Hi all,
Some years ago I rescued three teak chairs that had come apart at the joints – specifically the joints connecting seat to the back. They belonged to my great aunt, her son was throwing them out. Now I know why. There are no rungs in these chairs to hold them together. I paid to have someone glue them up, I’ve glued them up later – still they wiggle loose and eventually break.
I thought maybe you’d have some good advice. They are really nice looking, solid chairs otherwise and I ‘d love to keep them. Aside from fashioning rungs and then tryign to match the finish are there any other suggestions about how i might keep them solid? Can I simply keep glueing the mortise and tenon joint when it starts loosening up for instance? Or is there a better glue to use? OR?
Thanks for helping..
Replies
There's a knack to fixing old chairs whose joints have failed.
First, you have to clean the joints really well of old glue, etc. Any old residue will cause the new glue-up to fail much sooner thsan the original.
I also think that repairing old chairs is always a weighing of benefits. Just because a chair is old, or just because it's teak, might not mean it has antique or collector value. A lot of old chairs were built in early production shops that used really, really crappy methods of construction.
It gets easier if you just like the chairs but don't care about Put 'em together with Gorilla Glue and follow the instructions very carefully! There's no known solvent for GG.
You wouldn't have to make new rungs necessarily, but if I understand the way these chairs are designed they're natchel-born wobblers, nothing to resist thjat wracking stress (GG will help). So all in all I think it's your subjective call whether or not to keep repairing them. Good luck!
Thanks Chad.
Gorilla Glue it is. Just the sort of help I was looking for. They are clearly early production numbers - probably circa 1920's - I just happen to like the look of them - and the fact that they were in my great-aunt's house all those years. My mother lived there when engaged to my dad etc...
I suppose I should ask for tips on using GG?
AmP
Yep. GG works like this: You put a dab of GG on one piece (face, etc.) and WATER on the other. The water catalyzes the glue. You really need just a very little GG. As the catalyst (catalycist? cataclysm?) happens, the stuff foams up. This results in a squeeze-out that's very easy to clean up with a sharp chisel.
NB: Put a clamp on the joint so that it reinforces the cheeks of the mortise. This stuff will expand/split the joint if you're not careful.
Maybe that is where we get the term " occasional chair ".
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