# Best Wood Glue?



## ewhitman (Jan 30, 2009)

What is the best all purpose wood glue to use? Thanks in advance!


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## dustmaker (Dec 17, 2008)

My preference would be titebond 3. I glued a piece up that had walnut and oak in it that I wanted to steam bend it after I glued it.It would not bend with it being glued up. So that sold me on titebond 3 and I now use it on everything.


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## woodworm (Jul 27, 2008)

Titebond II.


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## hObOmOnk (Feb 6, 2007)

There is no single best glue.
It depends on:

Type of wood(s) and materials
Kinds of joining
Environmental conditions

I would use a different glue for each of the following:

Mortise and tenon
Panel gluing
Veneering
Mixed substrates, e.g. metal to wood
Outdoor usage
Stone and shell inlay
Historical restoration


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## sbryan55 (Dec 8, 2007)

Titebond II for most general applications.


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## dennis (Aug 3, 2006)

yellow


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## GaryC (Dec 31, 2008)

TB II & TB III like the rest. If you get into specifecs, contact DRG!!


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## toddc (Mar 6, 2007)

I use Titebond III as my all purpose. I test my joints regularly and I trust it implicitly.


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## johnpoolesc (Mar 14, 2009)

the one very best.. 70 percent of the time, titebond 2 or 3,,

but if your talking teak, burbinga etc.. gorilla glue

and if your thinking small parts and a quicker bond,, ca

and then at times you can not work without a two part epoxy

drg nailed it,, asking me to work with just one glue would be the same as just one power tool


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## ewhitman (Jan 30, 2009)

Sounds like Titebond 2 or 3 is a good way to go. Thank you so much for all your resoponses. Really appreciate the feedback!


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## ewhitman (Jan 30, 2009)

I was going to be buying it in bulk, and was hoping to get something that would work well for just about anything. Thanks again everyone. Really appreciate all your responses.


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## motthunter (Dec 31, 2007)

I prefer the right glue for the job. Each Titebond has its application and for outdoors, I use foaming glue like Gorilla.


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## ewhitman (Jan 30, 2009)

No, at least I don't have control over the credit card.  One of the other girls does the purchasing, I was just helping out to see wich Glue we should buy. By the way, I noticed you were pretty new. Welcome to Lumberjocks! Great people here always willing to give good advice, but I'm sure you have already noticed.


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## Brian024 (Feb 2, 2009)

Just switched from Titebond II to Titebond III. Anybody use Gorilla's wood glue?


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## pommy (Apr 17, 2008)

i use epoxy i'm affraid glue if i use is straight forward pva wood glue


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## Kindlingmaker (Sep 29, 2008)

I'm a TB III kind of guy but most yellows are great.


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## Moai (Feb 9, 2009)

T i t e b o n d I I I …..the ultimate thing.


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## Gofor (Jan 12, 2008)

For price and overall use, a PVA glue like Titebond II will give good glue strength, some moisture protection, and has easy clean-up. It will work in almost all furniture applications.

Titebond III is more expensive but is more waterproof, making it good for outdoor use, and areas like kitchen/bar surfaces. It has a slightly longer set time, which makes it good for complex glue-ups.

The polyurethane glues like Gorilla glue, are now showing that they do not hold up well in the longterm, especially in moist areas. In complex assemblies, they are good in that you can apply the glue to one surface, and just wet the other with a spray bottle as you assemble (long assembly time). Downside is that they expand (can be a positive in a loose joint), are hard to clean up, and have a very short shelf life after you open the container.

If wanting a no-creep glue for bent laminations, or a "forever" glue, a two part urethane glue like Howard Marks uses is the best, but expensive.

Realize that many of the old masters pieces are still with us after several centuries, and they were put together with hide glue.

Go.

I am not disparaging Titebond I, Elmers white glue, etc. They are inexpensive, but work quite well for many items that are going to be inside in an air-conditioned home. They do have the advantage that you can use moist heat to "unglue" the pieces at a later date in time, much like hide glue. This can be a good thing if you have ever had to refinish/repair a rocking chair, etc.


