Primitive Archer
Main Discussion Area => Bows => Topic started by: yellow feather on July 02, 2008, 06:36:34 pm
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I bought a peace of bamboo from Rudderbows . My question is , how thick is the rind on bamboo and how can you tell when you have it off? I've used a scrapper on a small peace and I can't tell any diff. other than that it is smoother. Am I missing something here? Does the rind have to come off? ??? David
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When you get the rind off the color will go from the pale white color to a darker yellow color. Be carefull not to go to deep as you can cut the power fibers. You can scrape it down until you have a nice even yellow color. Try it on the end of a piece and you will see the obvious difference. Justin
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Thanks Justin. I just looked at it again and that test peace looks and feels smoother and is a more even yellow. Is that what you mean? It's more like just smoothing the back up? Because I probably only took off a few thousandths. David
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If its a test piece go ahead and take it down a little more. On a bow I usually go until it is all one even color then stop. Justin
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I used to scrape my bamboo pretty aggressive, but these days, I'm not. I leave the nodes very proud, basically not touching them at all. I only scrape, or even sand, between nodes, just enough to remove the outer waxy rind on the bamboo. If you don't remove the rind, the bamboo won't take any finish. I don't do much anymore. Go easy with the scraper, as it leaves little marks on the bamboo... potential weak spots.
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Thanks for the help..David
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somewhere on this forum is a thread where Marc the Master says that he has been taking down the nodes for years...so i copy him, and so far, no troubles. I scrape the rind off, like the other guys say, and then hit the nodes lightly with a fine file, and then sand the whole thing deadly smooth. No troubles at all, even on 65# bows...
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On that little boo backed Ipe I just did I took the nodes down quite a bit. I think it is safe to say the boo on it is under stress. ;)
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Radius, if you sand your nodes smooth you have a dangerous violation going, on a low stess design it might work even on high draw weights but the fibers run straight up almost to the peak of the node, anything off the peak is a violation of the vibers. Maybe just about a 1/32 is safe but anymore than that I wouldn't try. I have had a few I sanded flat and then overlayed a thin invisble layer of the stuff we can't talk about here. But they were no longer primitive. Steve
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ohhh shame shame everybody knows your name name ;D
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Robustusman will tell you about splinters lifting on boo-backed bows after scraping the rind down and leaving marks. I don't scrape it anymore but steelwool it smooth with 0000 and either stain and seal it or just seal it.