Normally we use this blog space to tell you about our adhesive products, specifically hide glue, protein adhesive and liquid glue.  We also like to blog about the uses of our hide glue and the industries that our hide glue adhesives serve.  Sometimes we tell you about hide glue news or developments in manufacturing technology.

Today, we though we’d take a break from the hide glue talk to send out a special “thank you” message to all the great Moms out there in the spirit of Mother’s Day yesterday.  We know that having a strong Mom to guide you through life is a blessing, and hope you all had a great day with your Mom yesterday, or on the other side, we hope your children celebrated you the way you deserve if you are a Mom!

Happy Mother’s Day from L.D. Davis Industries.

L.D. Davis Industries manufactures a wide variety of protein-based glues and liquid water-based glues, which are all eco-friendly, completely non-toxic and easily recyclable.  Today, we’d like to feature our eco-friendly liquid water-based adhesive products, also called “white glues.”

Eco-Friendly Liquid Glues

Liquid water-based glues are based on polymer emulsions that are modified with various raw materials to produce different kinds of liquid glues.  These adhesives are easily customizable for tack, adhesion, open time, viscosity, and even color.

L.D. Davis eco friendly liquid glues come in many different sized containers.  Customers can purchase totes, drums, and even convenient five-gallon pails.  Five-gallon pails of liquid glue are convenient to handle, ship, and use and are great for companies that do not have the equipment setup to handle large drums or totes.

Liquid Glue Facts

Eco-friendly liquid glues can be applied at room temperature, unlike hot melt adhesives and protein adhesives.  This fact in addition to their non-toxicity makes them extremely safe to handle.

Liquid glues are used in a wide variety of applications and are commonly seen in case and carton seal, packaging, woodworking, lamination, envelopes and other assembly work.  They are very easy to apply through a variety of different methods and they also dry clear on the substrates.

L.D. Davis Industries strives to provide many different companies with safe, effective, and eco-friendly adhesives.  Check out our website for our entire product line of environmentally friendly protein adhesives and liquid glues.

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Liquid Glue in 5 Gallon Pail

L.D. Davis Industries manufactures a wide variety of protein-based glues and liquid water-based glues, which are all eco-friendly, completely non-toxic, and easily recyclable.  Today, we’d like to feature our eco-friendly protein adhesive products, which are also commonly called animal glue or hide glue.

Protein Adhesive

Eco-friendly protein adhesives have been around since ancient times, and are commonly used in bookbinding, woodworking, case making, and box-making applications.  Protein adhesives are made up of just a few all-natural ingredients, which include:

• Gelatin
• Glycerin
• Water
• Epsom Salt
• Corn Sugar

Since these raw materials are naturally recyclable, protein adhesives are also completely biodegradable.  They will begin breaking down only weeks after being recycled back into the natural environment.

Protein Adhesive Manufacturing

Background Information

Protein adhesives, (just a reminder, also known as animal glue and hide glue) come in cake form and must be melted prior to use.  Protein adhesives are usually applied to a substrate by use of a wheel, roller, or pad.  The term protein adhesives come from the type of gelatin used in the adhesive manufacturing process, most commonly called technical gelatin.  The protein found in this gelatin is animal protein, historically extracted from the hides and bones of pigs and cattle, hence the alternate names, animal glue and hide glue.

We are proud of our protein-based adhesive line of eco-friendly glues.  Not only are they already used in a wide variety of applications; they are easily customizable for a number of variables to increase their usage potential.  For more information on our eco-friendly line of protein adhesives, please check out the below video, visit our website, leave a comment, or communicate with us via Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn and Google+.

Protein Adhesive Manufacturing Plant Tour

• Animal glue is an ancient material…think old religious texts or Pharaoh’s tombs in Egypt—there’s animal glue there!
• Animal glue is an all-natural, recyclable and non-toxic material.  When reintroduced into the natural environment, it will start to break down and biodegrade within a few weeks.
• Due to the lack of synthetic ingredients or preservatives, animal glue is sensitive to changes in heat and humidity.  LD Davis offers troubleshooting tips and tricks to help with this and also manufactures winter and summer formulas of some of our most popular animal glue products.
• Animal glue comes in cake form and must be melted prior to application.
• Hide glue and protein adhesive are other common names for animal glue.
• Raw materials include only water, glycerin, corn sugar, Epsom salt and gelatin.
• Gelatin used comes from recycled nutritional company waste, leftover from production of hard and soft gel capsules.
• Animal glue has excellent initial wet tack.

Check out this video for more information on Animal Glue Manufacturing.

Tell Us What You Think!

Please visit our website, leave a comment or communicate with us via Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn and Google+.

