good general purpose glues

[PRNDL]

After several years, I'm giving up on Gorilla Glue. I like that it foams up with water and is strong, but  the last two times the glue hardened in the bottle with over 75% left. It's also a pain to work with -- not as bad as Super Glue, but annoying.

I'm seeking a good general purpose glue.

What glues do you guys have on hand, and what do you use them for?

Thanks!!

[tubesornothing]

Wood - lepage contractors wood glue
Aluminum Logos to anything - 5 min epoxy
Tolex - just undergoing some testing now (see thread in cabinets section)


ToN

[PRR]

ShoeGoo (buy smallest tube unless you really need to fill great gaps)

Liquid Nails (available in toothpaste tubes) works well on clean aluminum and many electronic tidbits, and of course wood.

Sobo craft/fabric glue is good on cardboard and cloth and wood and even rhinestones, but says you should not launder (will stand one wash, usually) and I dunno how it is 20 years out.

That Ape glue is available in small bottles, but you have to be a busy boy to use it up before it hardens.

[sawdust]

For woodworking I use white glue, it has a longer open time when gluing. I buy small bottles, 6 to 8oz bottles. I write the date on the bottle and through them out after 6 months. That way i only spend 2 or 3 dollars on a bottle at a time. I used to buy the big bottles ($8 to $10) but found I was throwing out half empty bottles. The Titebond brand is very good for woodworking, here is a link with many different types of glues. Mostly geared to woodworking but many are for general purpose.

http://www.rockler.com/CategoryView.cfm?Cat_ID=545&ln=1&cookietest=1

Dave

[FUNK]

tolex... 3M super 77 spray glue or vynal floor adhesive , use a spreader with small notches and roller out any air bubbles, if more than one cabinet is ever going to be done, then purchasing a decent rubber J roller is worth the money. vynal floor adhesive is designed specifically for attaching a fabric backed material to wood and then withstand a lot of abuse.

[HCS]

I always keep the following around:

3M Super 77 for fabric/grill cloth/tolex
West Marine Epoxy- This is the BEST epoxy/glue around, bar none.  It is pricey but lasts a long time.  It is permanent, harder than metal, can be drilled, machined and can be colored(with epoxy dye).  I use it for everything I want permanently in place.  It work GREAT on octal guide pins that snap off.  I have never had one re-fail with this stuff.
3M VHB tape- I use this for logos, faceplates.....it is fast, strong and holds like grim death to metals/plastic
Rockler super glue-comes in big bottles in different viscosity levels.  Big bottles last better IMO.

[jhadhar65]

Where do you source those?

[HCS]

Where do you source those?

I get the Super 77 and VHB tapes at Home Depot, the West Epoxy and Cyanocrylate (super glue) at Rockler. 
3M has thinner/clear VHB's that aren't sold at retail but you can find them online(3m store).  I use their 468mp transfer adhesive, it is a thin 10mil? clear VHB (very high bond) tape.  I have a big roll of it that i bought from a distributor, it will last me more than my lifetime. 

I just used the West epoxy to fix a door with stripped out screws.  I drill the holes out, filled with epoxy, then tapped them for new screws once it was dried.  The stuff is amazing.

[Megachunk]

For wood I use Titebond. I've never used anything else. Fixed cabs that were in splinters and still came out great.

For small things and cuts on my skin, I use crazy glue.

For tolex I use the tolex brush-on glue they sell at CE Distribution. I seem to always use a bunch of cheap paintbrushes (one for each side of tolex!). Any better application processes would be welcome on that!

I know it's only a penny for my thoughts, but I had to put my $0.02 in. You can keep the penny.

[birt]

for all purpose stuff i use Wurth Klebfix

it's very strong but it doesn't "fill", it's liquid. also your eyes start to itch when using it for some time without enough ventilation.

for woodworking i allways use polyurethane glue (Bison for example). also works great on concrete, and a lot of rough surface materials like metal or plastic. it's also easy to cut away when it's hard. for very small things i use white glue or epoxy.

and for filling up stuff and glueing big things i use tec7. it also works well to glue small transfos into enclosures :p

[Mig29]

I use Titebond for wood - Type III has the longest open time, is strongest and dries dark. 

West is the best epoxy I've ever used and you can get different hardeners for different applications. 

I use 5 minute epoxy more than anything else - it sets up fast and is quite strong. 

I like CA's for quick fixes that are not structural - Stew Mac has a good variety, but they are spendy.  You might do better at a hobby store. 

3M77 is great for Tolex, but the high VOC's put me off.  I've used non flammable contact cement with good results, but it's a little more labor intensive.

[Katie 77]

Lick Wid Nailz for EVERYTHING

[G._Hoffman]

Depending on what I'm using it for, on wood I use either Tightbond (or something similar), cyanoacrylate (super glue), epoxy, or hot hide glue (the real stuff you mix up from granular form, not the crap from a bottle).  Each has it's advantages.  Tightbond is strong, drys pretty hard, has a reasonable open time, and is easy to clean up (on a finished surface, use a wet rag - for an unfinished surface, let it skin over, and use a sharp chisel to remove the excess). 

Cyanoacrylate is great for small tight cracks that don't need to hold much force, and it's capillary wicking makes it great for tight spaces.  It also drys crystal hard. 

Epoxy is nice when you need something that will never, EVER come apart, but it make repairs impossible, is incredibly messy, and is very difficult to clean up so I avoid it most of the time.  However, if you need to glue steel or carbon fiber to wood, you've got to use it. 

Hide glue is the king of wood glues, if you can clamp things up fast enough.  It drys crystal hard (noticeably harder than Tightbond, which is a very good thing when you are building guitars), is a breeze to clean up, is very easy to take apart for repairs, and has better resistance to heat than just about anything (when you take it apart, it is actually more the water than the heat that makes it let go.  Don't believe me?  CHECK IT OUT.)  If it is physically possible for me to clamp something fast enough for hide glue, I do it.  It's only real down side is the extremely short open time - as much as 45 seconds.  You can stretch that a bit my warming up the pieces you are working on, but you are never going to have much more than a couple minutes.  One of these days I'm going to get a video of my dad and our shop manager gluing guitar tops to the bodies with hide glue - it's pretty entertaining.  But other than the short open time, nothing works better than hide glue.



Gabriel