matthew kinney Posted April 5, 2011 Report Share Posted April 5, 2011 hello I am new to working with Ebony. I bought some of the Gabon variety...I am wondering how well it glues up and what kind of glue would work best. Any advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. thanks, Mathias Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bhelart Posted April 5, 2011 Report Share Posted April 5, 2011 I've used ebony, including Gabon, in a few applications. So far I've always used woodworking yellow (PVA) glue. I've used type one, type two and the new type three. Never had any problem with the bond holding. I do wash the ebony surface before glue-up with a quick wipe of denatured alcohol, that seems to be an easy way to eliminate any oils on the surface. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bhelart Posted April 5, 2011 Report Share Posted April 5, 2011 hello I am new to working with Ebony. I bought some of the Gabon variety...I am wondering how well it glues up and what kind of glue would work best. Any advice or suggestions would be greatly appreciated. thanks, Mathias Mathias, what are you going to use the ebony for? How does it fit into the project? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matthew kinney Posted April 5, 2011 Author Report Share Posted April 5, 2011 ah, good... thankyou Badflys. I am going to carve the ebony- part of a series of sculpture that I'm working on. The piece of ebony I have isn't wide enough on its own, so I'm going to run it through the joiner and glue it up with another. I'll use tightbond 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PaulMarcel Posted April 6, 2011 Report Share Posted April 6, 2011 The trick with Ebony is that it is oily. Since the water from the glue won't penetrate the surface very well, it won't wick the glue into the ridiculously dense grain very easily. For that reason, I wouldn't use a water-based glue. I haven't glued up Ebony like you intend so I'm saying more what I would do than what I've done. Use a non-water-based glue. Polyurethane glue, as PITA as it is with the foaming, can stick anything together. Epoxy will also work. In both cases, removing as much of the surface oils as possible will give the glue a better hold. Wipe it down with Napthla first then wipe the Napthla dry (don't wait for it to flash off and completely dry; you want to beat the oil from surfacing) then glue with either of the above glues. Epoxy is its own 2-part glue, but polyurethane's second part is water so there won't be much on that joint; wipe one side with a damp cloth with the poly glue on the other, clamp, and scrape that PITA foam off later. If it isn't obvious, my choice would be to use epoxy over PITA polyurethane glue. The epoxy is also clear to clear-amber, which should be more hidden with your carving than the tan colored poly glue. Don't clamp the be-jezuz out of the epoxy joint; that's a case where you can starve it. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vic Posted April 6, 2011 Report Share Posted April 6, 2011 The trick with Ebony is that it is oily. Since the water from the glue won't penetrate the surface very well, it won't wick the glue into the ridiculously dense grain very easily. For that reason, I wouldn't use a water-based glue. I haven't glued up Ebony like you intend so I'm saying more what I would do than what I've done. Use a non-water-based glue. Polyurethane glue, as PITA as it is with the foaming, can stick anything together. Epoxy will also work. In both cases, removing as much of the surface oils as possible will give the glue a better hold. Wipe it down with Napthla first then wipe the Napthla dry (don't wait for it to flash off and completely dry; you want to beat the oil from surfacing) then glue with either of the above glues. Epoxy is its own 2-part glue, but polyurethane's second part is water so there won't be much on that joint; wipe one side with a damp cloth with the poly glue on the other, clamp, and scrape that PITA foam off later. If it isn't obvious, my choice would be to use epoxy over PITA polyurethane glue. The epoxy is also clear to clear-amber, which should be more hidden with your carving than the tan colored poly glue. Don't clamp the be-jezuz out of the epoxy joint; that's a case where you can starve it. If you have animals, especially dogs, be aware they LOVE poly glue. It also cures in their intestines and without a very expensive procedure will kill them. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PaulMarcel Posted April 6, 2011 Report Share Posted April 6, 2011 Good point, Vic. Okay, Mathias, resist all temptations to glue an animal to the Ebony Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gardnesd Posted April 6, 2011 Report Share Posted April 6, 2011 Welcome, Mathias. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RenaissanceWW Posted April 6, 2011 Report Share Posted April 6, 2011 Good point, Vic. Okay, Mathias, resist all temptations to glue an animal to the Ebony thank thank you, Paul-Marcel I had a good laugh with this one. Is it ok to glue animals to each other? