a couple of ?s Lignum Vitae, ebony dust etc

[PlaneSimple]

Hello, I have a beautiful piece of Lignum Vitae. I am curious (before going to the trouble to cut and shape it) if it will hold as inlay.. glued in with hide glue. Is it too oily/waxy to glue?

My other question regards using hide glue and ebony dust as backfill / filler etc for Mother of pearl inlay. Should I create an ebony sludge or tamp ebony dust into hide glued crevices?

[Bill McCall]

I worked with lignum vitae a lot in a mill shop where we made bearings for ocean going ships. Very difficult to successfully glue, even when washing with solvents (acetone), but we certainly didn't glue up bearings, they were assembled block by block. We made tool handles out of the scrap and defective blocks, but they would inevitably come apart.

As for inlay, I've used the 'sludge' very successfully.

[billhay4]

I think your only hope will be epoxy. It not only is oily but waxy, too. But plane soles have been made of it for years, so I guess something will hold it on.
Bill

[StuartGold]

I think your only hope will be epoxy. It not only is oily but waxy, too. But plane soles have been made of it for years, so I guess something will hold it on.
Bill

I also wondered about that type wood a few years ago. Also called IPE or Ironwood. It's used for decking and is so dense that I have read that it has the same combustibility factor as concrete. It is very rich in color from yellow browns to dark red brown to dark dark brown and you can easily get inexpensive, nicely quartered boards of it at any good wood yard. I tested it and found that it seemed to have a very nice and "ringy" tone when tapped with good sustain. Again, the difficulty is in gluing it. It is oily and waxy and not too compatible with water based glues. I did find out that there was a specific marine epoxy that is made for it although, I don't remember where I would it on the internet.

Other research on the internet showed some successful guitars made from the stuff. Probably back and sides. I would not use it for a neck as it's WAY too heavy but it possibly could be used for a fingerboard if you could figure out the best glue to glue it to the neck. also one caveat. Don't be surprised if your drill bits and band saw blades get dull VERY quickly. There is a reason that they used it for bearings and I would not have a clue where to start trying to bend the stuff.

[billhay4]

Don't think lignum vitae is the same as IPE, Stuart, IF it's true lignum vitae. There is another wood that is sometimes called this that may be related to IPE. Ironwood refers to many different woods, to it hard to tell about that. It is extremely heavy and dense, being heavier than water. It is the genus Guaiacum. I think IPE is Handroanthus. Lignum vitae is harder than any other commercially available wood (Janka 4500) and the heaviest wood I have every seen. It was used extensively for making ball bearings for ships because of its resistance to water rot and wear. It was used for a lot of wooden plane soles, too, where the hardness and waxiness came in handy. Hard to get now.
Bill

[StuartGold]

Don't think lignum vitae is the same as IPE, Stuart, IF it's true lignum vitae. There is another wood that is sometimes called this that may be related to IPE. Ironwood refers to many different woods, to it hard to tell about that. It is extremely heavy and dense, being heavier than water. It is the genus Guaiacum. I think IPE is Handroanthus. Lignum vitae is harder than any other commercially available wood (Janka 4500) and the heaviest wood I have every seen. It was used extensively for making ball bearings for ships because of its resistance to water rot and wear. It was used for a lot of wooden plane soles, too, where the hardness and waxiness came in handy. Hard to get now.
Bill

Bill.... I knew that IPE was not Lignum vitae but Just making the point that "that type of wood" with very similar characteristics can be easily bought and experimented with.

[Jeff Hildreth]

"It was used extensively for making ball bearings for ships because of its resistance to water rot and wear"
It was used for bearings, but not "ball" bearings. It was used because of the density and high oil content as well as rot resistant.
It was also used for pier pilings which is now the major source of lignum.

IPE is not lignum nor close and IPE is one of perhaps fifty timbers colloquially known as "ironwood". Others would be Bolivian Rosewood (which is not a rosewood) mesquite etc.

[BradKlein]

I turned this mallet out of a Lignum Vitae bearing blank, back in 1986. I don't think I'll be needing another.

[Charles E.]

[QUOTE

My other question regards using hide glue and ebony dust as backfill / filler etc for Mother of pearl inlay. Should I create an ebony sludge or tamp ebony dust into hide glued crevices?[/QUOTE]

Why not use epoxy or super glue? Seems to me it would be more durable.

[G7MOF]

Bowls! (Sorry about that outburst) but don't they glue ivory weights into Lignum Vitae Crown Bowls with success and have done so for many years?
Would solvent being used as a cleaner not help different types of glue to adhere to the LV?

[PlaneSimple]

Well, I've had an over-riding theme to my mandolin project.. which is, to only use handtools and hide glue.. I suppose to create something of a hurdle for myself but also, to my thinking, to achieve some level of fundamentalism. So that is why I am arbitrarily avoiding modern glues.
I think I will save the Lignum Vitae for a plane. I need a smaller one for the tone bars anyway.
Thanks for the comments! It sounds like a mixture of hide glue and ebony will be fine as crevice filler in the headstock mother of pearl.. perhaps a bit thinned and hot.

[BlueMountain]

Last night I needed to fill a non-bearing hole in an old mahogany guitar neck. I mixed some mahogany sanding dust with a drop of StewMac tobacco brown stain and stirred it up and let it dry. Then I squirted in some thick CA glue and stirred it up. All in a plastic medicine cup. As I was applying this mixture with a toothpick, it suddenly began smoking, and white fumes were coming up to my nose, which was about six inches away. I realized I was working with CYANOacrylate, and that the smoke might be cyanide! I rushed it outside. Still living. Maybe it wasn't a problem, but better safe.

[Jim Adwell]

I realized I was working with CYANOacrylate, and that the smoke might be cyanide!

If this were true I'd be dead now.