Five SAPFM Cartouche Winners Together

Left to Right: 2013, 2008, 2005, 2011 and 2014

I just returned from the 2015 WIA in Kansas City.  It was a wonderful time with lots of expert woodworkers teaching lots of other expert woodworkers about everything.  There must have been around 20 different classrooms each with 4 or 5 different classes.

I started the day early Friday with a class on the history of marquetry and finished the day with a class on understanding protein glues.  The class rooms held around 50 people and the glue class was standing room only at the end.  Obviously more people are excited to learn about glues than something old and dusty like world marquetry.

For those of you who have not attended the annual Woodworking in America events, I strongly urge you to find time to attend next year.  Popular Woodworking magazine produces these events and it is a perfect mix of education and market place activities.

I also presented a lecture and demonstration on French Polishing, but I started out with the obvious disclaimer that it is impossible to learn it from a 2 hour talk.  In fact, I know professional polishers in Europe who have been full time polishers for over 10 years who still admit that they don't know everything about it.

After the market place closed on Saturday, it was a great opportunity for the SAPFM Cartouche winners to get together at the SAPFM booth for a photo.  What a great chance for 5 of us to stand together: Will Neptune, Al Sharp, Phil Lowe, Ben Hobbs and myself.  Funny fact: 4 of the 5 were born in the same year, 1948.  Makes you wonder what was in the milk at that time?

On Friday and Saturday the market place is an active center of tools, books, more tools, and woodworkers of all skill levels mingling around talking and buying stuff.  It is a lot of fun.  Thank goodness that I have every tool I need at this point so I am not tempted to get more.  That said, some of the planes and saws are absolutely perfect and would be very easy to bring home.

I have become fairly well known in these circles as the maker of Old Brown Glue, and I took 100 bottles to pass out for free just to promote my glue.  Last year we actually bought a booth and sold the glue, but the cost of the booth and the glue sales broke even.  So this year, instead of being tied to a booth for two days, we decided to just take the glue and make it free.  It felt good passing out glue.

It is interesting to note that one of the primary sponsors of the event was a very well known brand of polyurethane glue.  The glue which you find advertised everywhere.  The glue which cannot be removed from your skin with any solvent.  The glue which is toxic and scored a 53% strength score by independent testing at Fine Woodworking (Issue #192, August 2007, page 37) when compared to PVA Type I waterproof glue.

In the same test, I am proud to say that Old Brown Glue scored a 79% strength score.  This was the highest score for any glue which is organic and reversible.  The average breaking point in the test for Old Brown Glue was 1595 pounds where polyurethane glue broke at an average of 1164 pounds.

Thus OBG can hold 431 pounds more load than the best polyurethane glue.  Since the average male gorilla in the wild weighs 400 pounds, you can think of a standard gorilla unit as a measurement of strength.  Note this is a full grown male gorilla.  We will call a gorilla unit a "G force".

In conclusion, polyurethane glue is 3G and OBG is 4G in strength.

There are 4 Gorillas in Every Bottle of OBG.