
Although I agree that hide glue can last a long time, I've also been around antiques where they've broken and it was always at the glue joint. Hide glue doesn't cause wood failure as PVA and aliphatic glues due. In fact, I used to work with someone who restored old furniture as a hobby and he loved how joints with hide glue could be easily dismantled with a sharp blow with a rubber mallet.
 
#20 ·
Are you saying that you know furniture built for Louis XIV was not constructed using clamps? That is the point at issue here. We all know hide glue works okay under the right circumstances. The failure to use clamps is where I take issue with the video.
The video would have been more worthwhile if the guy had waited for the glue to cure and then put the piece in a vise and broke it apart. Properly clamped PVA glue will not break at the joint. I don t know about this demonstration. He could have done the same demo with hot melt glue and we all know how strong that is.

- ArtMann

It would not have broken on the glue line. Trust me. This joint has held furniture together to this day that was built for Louis XIV. I know of no 250 + year trials of pieces done with pva glue and clamps. This is not to say that the pva won't last 200 years, only that HHG can.

- shipwright
 
#21 · (Edited by Moderator)
Are you saying that you know furniture built for Louis XIV was not constructed using clamps? That is the point at issue here. We all know hide glue works okay under the right circumstances. The failure to use clamps is where I take issue with the video.

- ArtMann
It occured to me after reading this again that this is what known as 'survivor bias'. There are certainly some very old pieces of furniture around, but just as certain, only an incredibly tiny amount of the furniture made during that era is around. In fact, it's just about non existent, which is why it's so valuable. Think about how hard it would be to find even so much as a chair or table made in the year 1900, let alone 1700. Although, millions would have been produced.

It's just like how you hear someone tell you that they don't make X like they used to because they know one or two people that had one for decades. This ignores the fact that this may be one or two out of tens of millions. It also ignores the fact that all major purchases, including furniture were repaired, while these days we just tend to throw a lot of these things out.
 
#22 ·
Are you saying that you know furniture built for Louis XIV was not constructed using clamps? That is the point at issue here. We all know hide glue works okay under the right circumstances. The failure to use clamps is where I take issue with the video.
Yes.
 
#23 ·
King Tut had a stool or something to that effect entombed with him, plus boxes and other wood stuff. It's still in good shape today. Don't know what they used to keep these items together, whether it was glue or just a good fit. If they did use clamps, I pretty sure it would have been 2 slaves apposing each other pulling as hard as they could for several hours until the glue set.

Hey, how about using rawhide for a clamp. I've used old bicycle tubes to clamp round table top edgings before. These people in the past were not isolated from figuring how to do things. In fact, they invented the sharpest cutting instrument know to man today. With all our modern technology using highly educated engineers and modern materials, we still have to go back to technology invented tens of thousands of years ago to duplicate it. We today are doing it a lot easier than the ancients, who actually started the ball rolling with what they had, and all we have done is just expanded on what they started. They had their ways of doing things that got us to where we are today. ............ Jerry (in Tucson)
 
#24 ·
I so want to use HHG but can't get past the heating time and the ease at which I can grab a glue bottle and quickly dispense a little or a lot, and it is done. I'm not closing the book on HHG though. :) Thanks for sharing Paul.
 
#26 ·
Using an average glue can, how long does it take to Heat-up the glue?

... from very start, new flakes?

... from already present glue?

You can leave the old glue in the pot, I presume… and just add to it or heat it up whenever you need it?
 
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