Gorilla super glue, any good??

[Jeff Monson]

My son and I are building some puzzles that require gluing quite a few small blocks together. We are using pine and I need a way to bond them quick like super glue does. I have searched everywhere in town that carries Titebond as I was looking for some of thier CA glue, well nobody carries that here. I did find some Gorilla "super glue" that says it works on wood, does anyone have experience with this product, or is there something else out there that works well to bond wood quickly??

[Sean Walker]

I've only used it once to glue in some rare earth magnets on some walnut. It expands like crazy, so be prepared. It also took longer than I thought to fully dry, so be sure to check the drying times on the bottle. I probably won't be using it again, and will get some CA.

[Andrew Nemeth]

+1 on cyanoacrylate (CA). You can pick it up at a hobby shop in several diffrent viscosities. If I remember correctly, it binds in the absence of oxygen, which is why the bottles are never full. In general, the more porous and rough the materials being bonded, the thicker the CA. You can also buy a spray accelerator or "kicker" to speed the set. The kickers I have used cause the glue to bubble and form a white haze.

[Ole Anderson]

I've only used it once to glue in some rare earth magnets on some walnut. It expands like crazy, so be prepared. It also took longer than I thought to fully dry, so be sure to check the drying times on the bottle. I probably won't be using it again, and will get some CA.

Were you using the regular urethane Gorilla Glue or the Gorilla (CA) Superglue per the OP question? I have used the Gorilla CA stuff and I like it, it is a lot thicker than the watery stuff you usually see at the hardware store.

[Jeff Monson]

Thanks for the input Ole, thanks for actually reading my question. Have you tried this glue on wood? Thats the real question I want some input on.



Were you using the regular urethane Gorilla Glue or the Gorilla (CA) Superglue per the OP question? I have used the Gorilla CA stuff and I like it, it is a lot thicker than the watery stuff you usually see at the hardware store.

[John Coloccia]

Jeff, the most reliable superglue I've found is HotStuff. Pacer's Zap line of glues is great too, but the tips break and that's that. HotStuff's tips and applicators are replaceable and dirt cheap if you buy them in bulk and direct from Satellite City, so I stick with HotStuff. I've had multiple glue failures using other glues, and sometimes it seems like they don't want to set up at all, even with accelerator on them. As I understand it, it's a very non-aggresive formula to make it friendly for general woodworking joints, but just doesn't behave like any superglue I've ever used. For example, just try and glue two pieces of MDF together with Titebond/FastCap superglue. Forget about it. No matter how much accelerator and glue you put on there, it seems the glue simply soaks into the MDF before it ever sets, leaving an incredibly weak joint. It's trivial with HotStuff.

Anyhow, HotStuff is available at your local hobby shop. My local Woodcraft happens to carry it too.

[Dan Hulbert]

If you can get HotStuff, by all means use it. I just tossed a bottle of Gorilla super glue. It was crap. For small quantity purchases in remote areas away from decent hobby shops, I use Locktite thick viscosity CA. Works well, easy to dispense, and is available most everywhere.
Perhaps I got a bad bottle of Gorrilla CA, but I'll never buy it again.

[Jeff Monson]

I've had multiple glue failures using other glues, and sometimes it seems like they don't want to set up at all, even with accelerator on them. As I understand it, it's a very non-aggresive formula to make it friendly for general woodworking joints, but just doesn't behave like any superglue I've ever used.




Thanks John, thats the problem I have been encountering. I have tried 2 different types of CA glue (cheap stuff we had lying around the house) with NO success. Granted I usually dont superglue wood, so it was to my surprise it wouldnt hold at all. Hence my post, maybe I should have titled it "is there a superglue that works on wood thats available in my town!!!!" I had my hands on a bottle of Tite Bond CA glue in the Woodcraft store in MPLS last month, but I put it back because "I never need to superglue wood" $%^$&$^ it anyways.

Anyways I will stop by our craft store and see if they have any HotStuff.

[ian maybury]

I'm a little out of touch, but the likelihood is that most cyanoacrylates if they cure will stick wood. CA needs a source of hydroxide ions (basically water) on the surface to trigger the cure, and a very moderately acid surface will inhibit the cure of a basic first generation CA product. Woods vary quite a bit in acidity, so some bond (trigger a cure) readily and some don't. Lots of resin in the wood might just inhibit wetting and penetration too.

