Tried bone glue vs PVA on a restoration job last week and wow what a difference

I was working on this old 1890s hymnal that some lady brought in from her church in Burlington and the spine was completely shot. I figured modern PVA would be fine but after reading some old forum posts I decided to try hide glue for the first time. The way it sets up and lets you reposition things compared to PVA is just night and day for this kind of work. Has anyone else had good luck using hide glue on fragile old paper?

2 comments

2 Comments

felixb2520d ago

Hide glue" is a more accurate term, as "bone glue" is a different animal-based glue with a weaker bond.

hayden72020d ago

Brought up the temperature setting thing before... hide glue actually needs a specific heat range to work right, while bone glue gets runny way too fast in my experience. Most people don't realize that the working time difference makes hide glue way better for complex joints where you need to fiddle with the fit. It's all about the gel strength at room temp, hide glue holds up better when you're trying to clamp something tricky.