Steaming for hide glue joints

[Markus Schmid]

Honestly, using HHG is so easy, all of these hat tricks are completely unnecessary!

And yet... it works with steam. BTW, James Ham does not fiddle around with guitars but with double basses. No stop watch needed there because HHG will gel anyway when closing the box. Other standard gluing techniques there.

[Mario Proulx]

Sure, for a cello/bass, there's no way to go around it and not have it gel, unless we warm the shop to 95+ degrees, but even then, I'd rather glue and clamp short sections. Steam will introduce a lot of hot moisture, and in a repair situation, that can be nasty to the existing finish.

But ukes were mentioned here, too. C'mon, a uke? Easy peasy....

[Markus Schmid]

[...] But ukes were mentioned here, too. C'mon, a uke? Easy peasy....

Do you really believe I used the steam method on a sopranino ukulele because I thought time could be a problem? C'mon...

[...] Steam will introduce a lot of hot moisture, and in a repair situation, that can be nasty to the existing finish.

And do you really believe that the humidity of the steam would be a problem just because you have not tried it?

For your interest: I also have done repairs using steam to reactivate HHG on instruments finished with shellac, oil varnishes and nitro. I couldn't manage to damage none of those types of varnish with the steaming method so far.

Believe it or not, but sometimes there is more than just one approach to do something.
I like to have more than one knife in my kitchen drawer.

[Michael Lewis]

Maybe fresh finishes don't get damaged by steam but older finishes certainly do, especially oil varnishes and lacquer.