More hide glue stuff

[Christian Johnson]

OK kids, I've got experience with hide glue, but here's one I've gotten a good answer on: how long does it take for wood to oxidize? My patient is a Epi Les Paul with the ubiquitous broken headstock. It's not completely detached; held on by the plastic headstock veneer. The break is clean and will clamp great, but it's been broken for 4-6 months in the case. Can I still use hide glue, or not risk it and go with alaphitic???

[Jim Bancroft]

I guess you have me baffled about wood oxidizing, and what it has to do with a glue joint????
To repair the headstock you will need to use some sort of glue to repair it, and if it was me, hot hide glue would be the best.
I pretty much stay away from titebond for such repairs, because of the possibility of it creeping, especially if it gets hot. Super glue seems to work for cracks that can't be opened enough for hot hide glue.

Jim

[Charlie Hoffman]

I agree that this is a good candidate for hide glue. I am less concerned with the creep of titebond but hide glue does seem better if you have time to get the joint well glued and clamped. the oxidation thing is real - it does make the wood less amenable to a good glue joint but.. there really is nothing you can do to remove the oxidation and I do not think that it will have a material impact on the type of glue you use.

[Penql]

Oxidation begins as soon as there's oxygen :) As they say, rust never sleeps...

Speaking only from experience with restoring antiques (not instruments) I would worry if the lag was years, not months, and in that case I would worry more about humidity having caused swelling/shrinkage - so the parts did not fit perfectly - and resulting in a joint with too much glue filling gaps in the joint. If the joint is a great fit, and you can really get it clamped up good and tight, I think you're going to be OK with hide glue. Ditto what Jim says about creeping.

[Frank Ford]

I agree with Jim about the glue, too.

As to oxidation, it's my experience that it's a difficult thing to quantify. For example, rosewood seems to be much more prone to glue failure from oxidative contamination. Also, the conditions of storage and exposure of the surfaces can make a big difference. I think a crack such as the one you describe is unlikely to have a problem with oxidation.

[Russell Vance]

Hi Guys,
I'm from the electric side of the bed and as part of a previous experience in cabinet making was required to learn about glue technology and applications etc. I use Titebond cross linked alipathic glue as my principle repair and build glue and have yet to experience any creep in any application.

I am at a loss to explain the distain that these high tech glues attract from the hide glue crew - the stresses present in most conventional guitar applications are well within the capacity of the glue when surface areas and grain orientation is done right and I have never seen creep when these glues are applied per spec. Interestingly, when I talked to Titebond about applications they were quick to point out that the cross linked alipathics do have a creep factor in high load structural applications - fortunatedly we are not building bridges here and for typical guitar stresses it's not an issue (except when gluing end grain to endgrain which is a no-no) I've seen a lot of things that laymen attribute to creep but in reality are something else and I also build for tropical areas with high humidity and temperature ranges.

From a repair point of view I am a peghead/neck break specialist and see complex breaks, delamination and shattered breaks regularly - to get into most of these areas requires a glue that can get through a 22 gauge hypodermic into the fine cracks and crevices and in some cases be blown into these areas with high pressure air - this requires a low viscosity, long working time glue that is insensitive to temperature ranges. For this reason, and others, we use a quality cross linked 'yellow'.
However, in qualification, for right angle death blows that snap off the peghead clean at the nut at 90 degrees - we are not talking glue strength here - we are talking additional methods of stabilizing the break before working out a glue type, so don't try this one at home kids. Hope this helps open up the issue a bit. Rusty.

[Jim Bancroft]

I certainly don't have a disdain for titebond or any other aliphatic resin glue, I have used it for many glue joints over the years, and it is fine. But, titebond can be effected by heat, which can cause it to creep, more so than hot hide glue.
Hot hide glue is fairly simple to use, and I like the fact that when cured it is glass hard.
Just my experience, so that is why I recommend it for a peghead break, and many other glue jobs.

Jim

[Christian Johnson]

Thanks everyone for the lively discussion!!! I'm going hide.