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matthew kinney Posted April 7, 2011 Author Report Share Posted April 7, 2011 cool then, I have west systems that I'll use, thankyou! By the way, I would recommend using wheat paste when joining two animals together(just kidding)... lol Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tim0625 Posted April 9, 2011 Report Share Posted April 9, 2011 cool then, I have west systems that I'll use, thankyou! By the way, I would recommend using wheat paste when joining two animals together(just kidding)... lol 2 PETA people just stumbled across the thread and fainted dead away. REVIVE THEM WITH LACQUER THINNER!! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PaulMarcel Posted April 9, 2011 Report Share Posted April 9, 2011 2 PETA people just stumbled across the thread and fainted dead away. REVIVE THEM WITH LACQUER THINNER!! Nah, I say glue them together with Hide glue Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matthew kinney Posted April 18, 2011 Author Report Share Posted April 18, 2011 welp, I glued up the ebony(freshly machined) with G5 west system. I waited 15 hours plus before I started carving. At one point the joint flew apart:( So now I'm thinking about tightbond 3. Its possible I starved the joint- but I needed it tight,. I initially wiped the surfaces to be glued with laquer thinner, applied the resin and clamped. I noticed the next day that cured resin just chips off surfaces of unclamped wood, like it does not really "grab". I thought this to be suspect. So I gotta sand/clean the cured resin off the glue joints and try again- this time with tightbond3. Any suggestions? thanks, Mathias Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lawrence Brown Posted April 18, 2011 Report Share Posted April 18, 2011 So here are my thoughts on some different approaches that may or may not work for you, but maybe they'll help you think in different directions and come up with a better solution: You don't say what you're carving, but will parts of it be thick enough that you could do something like put dowels on the inside to join the pieces or something like that? If it's a fairly hefty piece, then a mechanical connection like that might work better, like rebar in cement. Try to clean the holes out with naptha and some kind of scrubber and glue/epoxy the dowels in. If it's a thinner piece and you don't want to do that, I wonder if roughing up the interior surfaces before epoxying would help. (Just thinking out loud on this one. Haven't actually tried it) After scuffing it up with something like 60 grit sandpaper, flood it with the naptha, scrub it quickly with a wire brush to really work the solvent in, then wipe it off and blow the dust off thoroughly with an air hose. With epoxy, you don't necessarily need flat contact over the entire surface since it will cure solid and the rough surface would give it more "tooth" to stick to. Of course that may cause other problems in that you might not get a solid seam. The roughness seen along the edge may make it ugly. You could also try drilling small, fairly shallow holes in each piece that line up and fill the entire inside with the epoxy. That might help structurally by having lots of little epoxy "rods" pulling it together. Of course that would get quite messy though and not be practical. Another mechanical option could be screws and epoxy, though of course that again depends on your project. Is there any way you could hide a counter-sunk hole somewhere? Oh, and I know the stuff is ridiculously expensive, but do you have any scrap bits that you can try your gluing technique on? Sounds like a major pain if you end up having to clean all the epoxy/glue off again. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Darnell Hagen Posted April 18, 2011 Report Share Posted April 18, 2011 I'm not a fan of doweling myself, wood movement inevitably breaks the mostly end grain glue joint, and hole alignment is difficult, paticularly in an irregular object like a carving. Fine Woodworking did a test a while back, it was found that washing the surface with solvents weakend the joint. Their tests concluded that a light sanding of the surface right before assembly removes oils and improves the bond between all woods because of the removal of the oxidised layer. I've used both PVA and epoxy on ebony and have had no failures with either. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
matthew kinney Posted April 19, 2011 Author Report Share Posted April 19, 2011 hi everyone, thanks again for all the thoughtful suggestions and advice. I chopped back and made fresh gluing surfaces. Then I thoroughly sanded the joining surfaces with 100 grit. I opted out of the water base glue and went with west system again, except went with the 205 fast hardener and 105 resin this time instead of their G5.... maybe I shoulda used 80 grit- I don't know and I forgot to wipe it with laquer thinner. Too late now, its clamped up. I eased off on the clamps too. I looked but wasn't able to find anything on that test that finewoodworking did- ah well! life is good. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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