L.D Davis Industries has developed a new liquid adhesive product to increase manufacturing efficiency and help with blistering issues for 3-ring binder manufacturers.

A binder customer came to us with a difficulty.  They were using two different cover materials laminated to chipboard to make their binders.  The two cover materials were PVC and polypropylene.  Not only did they have to use two different adhesives for the different cover materials, but they were also experiencing blistering issues because the glue took too long to dry.  They set LD Davis’ adhesive lab to the task, and we worked on a solution for them.

Adhesive Research and Development

Our technical staff developed a custom liquid adhesive that helped the binder manufacturer accomplish a few things.  First of all, this liquid adhesive will bind both substrates to the chipboard; it works to adhere both PVC and polypropylene covers.  This will increase the manufacturing efficiency of the binder maker because they do not have to take the time to switch out adhesives during their manufacturing process.

In addition, this new liquid adhesive has a much quicker speed of set, which means it dries much faster than the previous liquid adhesives our client was using.  This should help solve the blistering issues they were encountering.

While this new liquid adhesive is still in its final testing phase, we are confident that it will help solve their difficulties and make their binder manufacturing plant run more smoothly.  We are always willing to research and develop a custom adhesive for your application.  For more information, please visit our website, leave us a comment, or communicate with us via Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn and Google+.

Protein adhesives are a type of glue also referred to as animal glue or hide glue.  Protein adhesives are also sometimes called “cake glue” due to its appearance in 9-10lb “cakes” after production in a manufacturing facility.  Protein adhesive is more accurately called protein-based gelatin adhesive.  This term originates from the source of the gelatin used to manufacture this adhesive, which is typically protein gelatin extracted from the hides and bones of pigs and cattle.  This type of animal gelatin protein is processed in different grades of quality for use in food and pharmaceutical products.  The type of protein gelatin used in protein adhesive is industrial grade and usually referred to as technical gelatin.

Protein adhesive is completely non-toxic, eco-friendly and biodegradable.  In addition to the gelatin, the other common raw materials in protein adhesive include water, Epsom salts, corn sugar, and glycerin.  L.D. Davis Industries constantly sources its protein adhesive raw materials and has outstanding relationships with raw material suppliers.  This enables L.D. Davis to ensure that our customers can always get the protein adhesive they need to manufacture their products, when they need it.

Uses and Applications

Protein adhesives are useful in a wide variety of applications, but are most commonly used in bookbinding, box making and laminating applications.  Protein adhesive is generally applied using a wheel, roller, or pad.

L.D. Davis Industries is the largest of only a few protein adhesive manufacturers in the United States and we have been manufacturing protein adhesives for over eight decades.

For more information, please visit our website, leave a comment or communicate with us via Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn and Google+

Protein Adhesive Raw Materials

Adhesive manufacturing starts with sourcing the raw materials necessary to formulate protein adhesive.  Raw materials for protein adhesive include:

• Water
• Gelatin
• Glycerin
• Epsom Salt
• Corn Sugar

We constantly source our protein adhesive raw materials so that we can ensure that our customers always get the adhesive products they need, when they need them.  All of the above raw materials for protein adhesive manufacturing are non-toxic, natural, eco-friendly, and biodegradable.  That makes this adhesive manufacturing process special, because the result is totally healthy for the environment! We pride ourselves on eco-adhesive manufacturing.

Adhesive Manufacturing Process

Once the raw materials are obtained, screened for quality and sorted, they are poured into a large mixing kettle at our adhesive manufacturing plant in Monroe, NC.  They are heated up and mixed together and once the solution is ready, the hot, liquid adhesive mixture is poured into large trays so the adhesive can dry overnight into cake form.  The following day, the adhesive manufacturing process continues by removing the protein adhesive cakes from the trays by flipping them over. This process produces adhesive cakes of about 9-10 lbs. each that are packed six to a carton then sold in skid quantity.

Quality control samples are taken of each batch of protein adhesive produced and stored in our lab for future use.  This way if a customer runs into an application issue down the line, we can pull the sample by lot number and determine how to find a solution for them.

Adhesive manufacturing has a lot of steps to the process, but at this point we have it pretty down pat.  For more information, please visit our website or communicate with us by leaving a comment or visiting our social media pages: Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, LinkedIn, and Google+.

From its beginnings over eight decades ago, LD Davis Industries has manufactured quality animal hide glue for the book binding, packaging, and graphic arts industries.  In 1980, LD Davis Industries purchased a company called Adhesive Products of Georgia, which enable the company to begin manufacturing liquid adhesives to add to our line of non-toxic, eco-friendly glues.

