When to use Epoxy
Unlike hide/protein glues, epoxies are NOT reversible. This means they should be used with caution and lots of forethought. Never use epoxies on joinery such as the mortise and tenon or dowel joints of chair or table. Joints are meant to come loose so that repairs can be more easily performed. Furniture that is too difficult to repair will likely end up in the landfill, which is sad in many ways. Epoxy is wonderful when you have a fracture that does not fit back together well and has gaps that hide glues are NOT designed to fill. Epoxies excel at filling gaps, especially when used with fillers/bulking agents. So consider using an epoxy ONLY when theses conditions exist:
A fracture that doesn’t fit back together tight enough to use hide glue.
A fracture NOT on or at a joint, but rather between the joints. Common examples are chair backs where the fracture is above or below a joint. Or perhaps a fracture at the thin ‘ankle’ of a cabriole leg.
Ok, some of you might be thinking, I want my chair joints to stay together FOREVER or I want my dovetailed drawers to stay together FOREVER. First of all, there is no “forever”. No matter how well you design and build something, someone or some force beyond your control will break your furniture. A damaged piece of furniture that is easy to repair stands a much better chance of surviving than a one that is difficult to repair. Using non-reversible glues and fasteners to build or repair furniture may be easier and chaper in the short term, but almost guarantees that the object will be difficult, impractical and possibly impossible to repair.
Furniture that is poorly repaired and then gets thrown out is a disgrace because:
replacing it uses up valuable resources
it occupies space in landfills
a piece of history is lost
The reason so many antiques exist is in large part due to the fact they they were built using hide glue which is a reversible adhesive. That is it can usually be “un-done” for repairs and regular maintenance. Chairs, in particular, get loose. It is normal for them to need disassembly and re-gluing depending on use and their design. Chairs that re-glued with hide glue should outlast you and your grandchildren if maintained properly.
Most furniture built today is assembled with non-reversible glues and LOTS of nails . . . nails driven in such a way that removing them takes time (money) and does irreversible damage in the process. Nails are also used by people trying to ‘tighten up’ a loose chair or other piece of furniture. Nails were not used indiscriminately 200 years ago because they had to be made by hand and they were still relatively expensive when the first “nail making machines” were invented. In my almost 40 years of building and repairing wooden objects, the number of improperly used nails I’ve removed far exceeds the number of nails I’ve driven. Most of these nails I’ve removed have been placed by well-meaning but clearly inexperienced and short-sighted people. For example, nails do not belong on the corner glue-blocks of a chair. Screws maybe, but not nails, especially if “set” below the surface. Extracting a ‘set’ nail requires time (money) and does permanent damage to the object (this damage is repairable but at a cost, of course).
Think twice before using epoxy on your furniture!!!!!!
