Titebonds response to shelf life

5/16/2009

A man that goes by the name Don2Laughs from Lumberjocks sent this letter to Titebond in reference about wood glue and it's shelf life.

How can I determine the age of this product? There is a faint 7
digits stamped on the upper portion of the (16 oz) bottle but it must
be code of some kind. What is your reason for not posting the date
clearly on the label?
Thanks,
Don2Laughs

He sent their respose to me. I asked him if he cared if I share this with my readers and he was more than willing to let me.
So first of all, Thank you to Don2Laughs for this great info.

Allison, I recently contacted TiteBond and here is there respons … very interesting. I asked why they didn’t post the manufacture date and … read their response:
The first digit of the lot number is a number. It is the last digit of
the year of manufacture. The second digit is a letter. It indicates the
month. We use the letters A through M, excluding the letter I. The third
digit is a number. It represents the manufacturing division the product
was made for. The next four numbers represent the internal lot or batch
number. That is followed by a decimal point and two numbers which
represent the day of manufacture.
Example:
6L12455.23 – This material was manufactured on November 23rd of 2006.
OR
The first digit of the lot number is a number. It is the last digit of
the year of manufacture. The second digit is a letter. It indicates the
month. We use the letters A through M, excluding the letter I. The
remaining number and/or letter combinations are an internal lot number.
Example:
9L12455 – This material was manufacturer in November of 1999.
OR
The first digit represents A for America (made in), the second digit is
the last digit of the year of manufacture, the third and fourth digits
represent the month, the fifth and sixth digits represent the day of the
month and the last four digits represent the lot number.
Example:
A904270023 – This material was manufactured on April 24, 2009

When we place the actual date or an expiration date on the material, the
retailers have complained and enough sent them back that we no longer
could do so.
We warrant the product for one year, because we have no control over how
the Titebond III is stored. When stored well, the product has a usable
shelf life of 4 years.

Please retweet this or stumble it. I think it's good information!
Thanks, Allison of Wood Alley

Wood Glue's shelf life

5/13/2009

 I can't say I ever thought about this before. Wood Glue's shelf life. I am reading the 2009 issue of workbench magazine and inside on page 15 without an authors name is an article about wood glue and shelf life.

Did you know wood glue's shelf life is generally 1 to 2 years? even if it's NEVER been opened? I did not. I am also guilty of this, buying wood glue when it's on sale and buying more than I normally would. Trying to save that buck, just to find out now I have wasted that buck. Just something to think about. There has got to be other's out there besides me that never really gave a second thought to this!

So do not buy glue that you don't plan on using in the next year or two.

You really do learn something new everyday!

Sanding spindles and sleeves

5/07/2009

Like I wrote in my last post I have such a small shop every little bit of area is sooo important. What you see here is an old totally trashed night table someone was throwing away. I am sure you can see I never tried to clean it up.

What I have done with it however was simply take a piece of plywood and place a bunch of dowels on it to hold up my spindle sanders sleeves. On the other side I also took a piece of plywood and drilled some holes. This is where I keep the spindle's themselves.

 The little single drawer you can't see is filled with extra's of all, along with my drill bits. I have this placed right next to my floor model drill press. This comes in really handy in this small area I work in as the nightstand is small. It sits behind the drill press up against the wall where nothing else could really go. I saw a tip like this once in a magazine and just threw it together. And ya know I think I will keep it just like it is.
 Sure I would like it to LOOK better, but by God it does and works exactly like I wanted and needed it too.

My (can't do without) pull out table

5/03/2009

This past week over at Handi's workshop he wrote a post entitled "Woodworking tip of the week- organizing drawers." A great tip on making drawers that will be easier to use and much more helpful to us woodworkers. You can find that here.

In reading this it reminded me of a post I was going to write about something my husband made me awhile back. I do not know why I got sidetracked and did not write it at the time, but since I still have the pictures I was going to use I might as well write it now!

Let me start off that I have an extremely small and weird shaped shop, so anything that saves space for me is not only a must do it is an absolute necessity. It is 25 feet long by 6 feet wide. In it I have a couple scrollsaws out at one time, 2 belt sanders out at once, one is a  1x40 and the other is a 4x36. Along with that is a standing drill press. Add to that a band saw. So you can just imagine I am sure just how "crafty" I have to be with "my space"

In the pictures below is what I call my "intarsia" table.It is here that after cutting , sanding etc. all the little pieces, I will bring them to this table to lay out on the pattern. To fit them together.

Anyone that knows intarsia knows there can be (and often are) hundreds of little pieces that need to be put together and glued.
Again anyone that knows intarsia knows what a complete nightmare it can be to lose just one of these pieces.

My husband built me a pull out drawer for underneath my table. It is here that I can safely put all my pieces on without worrying that they will fall off, get lost etc. I do not know what I would do without this one pull out table. It is without a doubt THE most important piece of "furniture" in my shop. My pieces are always secure and always right there where I am working.
He also has made me a similiar item on my regular desk where I place my computer. Underneath the "top drawer" he has made me a pull out shelf that holds my keyboard.

 

  

The slide out section is securely holding some of the pieces to a few projects I had going on at the time

 

This is it when it is pushed in. Underneath that you can see a trunk. In that trunk is where I have my extra special little intarsia pieces of wood, like I got last December from a friend. They stay safe in there and don't get all thrown around or dirty etc.

 

You can see this is an A-frame room also. Where the ceiling connects to the wall is only 4 feet high. 

Not the shop for a tall person. LOL!!!