First time hide glue experience

[tadej bratkovic]

So I got my first bag of hide glue and I was trying it out yesterday on scraps and a kitchen chair that was cracked.

I was using Philip's Avent baby bottle warmer for this. It heats up to 180°F. I kept switching the thermometer from water to glue. While my water was at 170, my glue was not near 140, maybe like 118.

I must say I mixed up a ridiculously minute amount, about 3 grams of glue (mixing ratio 1:1.9 by weight), so the mixture just barely covered the bottom of my jar. While my water was almost boiling, my glue never got up to 140. I am using a small, glass jar (app 3 fl oz) as my glue container. When I stirred the glue the thermometer went up to 135 briefly, but it quickly dropped.

Was I having too little glue and it was cooling on atmospheric air quicker than the baby bottle warmer could heat the stuff up?

I tried to keep the lid on the jar as long as possible but once I removed the lid and stuck a thermometer the needle started dropping as soon as it reached whatever the max temperature was at any given moment.

When I was test-running this bottle warmer last month I just put water up to the top in that glass jar and I heated up to 140 on a medium setting. Had it on max yesterday when I was playing with glue and the glue was about half the temperature of the water bath.

I must say my glue was still running and dripping from the brush as it is supposed to. So I used it and with great success.

I am only wondering what went wrong since my temperatures were a little off. Should I stick the thermometer in water or glue? I believe glue temp is more critical, right? And with 140°F we mean the temperature of the glue, right?

I am using a 200-210 bloom strenght glue. I am already liking hide glue very much, as it saves a lot of time.

Thanks!

[Hesh Breakstone]

It's the glue that you want to heat to around 140ishF and try not to exceed 145F for very long if at all.

A couple of things that I also wanted to mention that I picked up on from your post.  In Europe "Pearl Glue" is often sold as and even in some places called hide glue and it's not.  Pearl glue contains bone fragments and other parts of the animal, not just the hide, it smells terrible too and is not at all the same thing as HHG.  Had a student some years back who's glue did not perform across the pond as I would suspect that it would.  It took a couple of months to isolate the issue as pearl glue sold as hide glue....  

Above all HHD was the staple of the industry for decades because of three primary reasons.  1)  It's what they had.... 2)  It's reversible and serviceable and 3)  It's as easy as can be to use and none of this has to be complicated.

Some Luthiers back in the day would rarely change their glue, clean the pot and some even would urinate in the pot when the glue got too thick...  Not recommending this by the way and no pictures please...;)

If the glue is not hot enough it will not be runny enough and will not bond well jelling somewhat before it can do it's thing.  If it gets too hot it breaks down the collegians and degrades the eventual full strength bond that was possible.  Other than needing to stay in a range close to 140 - 145F the stuff is as easy to use as it gets and also cleans up super well too IMO.

At work in the repair biz we use it in a jar floating in a coffee type pot that has had the thermostat modified to hold a specific heat.  At home I float little bottles of HHG in a HotPot preferring the squeeze bottle for building activities.

Other things to know it's NOT intended to be a gap filler and has virtually no strength in that capacity.  It has been used as a gap filler unfortunately.... 

Open time is very short something like 15 seconds or less from application to when we need to have clamps in place and snugged down.  Open time can be extended by creative preheating of parts or the use of a hot room.

Open time can also be extended by messing with the viscosity and using the jelling characteristics as a tool and as an advantage.  Thicker HHG can form a bead that although the outside of the bead is jelling the inside remains hot and runny - it is this characteristic that was likely used for more time consuming operations in the past such as attaching plates to the rims, etc.

Great stuff, fun to use, super responsible for we repair people in so much as it's a serviceable glue not to mention the vintage nod as well.

A caution though - HHG adopters often go though a love, love thing with the stuff and attempt to use it everywhere and for everything.

If one does not have the chops to get clamps in place before the glue jells other glues with longer open times are better for these applications than attempting to be a HHG snob.  This is NOT directed at you but instead attempting to address a common problem with newer HHG users.  There in no glory in an instrument that was assembled with only HHG if the thing is going to fall apart on the first humid day because many of the glue joints took too long to get clamps in place and the HHG jelled.

HHG has some requirements that if we heed them it will serve us very well.  If we ignore them it will surely bite us...

[tadej bratkovic]

Fortunately my supplier is a reputable one. They supply their HHG to violin makers and on top of all they also sell fish glue, bone glue and rabbit skin glue separately. My HHG looks just like brown sugar. Once melted it looks slightly blonde like the polyfloral honey. :) Once dried and set it is almost completely clear.