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## mattg (May 6, 2008)

I like Titebond III, and the Titebond for dark wood.


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## 280305 (Sep 28, 2008)

Speaking of Titebond III, it is on sale at Rockler for $3.79 for the 8 oz bottle.


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## kcrandy (Jan 1, 2009)

I can tell you that Museum restorers use what has been used since ancient Egyptian times: hide glue. And one reason is if it has to be removed, it doesn't hurt the wood around it. Glues that provide bonds stronger than the material around them, then means that material must be damaged if the gluing has to be undone.


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## roman (Sep 28, 2007)

2 votes for "yellow"


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## JohnGray (Oct 6, 2007)

All the Tite-Bonds.


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## gcrutch (Sep 19, 2011)

I have a dresser that the top of coming off and I'd like to use glue to glue it back down. What would be the best glue to use. It seems like Titebond is the way to go.


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## NiteWalker (May 7, 2011)

I like TBIII for the lower working temp and slightly longer open time.

If I didn't need the lower working temp I'd use TBII.


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## Howie (May 25, 2010)

Titebond for me. I tried gorilla wood glue and frankly it was too runny for me.


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## Dusty56 (Apr 20, 2008)

*Hint : Don't buy bulk unless you know you'll be using it all within a year + /-....*


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## Chipy (Apr 20, 2011)

I have used all brands of glue and found that it's about how you apply the glue witch matters most IE.coverage, evenness,amount,clamping ,indoor,outdoor and grain direction.Unless you buy absolute garbage or your glue is old *it's more about how you use your glue.*


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## janggeungulk (Jan 9, 2014)

Best Wood glue for all purpose is Gorilla Glue,E-6000 glue.


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## AlaskaGuy (Jan 29, 2012)

I very seldom use anything but yellow glue and mostly Elmer's.


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## MalcolmLaurel (Dec 15, 2013)

I use mostly Titebond these days, but when I was a kid my Dad and I used to use Wilhold Aliphatic Resin (pretty much the same as TB, though the prevailing wisdom in the R/C community was that it was somehow "better". It still shows up online but I haven't seen it in stores in years.


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## Finn (May 26, 2010)

I make small artsy/crafty things. Lots of boxes with inlay and I use about three gallons of Elmer's white glue a year. It dries quickly, and dries clear in thin layer. Plenty strong. It is only $12 a gallon at Lowe's. I have small bottles of titebond II and titebond III that I use in places that may get wet on occasion.


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## Mahdeew (Jul 24, 2013)

Brian, I used Gorilla at times. You have to wet the two surfaces to be glued and use very little glue on them or you will have a mess to clean up as the glue expand a lot. It is water proof once cured.


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## lumberdog (Jun 15, 2009)

I like TB II and TB III, i also like Elmer's wood glue and hide glue. It all depends on what you are using it for. Most of the glues you find on the shelves today will do the job, you just have to use a little common sense when choosing it.


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## shipwright (Sep 27, 2010)

Somebody has to say it so I will.
I use hide glue for almost everything. I really like the advantages of hot but if I need open time, I will use liquid (OBG).
On a big project where any glue will do I occasionally use PVA but it is messy.


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## bondogaposis (Dec 18, 2011)

Titebond II or furniture and Titebond III for outdoor and kitchen ware.


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## AlaskaGuy (Jan 29, 2012)

I got this from WoodCentral forum.

I'm a former Franklin employee and worked in the technical group until March of this year. Bill, your name sounds very familiar and I'm almost positive I've spoken with you at some point. If you're who I'm thinking of you requested an informational CD after IWF two years ago after talking with Dale.

