www.KitGuitarsForum.com

Following Tippie53’s lead, over the past year I have become a big fan of fish glue. Listening to one of John’s videos this week, he made it a point of noting that the next morning you can take a toothbrush and some hot water and remove the excess squeeze out from the joint.

OMG - it works like a charm! Color me surprised!

Fish glue, like its cousin hide glue, dries hard and thin. It is repairable, and with some heat and a little water, a fully glued joint can be coaxed apart. There is no need to remove all of the glue to achieve the repair as you would need to do with an aliphatic glue like TiteBond. It can be used at room temperature and from what I can tell, has a pretty darn good shelf life. Plus, it is very tacky — when you put a joint together for clamping, there is very little (if any) slippage as you tighten the clamp. That has happened way too many times when I have used TiteBond; maybe it’s not a problem when building a piece of furniture, but there is no room for slippage in luthiery.

I am liking this stuff more and more. Plus, no gluepot or mixing needed.

The only possible drawback to fish glue that Ive heard is that it may be sensitive to high humidity and tend to fail if left in a place of high humidity. I'm not sure what a precise definition of "high humidity" might be in this context, or

I've used fish glue on 4 violins that went to India and parts of each one has failed due to the high heat and very high humidity there.

So in those environments its not a good plan, but I did like using it. Never considered using it on a guitar but sure wouldn't if it is going to India or any other high humidity area.

I guess the rumors about fish glue failing may have some merit.I've used it on most of my builds. I don't recall which ones, or what I used in place of it. I've4 always used HHG for the bridge and the dovetail joint, out of consideration for the hapless sod who has the job of fixing all the faults I managed to create. ;-)

I guess the rumors about fish glue failing may have some merit.I've used it on most of my builds. I don't recall which ones, or what I used in place of it. I've4 always used HHG for the bridge and the dovetail joint, out of consideration for the hapless sod who has the job of fixing all the faults I managed to create. ;-)

not all fish glue is the same I use a high tack fish glue . the only failure I Had was a customer that threw in a wet rag because RH was low.
easy repair. be sure you allow 24 hr clamp time

tippie53 wrote: ↑Sun May 17, 2026 5:56 am not all fish glue is the same

As with many things. There are various grades (gram strengths) of hide glue, too. I guess I won' t give up on fish glue -- at least not the fish glue you sell -- just yet.