bonding veneer without contact cement fumes

It sounds like a very involved process; having to steam the veneer so it doesn’t shrink, using the wife’s iron…that could be a no-no…then she’d want me to iron the clothes. LOL. Thanks for explaining the process. Could you make a video like David did?

-- Jesus is Lord!

I’ve done that procedure and there are drawbacks I ran into. For some veneers, the glue will leave an impression on the surface. It works for small areas, but I prefer other methods for veneering large areas. For veneer applied over crossbanding, other methods work better for me. I put up with the solvent based contact cement with as much respiratory protection as possible and use good ventilation. I don’t use water based contact cement at all. I’ll use a good yellow glue with pressure on the veneer like weights, or overlays with cauls, and also use Unibond 800.

Glue bleedthru is indeed a problem, but thru the cracks where the pieces meet. Ive never had any glue bleed thru the solid part of the veneer (YET). That’s why i recommend using full strips of veneer tape ( 6 bucks for about two or three “miles” of it, or so it seems. ( made the mistake of misreading the roll size, 650 inches made more sense to me than feet, so i thought it was a misprint. i now own more veneer tape than ill use in 2-3 lifetimes. lol) anyway the bleedthru is probably worst in projects like my chessboard where there are dozens of joints, but minimal where large sheets butt. I wish i knew this technique when i was veneering a built-in desk in my old home.
as to using the iron. I use an expensive nine buck specimen i had bought for my wife to use(like that would ever happen). get one and store in some sander box and she’ll never know, and you steam the veneer as you are pressing in place and then turn down the steam so the hot iron dries the moistened wood. aint that complicated once you try. and i steam off the veneer tape by holding the same iron an inch off the piece on full steam for 40 seconds and the veneer tape pulls off easily and requires almost no sanding to remove any vestiges of it. you are indeed correct. water based contact cement is crap, but the other stuff is so vile (you smell it in your dreams) and so unforgiving, that anyone attmpting veneering for the first time, should use the iron initially. especially if they want to experiment on scrap and get the hang of it.

-- Dan

Dan

I wasn’t only referring to the problem at the butt joint, but the irregular lumping or surface smoothness due to the glue under the veneer. I’ve done a lot of both and for large areas, I prefer other methods. The moistening and drying of some veneers, especially highly figured ones can be adversely affected.

Using aliphatic resin glues or Unibond, are my preferred methods. As for the moistened butt joint tape, I never liked that stuff. I use a good masking tape from either Scotch or 3M and handled properly works much better, and will release without marring. Like you, I tape the entire butt joint.