Glue Open Time

[Nicholas Lingg]

When I make a box I use 1/4" wide box joints and use Polyurethane (aka.Gorilla glue). The Polyurethane gives me longer working time as opposed to PVA. The last time I made a box it was 6" tall and I almost didn't get it square before the glue started to set up ( I work alone and getting the culls and clamps in place is a job). Now I'm making a 10" tall box and was thinking of using Plastic Resin glue. Will this give me a longer open time and will it work on a box joint?

[Prashun Patel]

Titebond makes Extend versions of their glues. How much open time do you require? For box joints you don't need that much glue on each finger; and you probably don't need to do each size of the joint.

[Jerry Thompson]

Try liquid hide glue. It has a longer open time. I am speaking of the premade Titebond brand.
I use mostly hide glue and it love it. Of course it is not for outdoor use.

[Phil Simard]

I have had great results with epoxy while gluing house doors. I too work alone, and I don't like being stressed. This epoxy has a pot life of one hour and reach 80% cure in one day.

http://www.leevalley.com/en/wood/page.aspx?p=20011&cat=1,110,42965,20011

[Jeff Duncan]

You may also want to think about how you apply your glue and clamp and see if there are faster ways to go about it?

I don't use box joints but make 8" tall dovetailed drawer boxes fairly frequently and have no problem getting them glued up with plain old yellow glue. There are other alternatives but they all have drawbacks. Epoxy is expensive, needs to be mixed, stinks, and usually has a painfully long cure time. There are situations where you need it and I always have it handy. Poly glues are just a messy nuisance and are my absolute last choice, to the point that I don't keep it in the shop. If a project absolutely needs it I'll go out and buy the smallest bottle available. Titebond's Extend will give you a little more open time without a lot of the drawbacks, but may not be enough depending on how much time you need? I haven't played with the Plastic Resin so I'll leave that for others.

good luck,
JeffD

[Mike Cutler]

Another epoxy fan here. With epoxy you have a tremendous amount of control of pot life. The downside is that most "readily available" epoxies do have a longer clamp time. Plan on 24 hours.
When I don't use epoxy I use Titebond Hide Glue, or Titebond Extend. Both are excellent products, and should allow you to get everything together with no stress.

[Paul Murphy]

Nicholas, I have used plastic resin glue in bent lamination, and it does have a longer open time. I used this product, as it advertizes Formaldehyde content below the EPA threshold:
http://www.vac-u-clamp.com/index.php?pageControl=productdetails&prodid=12 (http://www.vac-u-clamp.com/index.php?pageControl=productdetails&prodid=12)
This glue is mixed with water to activate, has a finite shelf life even unmixed [~1yr], and all the glue mixed is used or disposed of at the end of the pot life.

I also use Titebond II Extend for lots of glue-ups, and while it doesn't have the open time of plastic resin glue, it is manageable for many projects.

[Clay Fails]

Titebond's literature lists "Open Time" of 10 minutes and "Total Assembly Time" of 20 to 25 minutes for Titebond III. Does anyone know what the difference is in these designations? For example, if i start spreading glue on the first piece at time Zero, do i have 20 minutes until that piece needs to be clamped? Or do I just have 10 minutes? Thanks,

[Martin Jodoin]

From Titebond:

Open Assembly Time : Period of time between initial glue application and putting the substrates together.
Total Assembly Time : The period of time between the initial glue application and clamping.

So to answer you question i would say yes, you have 20 min to put all your clamps.