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UNGLUEING GLUED PIECES
From time to time you may want to securely glue two pieces of wood together, and after machining, sawing or carving, to unglue the finished pieces. An example of this is gluing several pieces of wood together so that they can be cut to the outline of a part of a gun carriage, and then to separate them for use individually. Cabinet makers have a method. It involves gluing two pieces together with a piece of paper between them. They can be separated by a sharp blow, though this may not be advisable with small delicate parts. Of course, the presence of the paper layer would make it easier to achieve the separation with a solvent or water. It has also been suggested that glued surfaces can be separated with a strong solvent such as acetone. I have tried this method, and it works, but not very well. After 24 hours of soaking, I have found that it is still necessary to pry the pieces apart. A procedure that really works is to glue the pieces together with Elmer’s "School Glue". Right on the label it says "Washes out in soap and water". I tried it without any soap, though it may have worked better with it. I placed the glued parts in a bowl of water and applied heat in the microwave until the water was near boiling. Then I allowed it to cool, moving the parts around every few minutes. After about 15 minutes, the parts easily separated with little or no prying, and with very little residual glue.