Tightbond Creep

[Ron Nossaman]

>Is this just urban legend or what? What I am especially concerned about is 
>laminated ribs, rib-to-panel, and bridge-to-panel joints with Tightbond. I 
>know its been stated that creep is not a problem, but I was rather 
>suprised to see the above on a website that otherwise seems to provide 
>pretty darn good information.
>
>Terry Farrell

And you'll hear it again and again forever from everyone on the planet who 
uses hide glue, resorcinol, plastic resin, epoxy, urea formaldehyde, 
Gorilla Glue, or anything else that's not an aliphatic resin (because 
someone told them it creeps). What you won't hear - at least I never have 
that I recall in spite of having asked around a number of times through the 
years and searched the Web for creep rate information - is anyone who 
reports actual instances where Titebond or any other yellow carpenter's 
glue has shown this to be the case. Everyone seems to "know" this, but no 
one seems to have seen it first hand. If you ever do find documented creep 
rates for a Titebond glue joint observed under real world livable 
conditions, I'd sure like to know about it. Anyone have creep and 
compression set rate figures on spruce under the stress conditions it's 
placed under in a piano soundboard - compression crowned or rib crowned? 
Laminated ribs? It wouldn't surprise me a bit to discover that the creep 
rate of spruce is considerably higher than that of Titebond, which leaves 
us where if that's the case? I've been using Titebond for bridge and 
soundboard work for over 25 years, and don't know of a glue joint failure. 
Maybe they just don't tell me when the ribs fall off.

I rank it at about the level of concern of sound not going through 
horizontal laminations in bridge caps and roots, plate bushings killing 
tone, tuning duplexes increasing sustain 300%, and which side of the 
mountain your soundboard lumber came from.

But that's me. Your mileage may vary.

Ron N