
When it comes to woodworking, glue is often a point of confusion and concern for beginners. If you’re like me and your experience in the wood shop has been mainly based on trial and error, you may find yourself asking what glue you should use for what part of a project.
In this video, Linn has done a ton of that trial and error for us! Comparing all these glues to a point of failure is extremely helpful. Not to mention the fact that it is also just really fun to watch people test things.The miter joint is especially fun as it ends up holding surprising amounts of weight.

I wouldn’t recommend this as a complete scientific guide to glues or even a thorough glue review, but as an anecdotal reference it seems pretty helpful! I know I’ll be buying some two part epoxy (testing around 10:00).
Want to see more? You can find Linn on her site, Darbin Orvar.com
13 thoughts on “The Most Entertaining Video About Glue You’re Likely to See”
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Fun. Interesting to see how much the joinery makes a difference.
Regarding attribution: “blah blah from blah”? Missing something?
what? no, I would never make a mistake like that! I totally got her name in there right the first time! :)
Try again!
http://www.darbinorvar.com/about/
Not a very accurate or precise test at all.
She didn’t control the distance from the joint very well. In fact, there’s one point where you see her putting a small weight offset closer to the joint.
Additionally, placing weights on incrementally ruins the accuracy due to the impacts and SUDDEN stress change. (Just as when she jumped up and down during one “test”.)
A better rig would have had a rope holding up a bucket, around the end of the arm, at a measured and fixed distance from the joint.
Then SLOWLY fill the bucket with sand, and weigh the sand.
Also, test the different types of stress the different glues can handle. (Shear, compression, tension, etc.)
No safety glasses. Fail.
nails? plywood? old glue? those invalidate the test no matter how she puts the weights on the wood. :(
I would also argue with her statement about epoxy not being used in woodworking. While it is not often used in traditional methods, it is used all the time for wood repair where a lot of strength is needed. Like around door frames.
She pointed out this is not scientific. This is good though as most of this is a comparison. I’ve never really seen anyone test the different types of glue. Without a lab, with million dollar equipment this is a pretty good comparison.
terrible test. she is really testing the bonding found inside the plywood not the joint holding the 2 pieces together. waste of time.
Reblogged this on heavydiy and commented:
I love me some systematic testing with consistent methodology!
Notice also the difference the joint design made.
Gloriously geeky! Thanks for this. Putting epoxy on the shopping list.
It looks like the joint repeatedly failed because the layers of plywood came apart – not because the original glue gave way. The variations between glues are probably nothing more than the random variability within the plywood.
Hmmm wearing a labcoat doesn’t make it “Science”. There are at least a half dozen things wrong here.
The entire bit of plywood testing was a total waste of her and our time. After the first delamination, she should have scrapped her plans and moved the joint 1″ or more toward the weights. So that the plywood would have been “stronger”. Or whatever.
Amateur.