Loctite and the makers of high end CA have developed some technologies for what they call surface insensitive CAs, the adhesive basically sees the surface as being a little more basic/alkaline than is actually the case and so can bond slightly more acidic woods, card and the like. An activator can be used to bump off the cure too though in cases involving older style CAs when the surface is a bit acid. (there will be a limit, but it should bond most woods)

We've in recent years started to see higher volume packs sold for woodworking. These are usually sold with an activator, and are pretty slow to cure and more surface sensitive. A big part of the cost in making CA is in maintaining a high enough level of purity so the stuff doesn't kick off in the bottle. My suspicion is that as a result the bulk/cheap woodworking variety may be formulated for a little more stability to avoid the cost of achieving high purity than the more expensive branded varieties - which may explain the slow cure/additional sensitivity to surfaces.

Chances are that the majority of products sold for use in woodworking originate from the same suppliers....

Gap filling isn't advisable - it tends not to cure, and if kicked off with an activator in this situation it tends to end up more brittle. (it's already pretty brittle anyway)

Thick and thin doesn't I think make a lot of difference - they all start with a low viscosity base monomer. The thicker ones right up to the gels just have more filler (silica powder) mixed in to thicken them.

There's likewise probably not going to be much difference in wetting ability, penetration for a given viscosity or strength between brands on a surface like wood provided it's cured properly - it's about the basic properties of the cured polymer.

That's not to say that there aren't potentially differences between brands in very particular situations, especially when issues of specific sorts of surface contamination start to play a role - but realistically if it cures and there's a decent bond it's probably fine. The makers much like most glue producers will of course blow smoke all over the place and tell you otherwise, but bluntly I saw too many 'special' grades produced by adding some colour to take too much notice most of the time....

ian

[Carl Babel]

You mean there's science involved in adhesives?!?
JK! It is so cool that we are able to get such great information on this site!

On a completely non-technical note: I will +1 HotStuff. I have used it for woodworking with great success, although it has been a while now. I have not had much success with any other brand.

[Carl Beckett]

It's not for every application, but if you put baking soda on CA it instantly hardens. Learned this building fillets for RC gliders in the younger days. Allows you to build it up ( I would often put a line of baking soda in the corner to form a gusset, then touch a drop of CA to it - and instant set)

[Kevin Bourque]

Home Depot carries it.

[ian maybury]

:) Think what I'm saying is that there's science, pseudo science and total b*****it, and that a lot of what we're fed about adhesives belongs in the latter two categories. That adhesive systems tend to have characteristics which are determined by the nature of their base monomer/chemistry, and that realistically there tends not to be a lot of difference between brands. i.e. there may seem to be big difference between one CA that will cure and another that won't on a given surface, but in reality it's probably only a tiny difference in ph/acidity of the surface and of the formulation.

There's scope for some tuning in terms of quality/purity, and scope for some adjustment of characteristics (like that described above, or to deliver minor changes in elasticity, or whatever) - but it's rarely possible to change the inherent nature of a given adhesive chemistry. Add to that the fact that the base monomers in many cases used by a fairly wide range of manufacturers comes from the same bulk producers, and you can see that the differences are mostly down to marketing hype.

When you see a company with no prior background in a specific product type (like a CA, or one of the other adhesive chemistries) start to offer one, you can be pretty sure that they are buying it in bulk, maybe doing some final formulation and packing it down for sale. It's mostly a reselling and marketing exercise.

You can never say never, and even a seemingly inconsequential formulation or packaging difference can matter a lot in the context of a specific application - but even the companies with long standing businesses based on the various chemistries/adhesive types and running teams of R&D people by and large remain constrained by the properties of the specific chemistry - they don't get much beyond stuff like adjusting viscosities using fillers, speeding/slowing the cure, adding colour and the like. There's the very odd breakthrough that enables the use of an adhesive in a whole new situation, but they seem to be rare enough.

That doesn't prevent them claiming all sorts of stuff including inside their own organisations to keep their jobs, but it's in the end mostly about generating enough perceived novelty to maintain the impression of their being a leading edge organisation - to justify premium pricing.

In the end though a CA is a CA, and there's generally not that much between them....

ian

[Grant Wilkinson]

I know nothing about the chemistry, but I've had very good results bonding brass tubes to wood, aluminum to wood, and wood to wood. using Gorilla CA.