Initially, all animal glue production was based out of a plant in Bristol, Pennsylvania and then completely moved to a new, state-of-the-art adhesive manufacturing facility built in Monroe, North Carolina.   After the acquisition of Adhesive Products of Georgia, all liquid adhesives were made in that facility in Georgia, but were eventually moved to the main adhesive manufacturing plant in Monroe, North Carolina.  Manufacturing liquid adhesives and animal glue under one roof that also contains a full adhesive lab and technical department that have a wealth of knowledge about liquid adhesives has been a great success for the company.

Properties of Liquid Adhesives

Liquid adhesives are also referred to as white glues, water-based adhesives and sometimes, cold glues because they can be applied at room temperature.  Liquid adhesives do not have to be heated prior to use like some other types of glue.  Liquid adhesives are often used in case and carton sealing, packaging, wood bonding, lamination, envelopes and other applications.

Liquid adhesives are always safe to handle due to the lack of heat and also because of its composition.  Liquid adhesives, just like all LD Davis manufactured adhesives, are:

• Non-toxic
• Eco-Friendly
• Biodegradable
• Liquid Adhesives are safe to handle.

Some other advantages to using liquid adhesive for your application include ease of use and cleanup, liquid adhesives dry clear, and are typically solvent-free.

For more information, please visit our website, leave us a comment, or check us out on Facebook….our new timeline features the history of LD Davis Industries.  Look for the milestone of the acquisition of Adhesive Products of Georgia which enabled us to manufacture liquid adhesives!

In the beginning, LD Davis Industries manufactured an adhesive product for the stenciling industry.  However, as a smart and innovative company must, LD Davis Industries adapted to the changing business climate when necessary and altered its product to serve the box making and book binding industries.  Book binding glue became, and is to this day, one of LD Davis’ premier adhesive products.

Book Binding Glue

Binderies use different types of book binding glue depending on the type of book and the binding process used.  LD Davis book binding glue is a type of animal glue, which must be heated prior to use; however, it is different from a hot melt adhesive.  Book binding glue is made up of the following raw materials:

• Water
• Corn sugar
• Gelatin
• Glycerin
• Epsom Salts

Eco-Friendly Book Binding Glue

Once the raw materials are mixed together in a heated kettle, the animal glue material is poured into large trays to try, which creates cakes of about 10 pounds each.  These cakes are then packed in boxes and sent to our customers, who melt the cakes down before use.  Due to its ingredients, book binding glue is completely non-toxic, safe for the environment, recyclable and biodegradable.  We like to call our book binding glue an “eco adhesive.”

Book Binding Glue Cakes

Whether they’re hard cover, paperback, or specialty bound, LD Davis Industries can supply the book binding glue to get the job done.  Our book binding glue has been a standard in the industry for decades and will continue to be as long as books are printed!

Do us a favor: put down the E-Reader, Kindle, or iPad…pick up a book…and check out the quality book binding glue securing it together while you’re at it! To learn more about book binding glue manufactured by LD Davis Industries, please visit our website.

Tell Us What You Think!

Please leave us a comment or communicate with us via Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, YouTube and Google+

Greg Brown, our Technical Service Manager, is also an accomplished photographer.  He makes our clients’ lives much easier by sending them photos with explanations when we are working on their products in our lab, he send staff funny photos from the day’s work, and, most recently, he won second place in Chemistry and Engineering News Magazine’s “Beauty at the Lab Bench” photo contest.  Click here for the photo!

Customizable Adhesives

Greg snapped the winning photo one day while mixing pigment into white, water-based liquid adhesive.  All of our adhesives, animal glues and water-base liquid glues, are easily customizable for a number of variables, but the water-based liquid adhesives are also customizable for color.  Red, blue, green, black, whatever colors your heart desires we can mix into our liquid glues for you.

Liquid, Water-Based Adhesives

LD Davis liquid water-based adhesives are used in a number of applications including laminating, packaging, case and carton seal, woodworking, paper bonding, and other assembly applications.  They are sometimes called “cold adhesives” because unlike animal glues or hot melt adhesives, they can be applied at room temperature.  Since they have no risk of burns and they are also completely non-toxic, our liquid water-based adhesives are always safe to handle!

To take the winning photo (on his blackberry!) Greg stopped the agitation process that was mixing pigment into the liquid glue for just a moment to capture this awesome photo.  He won second place, and the first and third place photos were both taken with electron microscopes!  We are very proud!

Talk to us!

If you’d like to learn more about liquid water-based adhesives, please visit our website.  Also, if you have a question for Greg about his photo or his work, please leave a comment here or contact us via any of our social media channels!

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