Gluing up Cherry

[William A Johnston]

I've encountered an issue with making some end grain cutting boards for Christmas gifts. The maple and walnunt slabs have glued up nicely but on the cherry slabs I have a failure at the glue joint. It only happens on the cherry?

I have run all boards through my spiral head jounter and all pieces are square. I read you can put a drop of water and if it soaks up within a couple of minutes the wood is good for gluing. Well after jointing the cherry a droplet does not soak up into the wood? But after lightly sanding the edge it soaks up in a few minutes.

Is the edge becoming burnished?

What have others done to glue up cherry?

I have fresh cutters on the jointer and I use 3/4" pipe clamps and use my fingers and thumb to tighten.

Thanks for any advise.

Bill

[Jim Becker]

If anything, the cherry should glue up easier than the maple! I've never had the issue you describe with cherry and have used a lot of it over the years. What glue are you using? Be sure you're not sanding the pieces finely, too...the edges you are gluing don't want to be "silky smooth" and burnished.

[William A Johnston]

Jim,

I'm using titebond 3. The boards are being glued up on the edge grain. I can't wrap my head around why it is failing at the glue joint. All my maple and walnut glued up great right from the jointer. Also it is brand new bottle of glue I purchased yesterday. Do you think my spital head jointer is getting the edge to smooth? I thought about running the boards through my drum sander and give it a try. I keep 80 grit on it. I also keep my shop around 65 to 70 degrees and store the gallon of glue on a shelf.

Bill

[Andrew Hughes]

I also had a problem gluing Cherry last week. It was a curved laminate when I checked the cut offs the glued didn’t bond that well. My surfaces were hand planed. I remade the piece and scuffed it with 100 grit it was much better.
My only suggestion is to wet both sides and clamp very tight.
Good luck

[Jim Morgan]

Did you joint the cherry first, last, or in the middle?

[William A Johnston]

Should I wet the edges to raise the grain? Let it dry then glue?

I did all my jointer work this morning then went straight to glue up. I typically leave my pieces clammped for an hour or so so I can scrape and excess off easy

[Zachary Hoyt]

That's very odd, I routinely glue up all three of those woods and I have also found that if anything cherry glues better than maple. I have never used Titebond 3, though, only 1, so maybe there's something about the glue that is causing the difference.
Zach

[Jim Becker]

Interesting. I only use Titebond III for all of my work which is why I'm further confused about the issue. I agree with abrading the wood to see if that resolves the problem.

[Bradley Gray]

I'm pretty sure if you run it through the drum sander all will be good. 80 grit is perfect.

[glenn bradley]

I would like to ask where the cherry sourced from. The reason is that I have, like a lot of folks, glued up a lot of cherry. I am curious if yours is locally milled. Much of my cherry is jointed with hand planes which leaves an almost glassy surface.

[Robert Engel]

The only explanation I can give for the glue failure is possibly some resin in the wood. I leave panels in clamps overnight because I have had some issues taking out of clamps in a few hours.

FWIW, I've read about planed surface and glue integrity, since I often do spring joints or a final jointing with hand plane for long panel glue ups.

I've seen many build videos where hand planed edges are glued without sanding and some comments from the maker that it doesn't matter.

I've tested it myself & have never had a problem.

Of course this is something you will have to prove to yourself.

[Bob Grier]

When using Titebond glue I have not had a problem removing clamps after an hour when edge gluing 1/2" or thicker cherry or any other wood. However, I have had a problem removing clamps after an hour with cherry and other woods when edge gluing veneers or thin pieces. In these cases I tape the joints before gluing and then place the assembled and glued piece tape down on the work bench. Then I may add other layers of veneer or not but after I am finished, I place plastic wrap on top of the laminate and then cover with 3/4" plywood with cauls over the plywood to clamp everything down tight to the work bench. When I do this I have found that it is best to leave in the clamps until the next day. If I remove the clamps after an hour the glue joints usually separate.

