Hide vs. Hare

Cody Sisk · #1 02-27-2009, 11:20 AM

Which kind do you use/prefer? Are there applications you believe that hide glue works better or hare (rabbit) glue? Do you mix the two?

Thanks in advance for your two cents..

reedo35 · #2 02-27-2009, 03:21 PM

I never heard of rabbit glue. Not saying it doesn't exist, but I thought hide glue was from animal hides, including rabbit.

zeytoun · #3 02-27-2009, 04:44 PM

It's all gelatin (protein based). Doesn't matter if it's hide, hare, or fish. The factor that's going to matter is your water content, regardless of the animal source.

Ken McKay · #4 02-27-2009, 05:25 PM

They are very different things. Rabbit glue is traditionally for gilding and hide glue comes in many different strengths for different uses. It is measured in gram strength. 192 is good for lutherie. Fish glue liquid at room temp and has a long open time.

damonsmith · #5 02-27-2009, 05:49 PM

I know rabbit skin glue is used as a size for linen for oil painting. I have only heard of horse hide glue used for bass repair.

Marc Piane · #6 02-27-2009, 07:14 PM

I love me some Conejo. Awesome with a nice Rioja.

forester · #7 02-28-2009, 02:53 PM

used granulated rabbit for a few months on FBs,seams etc..it seemed to work fine...and it did not smell like @ss after two days of cooling ,reheating, freshening the batch..ran out so...back to large mammal,and the attending boquet

zeytoun · #8 02-28-2009, 04:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ken McKay

They are very different things. Rabbit glue is traditionally for gilding and hide glue comes in many different strengths for different uses. It is measured in gram strength. 192 is good for lutherie. Fish glue liquid at room temp and has a long open time.

The only way a collagen-based glue will be liquid at room temperature is if there is something added (urea?).

Are sure you're not comparing different glues with different additives and gram strengths?

I worked in a bindery that used a lot of glue, and the source of it varied, hide, fish, etc. We received granulated glue in gram strengths and melted it in water to create rubbery bricks of the stuff, of consistent specific density. In the bindery, we worried about temperature and specific gravity. If the fish glue inherently had a much longer open time, we would have noticed a dramatic difference on our machines.

Ken McKay · #9 03-01-2009, 02:13 PM

It is tempting to think that there is a better glue than the traditional hide glue which has been used for lutherie for centuries. Roger Hargrave a violin maker and researcher and expert on Stradivari and Guarneri makes a case for casien glue being used for center joints in cello and violin plates. If done right it has properties that can last for centuries. But most luthiers through the centuries and modern times use Hot hide glue even for this. Hide glue comes in granulated form and without reinventing the wheel you can order it from International Violin or many other woodworking supply companies. It is NOT rabbit glue, which is labeled as rabbit glue. Rabbit glue is different and of course might work because it is sticky stuff.

But if a luthier is sending a repaired violin out the door in the hands of a musician, his/her reputation is carried along in the case. Things pop and fall off all the time and sometimes that is good because something else is not cracking. Therefore it is essential to have a firm grasp (pun intended) on how the glue is working. Sometimes it is intended to be strong and sometimes weaker.

For this reason, I recommend buying a large quantity of granulated hide glue from one of the suppliers. 5 or 10 lbs will last a long while if you only do repairs. Mix it according to the directions in small batches and throw it out when is no longer fresh. There are ways to preserve freshness, such as putting it in the fridge every night and putting an uncoated aspirin in the glue (acid kills bacteria). But this way you will get a good idea of how the stuff works. Practice gluing stuff like a block of wood to a board and then hang a weight from it. Compare to Titebond and look for creep. After a few seasons you will have learned something valuable. The learning curve goes on and on it really helps to be working with the correct material to start with.

Fish glue has its own learning curve. It is liquid at room temp and does have preservatives. Some guitarmakers use it. It is more like Franklin Titebond than hide glue because no heating is required. But it lacks the bite that hide glue has.

On and on....

Jake deVilliers · #10 03-01-2009, 02:30 PM

Nicely put Ken. In the end, the only thing we have as repair people is our reputations.

You can also freeze epoxy cups of hide glue and re-heat them as necessary, though I wouldn't use it for critical applications for the reason stated above. Hide glue was an adjustment for me, coming from Titebond, but I love working with it now.

Cody Sisk · #11 03-01-2009, 08:50 PM

Wow, this thread was active, thanks everyone. I ask because my mentor strongly advocated rabbit glue because of how sticky it is. When we worked on mostly cheaper instruments and school stock, it was the best choice for these "workhorse" instruments that put up with a lot of abuse. I have both hide glue and rabbit glue at my shop. I've even experimented with mixing the two. I haven't found need to experiment with fish glue yet, and given its expense I haven't had the motivation either..

Cody Sisk · #12 09-23-2011, 10:38 AM

Reviving an old thread here. I've switched 100% to hide glue in my repairs now. The rabbit glue I bought from Howard Core is very sticky but I find that it just congeals entirely too fast even on warm surfaces. It also seems to crystallize and bond with itself nicely but not the joined wood surfaces. I hate to waste the pound-and-a-half of the stuff I have left over, but I'm just ready to pitch it into the dumpster at this point. I just don't trust it..

**Damon Rondeau** · #13 09-23-2011, 10:48 AM

I see Lee Valley doesn't sell hare glue anymore. Here's the Wikipedia on it. As you can read there, it's got a little utility as an adhesive, but that's not really what it was recognized for. It's more flexible than normal hide. I see it's actually used in instrument-making, for things like the bellows of a concertina.

There is also fish glue, which is extremely tacky.

Hide, hare, fish: all of them are collagen-type animal glues.

"Hide Nor Hair" -- one of my fave Ray Charles tunes!

Valis · #14 09-23-2011, 11:27 AM

I know at least two luthiers here in Italy (both in their 60s) that will only use rabbit glue and say it's the best glue when pure. They say it's the most elastic and doesn't absorb water (and that's why it's typically used by painters)... but... it does smell; apparently a sign of quality.

Scaramelli also mentioned rabbit glue when I visited him, but I don't know if he uses it exclusively.

I'm only saying this cause I got the impression while reading the thread that rabbit glue is not traditional, while I'm sure the luthiers I'm speaking about learnt its properties from their respective masters.

james condino · #15 09-23-2011, 08:18 PM

Ideally, you'll have all of the glues mentioned above available for different uses in your shop. They all have their own strengths, weaknesses, learning curves, and vary from batch to batch and manufacturer. Almost everything you can commercially find labeled as made in the US is Milligan and Higgins produced- LMI, Bjorn, and a lot of other folks all use the same source. Very nice grade of rabbit glue from Europe is a different material to work with as is sturgeon bladder and other forms of fish glue. You can get pretty nerdy about your organic glues and get easily sidetracked once you realize how many variations there are.

After 33 years of trying everything I can get my hands on, rabbit glue is my #1 choice for my personal new builds; everything else fall into the category of, if it was made with stinky old cow hide glue, then it gets repaired with stinky old cow hide glue....

j.