I agree with your opinion, but I started with HHG because there are some situations when it's perfectly suitable. I don't mind 2 hrs of prep work if my glue can set quickly. I hate the opposite when doing a small project and wait overnight for the glue to dry.

Since I am mostly into fretting and neck related things (majority of my business are solid-bodied guitars) I think I'll give it a try next time I'll be fretting.

I am thinking of adding some volume with marbles or bearing balls. I saw Robert O'Brien doing that in order to keep the glue hot for longer. Does anyone know if metal objects spoil the HHG? Because I have tons of bearing balls but no silicate/marble balls. :)

I did a few tests with water again today and when my jar is at least half full, the temperature rises to about 140°F. I guess my quantity was just too small.

[Hesh Breakstone]

I use marbles in the bottom of my hot pot but more as a riser to keep the plastic glue bottle from being in direct contact with the metal heating element in the bottom of these Rival Hot Pots.

I also use a stainless steel bolt in the glue bottle in direct contact with the glue for two reasons: 1)  Great shaker as in rattle can paint when I first mix up the glue and 2) the weight of the bolt helps keep the bottle floating upright in the water bath.  I never noticed any issues with stainless in contact with the glue but have no experiences with anything but stainless.

If your supplier also sell's bone glue marketed as bone glue you are likely fine and the colors that you mentioned seem right to me too.

Something else that might help you with clean-up is I wait about one or two minutes to clean up because then you can literally pull the now "snot like consistancy".... ;) glue up as it becomes much like the SLS (snot like substance) used to stick new credit cards to the letter that never tells you how much you will actually be paying to use the card....

Lot's of folks over the years have used HHG to pot frets in too and it works great in this application and is servicable too in that it releases with heat too come refret time.  We prefer CA for fret work because we also clamp every single fret in place and using HHG and clamping would add a lot of time over what super thin CA takes now.

Welcome to the world of HHG - wonderful stuff!  You ca even put it in your tea but you may get constipated the next day unless your body temp is naturally 145F... ;)

[Ned Knepp]

Hey Tadej, is it possible that your first jar didn't have enough glue to actually cover the tip of the thermometer? That might account for the low reading. Your description of how it flowed sounds like it was to temp.

[John]

Here's a very good tutorial on hide glue. 

http://woodtreks.com/animal-protein-hide-glues-how-to-make-select-h...

On the same site there a video on gluing veneer with a veneer hammer, there's information in it that's relevant to using hide glue in general. I wholeheartedly agree with Hesh and his diplomatic version of "when you have a hammer everything looks like a nail". 

[Frank Ford]

Don't worry about overheating the glue unless  you leave it under heat for long periods.  It's OK to heat it in a microwave and get it right up to boiling if  you're going to use it all right away.  The warnings about keeping the glue at a maximum of 145F is only for "industrial" use where the glue is kept hot all day.    

Hideo Kamimoto, Mario Martello and other old-timers I've known have used hide glue in a simple glass jar sitting in a pan of water on a hot plate, never measuring temperature or monitoring it in any way other than to add glue or water as needed to maintain appropriate viscosity.

I heat a cup of boiling water in the microwave, float a little plastic hot sauce cup with glue in it, and carry it over to the bench for use, dumping the whole mess when I'm through with the job.  Quick, easy, neat. Others I know use official glue pots and thermometers, keeping the glue hot for hours at a time.  Like everything else, technique is personal - whatever works for you. . .

[Ed Minch]

My daughter does repair in Brooklyn NY an I was impressed with her set-up.  She found that a leg-wax pot heats to 140°.  She mixes a larger batch of glue, puts it a couple of tablespoons at a time in little plastic ketchup containers like they use at fast food restaurants, then freezes them.

She takes out a couple at a time and floats them in the pot and Bob's her uncle.

Ed

[Lance Lawson]

You really don't want the glue super hot.  It can begin to break down.  If you're 130F glue try warming the pieces to 110 or 115F.  This should give you a nice warm environment for the glue bond.

[john hall]

 When I started I tried all the cheap methods ,  I have learned a glue pot is called a glue pot for a reason. If you are going to use HHG  invest in the pot.  One less variable to worry about.  There are also different strengths.  I  get my HHG from  Toolsforworkingwood.

  Never had a problem with it.