Binding Gluing Problem

[Charlie]

Hi, I'm building a 00/12 Kit that I bought from Ken, and recently I had one of those Life experience that I would like to share with you. The bindings are Maple and the purflings are herringbone, and I was gluing in the last binding, starting at the wedge and working toward the neck block. I worked slow, checking and rechecking everything as I went to make sure all was OK. When I was done I went back to check everything and to my horror I found about 4 inches of the binding at the curve of the lower bout had come out of the channel. By the time I found the problem the glue had dried and the buinding would not move.
I e-mailed Ken, explained the problem and asked him if there was anything that I could do short of routing out binding and gluing in a new one. He said that I could try melting the glue by heating the binding. He gave me a web address to Tower Hobbies, which showed a Monokote SEALING IRON on pg 86 of their catalog. I checked with a local hobby shop and they had in stock 3 different manufactures of sealing irons, priced from $15.95 to $24.95, I purchased one for $19.95. The iron is adjustable between 0 to 170 watts. I also bought a SEALING IRON HOT SOCK, which is supposed to stop the iron from burning the material being heated.
I set the iron at the 170 watt setting because the lower setting didn't seem hot enough, but I was worried that when heating the binding a the higher setting, the wedge, purfling and top would come unglued, as it turned out that was a nonissue. I started heating the binding at the wedge for about 1 minute, and then started to gentley pry the binding with a pic, and to my surprise the binding came loose. I then continued to heat about 12 inches of the binding, gentley lifting it as I went, until I was past the bad spot. I then cleaned up the old glue and reglued the wayward binding in place.
I may not have explained very well what took place, if there are any questions please ask and I will try to answer them. Thanks for looking.

[Dave Bagwill]

Great save Charlie!! 'Horror' is the right word to use, until we find out that almost everything can be fixed 'as if it never happened'.

I tried to estimate how many emails I sent to Ken during my first couple of builds, it had to be in the hundreds somewhere. He patiently answered them all, so you are in good hands.

Do you have any pix you would like to share? :-)

[Charlie]

Hi Dave, thanks for the reply. I'm not sure how one could keep going when first starting out, without the help of Ken. I know I have used his e-mail more than I care to admit. I would like to be a fly on his wall and hear what he is thinking when he gets this type of e-mail, or maybe not.
I didn't take any pics while I was working THIS mistake, I'm not sure why, I just wanted to get it behind me. I do have some pic of the project, that I will be sharing soon.
Thanks again
Charlie

[TonyinNYC]

I'm glad you were able to save it!
I emailed Ken a lot on my first kit but when I was doing my second kit I had very few questions. Ken actually emailed me to see why I had not contacted him. He worried that I had stopped building because I wasn't asking questions!! Good customer service.