: 'Mornin' all. There's been a lot said about carpenter's glue suitability for
: stems with regard to its tendency to soften and creep in high heat. I used
: Titebond II for my stems, so I'm especially curious. I happen to have two
: "spare" internal ash stems laminated with Titebond II, so I
: propose a torture test that might help to answer the suitability question.
: I think I'll toss the stems into a 200-degree (Fahrenheit) oven for a few
: hours to see what happens. I didn't pre-bend the ash strips, so there's
: some built-in stress, and glue failure would be evident. However, I don't
: think stem delamination is likely to occur due to heat. If it did, I think
: the whole boat would go soft, strips, epoxy, and all. Thoughts? I'll take
: pics and post 'em this weekend.

According to Rob Macks of Laughing Loon kayaks there is evidence of creep in dark colored decks on boats using Titebond to glue the strips and he recommends one of the poly glues for dark decks. It's one of the reasons I have a light colored deck (it also gets hot inside the boat when you're paddling in the summer).

Bill H.