Anyways, since departing Franklin I've founded a business that is focused on guitars (after consulting that industry for a bit over a decade.) I have no industry affiliations with respect to adhesives: So here's the straight dope on the differences:

White glues were the first PVA based adhesives and had little else to them. As a result they had lousy water resistance, were highly prone to creep, and generally wound up with a poor reputation compared to hot and liquid hide glues that were dominant in the woodworking industries at the time (mid 40s.) In order to improve their performance across the board (tack, creep resistance, thermal resistance, water resistance, to name a few) tackifying resins were added. In case you're wondering, this is all that "aliphatic resin" glues consist of. I often call them resin-modified PVA's because I consider it a less confusing term. This modification would not change the color on its own, so the decision was made to add yellow dye to differentiate them from white glues and is purely a marketing strategy. I have personally used dye free Titebond II and tested low quality yellow glues from manufacturers who have done nothing more than add dye to white glue. Uninformed individuals may try to convince you that yellow was added because it provided a better match to the surrounding wood. This is simply untrue. Not to mention, if you can see a glue line it's too thick. As part of some competitive testing I performed on Gorilla Wood Glue (not the polyurethane… The type II water resistant white glue) I found that not only was it nearly colorless and clear when dried but its performance was effectively identical to that of Titebond II. If you need something colorless for an exterior application I would not hesitate to recommend Gorilla Wood Glue. Titebond III is a different animal. It was actually the end result of a project to achieve type I water resistance from a PVA as a method to compete with urea-formaldehyde adhesives. It does accomplish it, but unless you're building a cutting board, countertop, or skateboard, I wouldn't recommend it. The product is prone to creep, and there's a reason its shear strength at 150°F isn't published: it's not great, usually around 1000 PSI which equates to a 2/3 loss of bond strength.

In terms of strength, at room temperature a good white glue can cause 100% wood failure just like Titebond Original, Extend, Titebond II, and Titebond III. Under ASTM D-905, they are also tested for shear strength at 150°F at which point from best to worst the list will look as follows: Titebond Extend, Titebond II Extend, Titebond Original, Titebond II, Titebond III. All PVA based adhesives are thermoplastics, which simply means they will melt (most of them reach their melting point somewhere above 250°F.) This is known as thermal plasticity, and in case you're wondering, it correlates exactly with creep resistance. It's also the reason that as a guitar manufacturer I personally use primarily Titebond Extend and Titebond 50. They're overkill, but if a guitar gets left in a hot car I can still feel confident that it wont come apart.

I've seen the term crosslinking a lot in this thread and some confusion about how it relates to creep. Picture plain PVA adhesive as wet spaghetti noodles: If you leave them to dry they will tangle around each other and shrink a bit, and you won't be able to pull the mass apart easily. Put that mess back into water and they will separate. Crosslinking PVAs would look more like spaghetti noodles that actually fused together as they dried and if you put them into water again those fused points (just like covalent crosslinks) would not separate. However, they do *not* crosslink with the wood itself. Instead, they have relatively weak electrostatic interactions (known as hydrogen bonds and van der waals forces) but in HUGE numbers, which is why they still create bonds stronger than wood.

I saw Bob's name mentioned, you're welcome to contact him if you wish. I helped train him, and unlike myself he comes from the sales/marketing world and still has an obvious corporate affiliation. In my case: I'm an entrepreneur with no specific allegiance to any adhesives company aside from my father who works for their industrial division. My Dad is the reason that despite being a younger guy I have been learning about the adhesives industry for over 25 years. I do my best to keep an eye on message boards because even though it's not technically my responsibility anymore, I care about getting good information out to fellow woodworkers. Not to mention, at over 5 months unemployed and just starting to get endorsements and contract work… It makes me feel like I'm still contributing something to the world.

I'm sure I've opened a can of worms, so feel free to reply or contact me directly. I'm always happy to help.

-Hugh

Here's a link to the whole thread if interested:

http://www.woodcentral.com/woodworking/forum/messages.pl/page/1/md/read/id/458486/sbj/the-difference...


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## CharlesA (Jun 24, 2013)

nevermind


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