Do you think leaving the clamps in place longer might help. Other than that, I would suspect that the pieces of wood might be cupping due to uneven clamp pressure or because they sat for a while after milling before gluing.

[Mark Bolton]

Switch to urethane (i.e. gorilla glue) for your cutting boards and youll be better off all around.

[John TenEyck]

Switch to urethane (i.e. gorilla glue) for your cutting boards and youll be better off all around.

What's your logic and/or experience with that comment, Mark? I've never been impressed with Gorilla Glue except for gluing air dried wood to be used outdoors. FWW testing on KD wood showed it to have much lower strength compared to TB.

John

[Mark Bolton]

What's your logic and/or experience with that comment, Mark? I've never been impressed with Gorilla Glue except for gluing air dried wood to be used outdoors. FWW testing on KD wood showed it to have much lower strength compared to TB.

John

We glued up endless boards with TBIII for a long while. You would often times see creep often before they even left the shop (were not talking about sloppy work but we are also not talking about treating a long grain commodity board like a piece of chippendale furniture either and even boards that I still have in use personally to this day that were glued up with TBIII are together but have long shown opening in the ends at the glue line and none in the field. Conversely, boards made at the very same time using urethane show absolutely ZERO creep and are dead tight at the glue line to this day. If there is an end split its in the field meaning the wood failed not the glue line. You can drag your fingernails over a board and instantly feel the creep in a PVA board.

I do a ton of severe testing. Lay glue ups out in the weather. Lock them in a hot vehicle. Set them on a counter in my shop that gets blasted with full direct sun through a non low-e window. PVA will often fail but TBIII will fail 100% of the time. Cutting boards live a brutal life and were only talking long grain, you go to end grain and the brutality is akin to Genghis Khan with regards to wood movement. Mine in personal use probably last unreasonably long because we lightly wash them, dry them with a towel, and stand them on edge to dry. That said, I never refresh the finish and try to abuse them to torture test them.

You can fiddle faddle around the TBIII thing all you want but all you have to do is look to the shops that build massive endgrain tops, 3" thick, commercially, that have had failures. You can read it all over about large shops that have "rid their shop of all TBIII". It is not the best glue for the job. Im not saying PU is, but its better.

[John TenEyck]

Thanks for the insights Mark. I agree that TBIII has it's shortcomings, especially with regards to creep and tendency to fail in hot conditions. Somehow I just never viewed Gorilla Glue as a better choice, perhaps because it's such a pain to use. Then again, Plastic Resin Glue and epoxy aren't the nicest things to work with either, and those are my usual suspects when eliminating creep and problems at high temperature are first and foremost. But maybe I'll have to take another look at GG in some of my own torture tests.

FWIW, I have several outdoor projects I've made over the years, mostly with redwood, but also some with black locust. All were glued with TBIII and not one has showed a sign of failure, even one where I edge glued several 3" wide boards together that is completely exposed to rain and sun. 20 years and it's still fine, which is quite surprising because I have had TBIII joints fail at high temperature. Curiously, those failures were with WO and Sapele which are much denser than redwood, so maybe that played a role in the bond or heat transfer.


John

[Mark Bolton]

Thanks for the insights Mark. I agree that TBIII has it's shortcomings, especially with regards to creep and tendency to fail in hot conditions. Somehow I just never viewed Gorilla Glue as a better choice, perhaps because it's such a pain to use. Then again, Plastic Resin Glue and epoxy aren't the nicest things to work with either, and those are my usual suspects when eliminating creep and problems at high temperature are first and foremost. But maybe I'll have to take another look at GG in some of my own torture tests.

FWIW, I have several outdoor projects I've made over the years, mostly with redwood, but also some with black locust. All were glued with TBIII and not one has showed a sign of failure, even one where I edge glued several 3" wide boards together that is completely exposed to rain and sun. 20 years and it's still fine, which is quite surprising because I have had TBIII joints fail at high temperature. Curiously, those failures were with WO and Sapele which are much denser than redwood, so maybe that played a role in the bond or heat transfer.


