A load of failures and some lessons

[jameswoodmot]

I don’t mind breaking the odd bow but four failures in a week is a bit tough to take!

One Perry reflex experiment with Indian Laurel on the belly. Shop got colder over night than I thought and I unwrapped the bow and the glue just popped open. I was pretty annoyed as I’ve made similar mistakes before but I thought I could just peel off the bamboo. Got to about a foot from the end and the glue had set and I split the belly wood.

A big (aiming for 100lbs) elm flat bow that popped at 70lbs as I’ve over heat treated it.

A flipped Hazel Molly that I did exactly the same to.

And most recently a little hazel primitive thing. I narrowed the tips up and they were too small for the loops on the string I was using. One shot and the string came off and it broke on the belly. Done that before too!

On the plus side I now know that a heat gun and insulation siding will DEFINITELY heat treat a bow all the way through. Like actually all the way through, not just the air getting round the back. Which is great as heat treating can now take a fraction of the time.

Also, Hazel is just incredible. It seems to be out performing wych elm which I’m pretty surprised at.  I tried to break the other limb of the primitive and couldn’t with basically all the weight I could put on it. It 61” and 42lbs at 26” when I broke it.

Here’s a video of me trying and some stills. The unflexed photo is after not before. The cracking sound is dirt on the floor

https://youtube.com/shorts/ZRhcKA_GHUw?si=YB1N-WBaE0FlxZ6x

[Del the cat]

Great post, v interesting...
The heavily heat treated Hazel sounds good.
Nothing more frustrating than repeating an old mistake and thinking Damn, that's happened before.
I'm sure we've all done it when trying to get something done a bit quicker than we should... it's all character forming (or so I'm told  )
Del

[Burnsie]

You are really blazing through the bows - the failures are unfortunate, but as you said, they are all learning opportunities.

[Jim Davis]

Seems like you are testing thin ice in several directions. Got to expect the ice to break sometimes.

[Badger]

  I can relate. When you have 100 experiments you want to do and can only do one at a time, it leads to rushing and inevitable mistakes. It was not unusual for me to break 4 0r 5 bows a week sometimes. I was always more careful with good wood and good staves but I was pretty sloppy sometimes when it came to board bow glue ups. But I did have fun and that was the real goal.

[Hamish]

I've had the same problem with glue not curing properly with some woods. Definitely made worse with a quick drop in temperature. Glues like Titebond 3  need to be relatively warm to cure properly, and need to stay clamped until it does. It doesn't happen usually with common woods like pine and oak, walnut. Anything slightly exotic or a bit oily needs extra time under the clamps, sometimes a couple of days if it's really cold.

That heat treated hazel is amazing. Looks like that experiment passed with flying colours.

Haste makes waste, but then again if you ain't breaking, you ain't making.