Thread: just some links

which begs the question,
What is the lifetime of various woodworking glues?

"to glue or not to glue, that's either sticky or non-sticky question".

How I understood it, to make an adhesive bonding of wood lasting a lifetime, there seems to be just two principles to follow. Either the wood and it's surfaces are stabilized in terms of the glue, or there is glue having the same properties as wood. When the first principle is only almost impossible, the latter one already is practically impossible. So, if the perfect thing is out of reach, I'll go for the second best. I use white glues and epoxies, usually.

I mix my epoxies myself from mere resins, additives and curing agents. Epoxy is not even close to be the ultimate wood adhesive, but good enough to hold pieces together much better there where white glue does not do anymore. Epoxies are also hassle-free, just because you can formulate them by yourself to cure them in from 3 minutes to days RT.

The price of bisphenol A epichlorohydrin (the epoxy resin) per metric tonne at the moment is about 2850 euros, thats about 4,7 AUD per kilo. DETA (diethylene triamine) which is one of the many curing agents (RT curing, tendency to blush when used alone) costs about the same or a bit less. If I pay something like double price per kilo when I get them from the barrels of the flooring company, it's still very nicely priced general purpose epoxy.

West System epoxies are quite good, but even better to me have been Gurit (SP Systems) epoxy systems. Prime 20 and it's successors have Lloyds certificate. Spabond adhesives are better than West System. Not affiliated with them, only what I have found out.

To me, what comes to wood glues, I'd say we can get and pay for only the second best at the moment. I wish not to pay that much all the time, so when the same second best can be purchased with a fraction of the price of the officially formulated epoxy systems, why not. Is it a good choice, well, no one has yet proven me wrong, not even my wooden joinings I made.

kippis,

sumu