John

Well thats an interesting observation with regards to dense/tight grain in that that is whats most commonly used in boards. I think so much of this is dependant on the type of work you do. I can see many people who are very conscientious with regards to jointing and so on for boards having little to no problem. But thats not going to be the case when your making a good amount of boards. Your going to have a few odd and stubborn boards in the batch and if your dealing with a glue that is somewhat fragile (TBIII is out for me) you are sunk. I agree that epoxy and unibond are a tough option which is why Ive settled with PU for now.

TBIII works well for many. I cant believe how many I hear use it by default for everything when I would never be without TB original or Super for our day to day work. We use gallons and gallons.

TBIII on light use things like peels, charcuterie, bread only, etc.. most likely never an issue. But I try to keep the amount of adhesives on the shelf to a minimum because the rarely used ones become a boat anchor by the time you use them a second time. So we will have TB super on the shelf, and several small sealed bottles of GG for odd jobs, and a couple of quarts of GG for larger projects. The GG we put the caps on and store them upside down in a box and its a roll of the dice as to whether they will be dead or not the next time we pull the cap off lol.

[Brian Holcombe]

I like TB II, works very much like a basic yellow glue. I think you’re onto something wrt accurate jointing. I don’t think that TB has much tolerance for thick glue lines.

[William A Johnston]

Lots of great information posted. I've never used a PU glue I assume that is a polyurethane glue? Is there a particular brand that is food safe when cured? I let the cherry stay clamped overnight and it was secure this morning. Is the PU hard to work with and clean up.

Thanks for all the info.

Bill

[Andrew Hughes]

I think polyurethane is harder to work with I avoid it when titebond with do.
It foams up stains it will stain your skin,uncurled poly only cleans up with sprits and it’s more expensive.
If your glue lines are thick just thin the glue so you can squeeze more out with clamps.

[Alan Schwabacher]

If the problem was that the cherry gluelines were not yet strong after an hour, is it possible the cherry was less dry than the other lumber?

[Jim Becker]

One other thought...just because we "can" take things out of the clamps after a relatively short period of time doesn't mean we "should" do that...sometimes letting the workpiece sit under pressure overnight helps when there is a problem like this.

[Mark Bolton]

Lots of great information posted. I've never used a PU glue I assume that is a polyurethane glue? Is there a particular brand that is food safe when cured? I let the cherry stay clamped overnight and it was secure this morning. Is the PU hard to work with and clean up.

Thanks for all the info.

Bill

Its definitely got its issues to work with for sure. As Andrew said, it foams and expands as it cures, its not as easy to cleanup as PVA, but a lot depends on how you work. I agree completely that PVA is a far better option where it works well. As I said we use gallons of titebond. If your on a project, or your workflow is to get parts very close to completion prior to glue up its likely not the best due to the foaming/expansion and cleanup issue. Cutting boards are generally heavily surfaced after they are out of the clamps. Either by hand, with hand power tools, or through a planer/sander so the cleanup is really a non issue. The food safe issue is a rat hole that comes up in these conversations every time. PU is non-toxic when cured but to my knowledge no manufacture has gone to the expense of getting the "food safe" status. Many glues and epoxies are stated to be "non toxic" once fully cured just as most finishes are as well. The amount of cured glue you will ever ingest from a cutting board over its lifetime probably pales in comparison to the amount of plastic you ingest from the bristles wearing off the bristles of your toothbrush throughout your life. Or the material shed off your non-stick frying pan coatings and plastic spatulas.

Its not something I would ever be concerned with.

[Robert Engel]

I use mostly TBII.

It should work for what the poster is doing.

Leave it in clamps at least 6 hours & pay attention to the jointing.

You won't have a problem if you do this.

If you're forcing misjointed boards together in a production situation, that's a totally different scenario.

It doesn't make TBIII a useless product.

[Brian Holcombe]

Nothing wrong with pointing out issues one has had and Mark provided context. Mark strikes me as being precise, I’d be willing to bet that the joints coming out of his machinery are reasonably accurate.

