Anyone Use Hotmelt Glue?

[Derek Arita]

I'm wondering how many people use hot melt glues and how they use them and for what jobs? Once the cartridge is in the gun, how long can it stay there in storage? Clamps, nails, screws?
OK...confession...I've had one of these guns sitting in my garage for years, but never used it, because I don't know how and for what applications it is best used and because I never had much confidence in the bond strength. I also, generally need a little more open time than I think the hot melt glues allow.

[Mark Wooden]

It's good as a temporary fastener or used in a non structural area; for example, I run a bead of it under drawer bottoms to keep them from ever rattleing or use a dollop on a block to hold something in places while other glue dries. I also will put a drop of it on the tabs where my tablesaw insert sits and then press a new wood insert into it, stopping when I'm flush with the table. Let it cool an viola! a flush zero clearance insert.

[Wade Lippman]

Aside from crafts, I have never used one. But just out of curiosity I looked it up and found they were much more complicated than I thought.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hot-melt_adhesive

[Mel Fulks]

I've used it to hold the bars in things like gothic sash ,if you over cope a bit it serves as a filler .Can be trimmed with a skinny knife after it hardens. Quality of the glue sticks seem to vary a lot. Had better luck with the clear sticks than the white ones which were gummy and didn't flow.

[Andrew Pitonyak]

I have used the glue as "shims" when running a board through a planer on a sled (because i don't own a jointer).

[Doug Richardson]

Never gave it much thought of using it for a wood project. Normally use it in electronic work like securing a plug or a ribbon cable to a circuit board.....

[Peter Quinn]

I use glue stick hot melt for plywood drawer bottoms, keeps them quiet and solid. A small bead front and back is all it takes. I've used them for temporary holding on jigs, any where a quick reversible bond is neccessary. I have a feeling when you say cartridge though you are discussing something like Hipur hot melt, which is a whole different animal. It has the quick set no clamp strength of hot melt but cures over night to polyurethane strength, and excells at end grain glue ups where yellow glue is weak. I haven't used it but primary small shop use among guys I know are molding assemblies, like tricky pediments or complex crowns, and glass grills. Good for exterior too being highly water resistant. I saw a crown demo a few years back using titebond hi pur, 10 minutes out you couldn't break the joint with a hammer, I've wanted the kit since but haven't quite had the need to make it happen.

[Jeff Duncan]

I used to have one of the PUR guns and sold it after a couple months as it didn't do much for me. The glue sets really, really fast! They do have different set times, but even the slow set was too fast for me. It also tends to have a much larger glue line than regular PVA glue. It is used in large manufacturing plants for production work so it obviously has significant benefits in the right situation. I just couldn't find any for my small shop:o

good luck,
JeffD

[glenn bradley]

I use one to temporarily stick parts together, apply templates, stick magnets to things and so forth.

[Stephen Cherry]

Here's a nice hot melt glue, and you don't even need a gun.

http://www.amazon.com/Brooklyn-Tool-Craft-Hide-Strength/dp/B0083SH7F2

[Tony Zaffuto]

Here's a nice hot melt glue, and you don't even need a gun.

http://www.amazon.com/Brooklyn-Tool-Craft-Hide-Strength/dp/B0083SH7F2

At the beginning of this thread, I was going to give a similar answer, however after reading through the replies, I've seen a few instances where I "might" consider hot melt glue (though it would take a lot for me to give up my hide glue & melting pot!).

[Derek Arita]

Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but the hot glue I'm talking about is the Pur system. From what I've seen on youtube, it instantly holds and the wood fails before the joint. It does however, take 24 hours to fully cure. Sounds like some of you think I'm talking about the crafting type of hot melt glue, which the Pur system is not. I believe it's polyurethane. At any rate, from what I've read, there is nothing temporary about this glue. I just wanted to know how it's used.

[Stephen Cherry]

At the beginning of this thread, I was going to give a similar answer, however after reading through the replies, I've seen a few instances where I "might" consider hot melt glue (though it would take a lot for me to give up my hide glue & melting pot!).

I've just started messing around with it, and it seems to me that hide glue is the original super glue.

[David Weaver]

When I worked at aristokraft (probably near 20 years ago now) we used hot melt glue and staples exclusively to assemble everything (face frames and doors were, of course, done separately).

The hot melt went into a large stationary pot and each "clamp" (a pneumatic adjustable jig that kept everthing clamped and square) assembled a cabinet in just under 2 minutes, so open time wasn't too much of an issue. It was unlike any stick glue that I've ever seen, though, it didn't come in sticks, it came in bulk and looked like little pieces of corn that you scooped into the pot and the running temperature was somewhere around 350 or 380 degrees. It was liquid for a while even after it came out of the clamp (and if you stuck your hand in a cabinet and accidentally touched a glue line, you could get burned.

The glue seam was very thick but remained pliable indefinitely on any older cabinets I've ever seen. Dados were all cut significantly oversized to accomodate the glue and rabbets left a substantial gap even when assembled, IIRC, for the glue.

Cabinet quality has increased a lot since then (price, too). The doors, face frames and drawer fronts were pretty good quality, but most carcase work was designed to be done fast there.

[Glenn Bird]

I have used it to secure small pieces on baseboards and they have lasted 25 years for the most part. A fellow cabinet maker used to use it to secure mouldings and such back in the 80s until he had some fall off after staining. Apparently the glue formulation (glue sticks) was changed from the earlier formulations resulting the the failures. He quit using it for that purpose. It does work well for me when securing small parts and pieces but I would never use it on a quality piece.

[Peter Quinn]

Maybe I'm misunderstanding, but the hot glue I'm talking about is the Pur system. From what I've seen on youtube, it instantly holds and the wood fails before the joint. It does however, take 24 hours to fully cure. Sounds like some of you think I'm talking about the crafting type of hot melt glue, which the Pur system is not. I believe it's polyurethane. At any rate, from what I've read, there is nothing temporary about this glue. I just wanted to know how it's used.


Thats what I was discussing in the end of above post. I've been wanting the system to play with it for a while, haven't had the big push yet. Demo's I saw all involved molding miters, gluing up glass bars, like single sided SDL grates where a single piece of glass rides in a rabbited frame, the grill is applied to the door front. They build the grates quickly just using Hi PUr and holding it until set. The stuff sure makes a strong miter, hard to beat it apart, wood usually breaks first. I'm told storage of open tubes can be dicey like most PU glues, once exposed to ambient moisture, it starts going. But in theory it can last a while if properly closed and stored? You read lots of complaints on the net from people who lost lots of expensive glue, others love it.

[Mel Fulks]

I also thought we were talking about the more common "craft " type. It too is used in more industrial applications with larger capacity and types. The other stuff I have not used . I have a friend who has used it on stained mantles to avoid filling set nails in all those small pieces ,and likes it for that.

[Dave Cav]

If we're talking about the regular gun style hot glue sticks, I think it's a dirty secret of a lot of woodworkers. I use mine all the time for jigs and fixtures, semi permanent setups, and other stuff. I have used lots of it to stick my dust collector pipe together, usually to make butt joints between black fittings and the 4" white PVC that makes up the piping. It holds well and is more or less removable when I need to reconfigure the D/C. Just this past weekend I made an enclosure around the heads on my tenoner to contain and direct the chips into the dust collector using 1/4 plywood, hot glue and staples. It looks like crap but it's pretty effective, and I've never seen anything that can throw chips like a tenoner.