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What type of glue, epoxy, etc. is recommended for use with celluloid binding?
All help appreciated!
Mark

I use cyanoacrylate gel

Duco cement is supposed to work great but I haven't tried it yet. I have used the acrylic cement that Stewmac sells, called Weld-On but I did not have good results with it. I had a celluliod to fiberwood glue up completely fail. Also, it didn't seem to hold up with experiments I did gluing up celluloid to wood. I was able to pry off the celluloid with a chisel without much effort after 24 hrs dry time. However, it seems to be holding up fine on the guitar. Next time, I will try Duco cement, which I have heard good things about.

I prefer Duco. Any other similar solvent based cement should work about the same. There's Ambroid, Sigment, several Weld-on, and many others. Duco seems to have a relatively slow flash off for this type, which is normally annoying, but helpful for bindings.

I've used weld-on but not for bindings, so can't speak to that directly, but suspect it may have started to flash off before it was fully roped/taped in place.

I like the acetone/titebond method.

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Good judgement comes from experience. Experience comes from poor judgement.

It's a long time since I don't install celluloid bindings, but for both celluloid and ABS I get very good results with a German glue, UHU Hart, which must be similar to Duco. I tried Weld-On, but I didn't get the results that I expected.

That said, you can try a very different approach, but then I'll have to tell a little story. Recently I bought some plastic bindings expecting they were ABS, but some of them were PVC. PVC is difficult to glue unless you use PVC cement, and then it only glues PVC to some plastics (including ABS), but not to wood. I tried different glues, and after all the failures I tried dissolving a little PVC cement in "common" epoxi (which sticks to wood but not to ABS or PVC). This improved the adhesion a lot, but it had two problems: first, the final hardness was affected (this I expected); second, it turned to a strong red/brown color but only when the epoxy set (this was a surprise). I tried to simplify this method, and from the ingredients in the PVC cement I saw that the tetrahydrofuran was the chemical that dissolved the plastic. I live in Spain and there is a shop in Madrid (Droguería Riesgo) that has almost any chemical that you may need. In the case of the tetrahydrofuran, I paid around 6€ for 250cc. A few drops of THF in the mixed epoxy made it great for ABS, PVC and wood, better than any other glue that I've ever tried (and it doesn't turn red!). Now I don't want to use any other thing, as this gives me a lot of time to work (I use 1 hour epoxy) and the bond is very, very strong. There is always the danger of the THF reacting somehow with the epoxy a few years from now (and a bunch of clients bringing me their guitars for repair), but THF it is a volatile chemical that I hope will migrate slowly even through the epoxy itself and disappear completely. Returning to your question, you may try something similar, using epoxy+acetone. I think it will work.

FWIW, I had good luck with the old Weld On that Stew Mac used to sell. It came in a red tube as opposed to the new blue tube. I think the new formula is more of a "green" formulation.

Kevin Looker

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I'm not a luthier.
I'm just a guy who builds guitars in his basement.
It's better than playing golf.

Folks,
Thanks for the info. Leaning towards the Duco. Will report back on how it went
Mark

What about wicking acetone into taped binding? I read that Martin would simply wipe acetone onto wood and then bond celluloid pickguard on it, and the bond is so good that when the celluloid shrinks it would crack the soundboard.

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Cat-gut strings are made from kitten guts, stretched out to near breaking point and then hardened with grue saliva. As a result these give a feeling of Pain and anguish whenever played, and often end up playing themselves backwards as part of satanic rituals.

Typhoon Guitars
http://www.typhoon-guitars.com

I taped up some tortoise celluloid binding with an ABS backer in the channel and then flooded with CA. I had tested the celluloid and ABS bond with CA before I moved to the real thing.

My only issue was that I had a bit in the waist come loose. I think this was from my application though where I had let the CA skim over the top of that crack. I taped it back up and flooded it again and it has been fine.

Sounds like the OP got his answer. I was stimulated by this thread to check out using fish glue, preceded by wiping with acetone. I am now using fish glue to bind my third guitar, and while it's slower than CA, it's allowing me to do a better job. I also like how the slow setting fish glue reduces my stress level.

In the mini-test, pictured below, I found that even a rubbed joint produced a good bond, though I was able to pry off the binding. I did notice, thought, that especially with one of the two samples of binding the acetone leached out some colorant. Before I try this technique on a guitar I would want to make sure the color didn't migrate into nearby wood or purfling.

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Tim Allen
"Never hurry, never rest."

Titebond Melamine glue works well.

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Another day, another dollar.

+1 for fish, reduces stress, increased open time.Hopefully better job will be done.

Fish glue alone?

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Pat

Does this only work with celluloid? Or maybe other plastics? So you just wipe it with acetone and glue with Titebond (maybe fish?) like normal?

That would be good news, because I used one of those solvent glues once, and it seemed really messy.

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Pat

3M plastic and emblem adhesive works great too. Used mainly for gluing plastic emblems to sides of cars. Its like super model glue. They sell it at auto parts stores.

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Jason Moe
LaCrosse WI 54601

LMI FCA for me. Pour it into a syringe with an 18G needle to lay in the channel and glue up 5 or 6 inches at a time.

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It's not what you don't know that hurts you, it's what you do know that's wrong.

Duco works just fine with fiber purflings and plastic bindings.

I assume people using fish glue are wiping plastic bindings with acetone first?

Red pearloid huh? I'm glad I'm not the only one with a taste - or lack thereof - for MOTS.