[Wade Lippman]

Nothing wrong with pointing out issues one has had and Mark provided context. Mark strikes me as being precise, I’d be willing to bet that the joints coming out of his machinery are reasonably accurate.


I don't know Mark, but have glued lots of cherry with TBIII and never had a failure. I've also never sanded a jointed edge and rarely left stuff glued up for more than an hour.

Unless there is something really bizarre about his cherry, I would have to conclude it is poor technique and he got lucky on the walnut and maple.

[Edwin Santos]

One other thought...just because we "can" take things out of the clamps after a relatively short period of time doesn't mean we "should" do that...sometimes letting the workpiece sit under pressure overnight helps when there is a problem like this.

Good advice I think. For those that can afford the time, I think it is better to err to the side of more time versus less time in the clamps. You can't harm your joint by clamping it too long, but it is definitely possible to "under-clamp" it.
It would be interesting to see if the OP could recreate his scenario with more clamping time to see it makes any difference in this particular case.

[Edwin Santos]

We glued up endless boards with TBIII for a long while. You would often times see creep often before they even left the shop (were not talking about sloppy work but we are also not talking about treating a long grain commodity board like a piece of chippendale furniture either and even boards that I still have in use personally to this day that were glued up with TBIII are together but have long shown opening in the ends at the glue line and none in the field. Conversely, boards made at the very same time using urethane show absolutely ZERO creep and are dead tight at the glue line to this day. If there is an end split its in the field meaning the wood failed not the glue line. You can drag your fingernails over a board and instantly feel the creep in a PVA board.

I do a ton of severe testing. Lay glue ups out in the weather. Lock them in a hot vehicle. Set them on a counter in my shop that gets blasted with full direct sun through a non low-e window. PVA will often fail but TBIII will fail 100% of the time. Cutting boards live a brutal life and were only talking long grain, you go to end grain and the brutality is akin to Genghis Khan with regards to wood movement. Mine in personal use probably last unreasonably long because we lightly wash them, dry them with a towel, and stand them on edge to dry. That said, I never refresh the finish and try to abuse them to torture test them.

You can fiddle faddle around the TBIII thing all you want but all you have to do is look to the shops that build massive endgrain tops, 3" thick, commercially, that have had failures. You can read it all over about large shops that have "rid their shop of all TBIII". It is not the best glue for the job. Im not saying PU is, but its better.

Hi, I interpret what you are saying to be that adhesives are a tool like any other and should be appropriately matched to the job at hand. I confess to using TB I and II on auto pilot a lot of the time, maybe TB III for something that will be outdoors or exposed to moisture. But hearing this, I plan to start trying out different adhesives and giving more conscious thought as to which one to use for a particular situation. I can't believe there is a one-size-fits-all glue for every situation.
I have heard the factories that build endgrain tops like Boos and Weldwood use epoxy.

Let me know if I misunderstood your advice,
Edwin

[Edwin Santos]

Somehow I just never viewed Gorilla Glue as a better choice, perhaps because it's such a pain to use. Then again, Plastic Resin Glue and epoxy aren't the nicest things to work with either, and those are my usual suspects when eliminating creep and problems at high temperature are first and foremost. But maybe I'll have to take another look at GG in some of my own torture tests.

John

Historically I've been right there with you on this thinking, but FWW published an article by an impressive woodworker named Craig Thibodeau who lays out his reasons for looking to PU glue as his go-to. He talks about the harder glue line advantage which is another way of speaking to the creeping that Mark B. is talking about. I'm not knocking PVA glues in any way, but as I mention in another post in this thread, it may be a case of keeping an open mind about the various adhesives and where they each excel. And ease of use and clean up is a factor too.

Here's a link to the free section of the article:
https://www.finewoodworking.com/2016/11/02/polyurethane-is-my-go-to-glue

Edwin

[Brent Malwicks]

Everything you've said OP is quite normal. I had this problem the first time I tried gluing up cherry, but I discovered that it was because I was sanding too finely.