Gluing the Staves

At last, time to glue the staves. As much as I wanted to get on with this stage, I procrastinated and did other small tasks to put off the inevitable. The problem is that there's no going back from here.

After a good deal more dry assembly and adjusting bevels with the hand plane, I got down to it.

The glue I used is a Welbond aliphatic resin (carpenters yellow glue). It has a low clamping time (30 minutes) and forms a bond stronger than the wood itself. It doesn't fill gaps, so the staves need to be a tight fit (whatever that means). I'm afraid my woodworking skills aren't up to planing joints that the Inca's would be proud of but I managed to keep the gaps to a minimum.

	The short clamping time means that you have to work quickly, too quickly to stop and take photos really. The disks sticking out of the half completed drum shell in the photo are the stand. I've temporarily solved my base stability problems of the stand by adding a 5lb weight disk to the base of the stand. Both edges of each stave has to be completely covered with the glue. The staves are roughly aligned while the remaining staves are glued. Here's another method of assembling and clamping the staves, particularly useful for compound stave drums (djembe's).
	Once all the staves are glued, the straps can be tightened to pull the drum into shape and close up any gaps. The straps can be further tightened by pushing them down the drum shell ( (with a small block of wood). The joints must be a tight fit, but it doesn't matter too much if they are not flush or level on the inside or outside. The outside will be planed later and any differences in levels will be sorted out then. The inside is left rough. A rubber mallet can be used to tap the tops of the staves level and to ensure the drum is not leaning to one side. The clamping time for the glue is only 30 minutes, but a full strength bond is achieved after 12 hours. While the glue is pretty strong, there doesn't seem to be too much problem of excess glue bonding with the straps. Excess glue can be wiped off with a damp cloth, both inside and outside the drum.

The short clamping time means that you have to work quickly, too quickly to stop and take photos really.

The disks sticking out of the half completed drum shell in the photo are the stand. I've temporarily solved my base stability problems of the stand by adding a 5lb weight disk to the base of the stand.

Both edges of each stave has to be completely covered with the glue. The staves are roughly aligned while the remaining staves are glued.

Here's another method of assembling and clamping the staves, particularly useful for compound stave drums (djembe's).

Once all the staves are glued, the straps can be tightened to pull the drum into shape and close up any gaps. The straps can be further tightened by pushing them down the drum shell ( (with a small block of wood).

The joints must be a tight fit, but it doesn't matter too much if they are not flush or level on the inside or outside. The outside will be planed later and any differences in levels will be sorted out then. The inside is left rough.

A rubber mallet can be used to tap the tops of the staves level and to ensure the drum is not leaning to one side.

The clamping time for the glue is only 30 minutes, but a full strength bond is achieved after 12 hours.

While the glue is pretty strong, there doesn't seem to be too much problem of excess glue bonding with the straps.

Excess glue can be wiped off with a damp cloth, both inside and outside the drum.

Step 6: Shaping the drum shell

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