Antique Furniture & Glue - How to fix?

[James Malcolm]

Not sure if this is the proper place to ask, but here goes...

I recently inherited a piece of furniture that belonged to my great-grandmother and one of the rosettes has come unglued. I assume it is some sort of hide glue, but I really know absolutely nothing about this sort of thing. What is the proper way to reattach it? I think if I just use superglue or regular old titebond it will haunt me forever, it seems like a waste to risk taking it to a professional for something so minor and I certainly don't want to screw it up myself trying to remove the old glue if there is a better way. Thanks for the insight.

[David Werkheiser]

James, you are right in thinking not to use anything but hide glue. You should be able to find hide glue made by "Franklin" in a brown plastic bottle, it is almost as good as the glue that needs to be mixed with water and heated. You should try to carefully scrap most of the old glue off to get a smooth surface. The nice thing about hide glue is that it will bond with the old glue.
David

[Jerome Hanby]

Exactly what i would have said...except I didn't know the brand name. I think Titebond may have hide glue also (for all I know, Franklin may be the company that makes Titebond <g>).


James, you are right in thinking not to use anything but hide glue. You should be able to find hide glue made by "Franklin" in a brown plastic bottle, it is almost as good as the glue that needs to be mixed with water and heated. You should try to carefully scrap most of the old glue off to get a smooth surface. The nice thing about hide glue is that it will bond with the old glue.
David

[Tom McMahon]

One of the advantages of hide glue is that it can be reactivated by the addition of new hide glue. Just remove any loose glue, dirt, or any thing that makes for a bad joint and reglue with hide glue and you are good to go. You don't need to totally remove the old glue.

[James Malcolm]

Thank you all for your responses