I have a 30 to 40 year old Dinning room chair that has repeatedly had some of the cross spindles come out of the legs, I've reglued with standard yellow glue but they just keep loosening up. My question is could the original builder have used hide glue to assemble and is it possible that the hide glue is interfering with the bond of the new glue?? I'm at the point I might glue them back in and pin the joint with a wooden dowel to keep it in place but would rather not. Not all of the spindles are loose so i can't completely disasemble the chair for a real reglue so any help would be appreciated.
Bill, I have had very good success using polyurethane (Gorilla) glue on chair rungs & such. Never had one come loose yet, and some have been in daily use for five years after regluing.
DonkeyHody "You may not always get what you pay for, but you always pay for what you get."
Absolutely and positively I second that... hell, I'll even third that. Used polyurethane glue on several chairs and they are still rock solid a few years later. I've used 2 brands of poly glue, one of which was Gorilla Glue. They were nearly the same but I just got a better vibe using Gorilla Glue. It seemed to be "better" than the other brand... but it could have been my imagination.
At any rate, disassemble what you can, scrape off as much loose glue as possible from the joints. The joints don't have to be super tight. A little loose fitting is ok. Wipe a medium film of gorilla glue on each side of each joint and assemble. Too much glue is better than not enough. No need to clamp exactly, but since the glue expands, it would be a good idea to immobilize the chair parts so that the joints do not expand apart.
Since the glue expands, you can use this feature to fill gaps in the assembly. Remember that a gap filled with tough glue is stronger than a gap filled with air.
Allow several hours to dry. Ideally you'll see the glue foaming and oozing out. Let it. Don't mees with the glue until it's fully dry (at least 8 hrs). When it's dry, the excess should chip/scrape off fairly easily with a chisel.
On my chairs, I left the excess oozed glue remain on the underside where the legs go into the seat. Seems to me it adds a wee bit of strength and nobody can see it.
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