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Author Topic: Sometimes they go BOOM  (Read 5240 times)

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Offline Marc St Louis

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Sometimes they go BOOM
« on: February 18, 2011, 03:08:13 pm »
I have a board of Bubinga with fairly straight grain.  A few months ago I had the curious idea to see if it would work as a backing.  I used some Satinwood for the core and glued up an RD bow.  Then a few weeks ago I decided to tiller the bow out.  Everything went well up to 22".  The bow was bending well



At 24" it exploded violently, you can still see a piece falling at the bottom of this picture. 



This is all that's left



My curiosity as satisfied

I also had some Bulletwood backing strips that Steve Gardner gave me many years.  At about the same time I glued the Bubinga bow I decided it was time to make use of them so using the same core wood I glued another RD bow.  A couple weeks ago I figured I would tiller out that bow.  Everything was going well out to 26".  The bow was bending well, it had high draw weight and was losing very little of the reflex I had glued in



Then at 27" it self destructed, violently.  The camera just about caught the explosion



This is all that was left of that one




Of the 2 exploding bows not one piece of wood touched me, my nerves on the other hand were a bit frazzled  :)
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Offline Mark Anderson

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Re: Sometimes they go BOOM
« Reply #1 on: February 18, 2011, 03:17:41 pm »
Awesome pictures thanks for sharing. Although I hate to hear that it happened, it is good to know that it can even happen to the best. Helps me not get so discouraged when it happens to me!
Mark
p.s. They were both looking great before the mishap.
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Offline JackCrafty

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Re: Sometimes they go BOOM
« Reply #2 on: February 18, 2011, 03:20:53 pm »
Yep, I'm frazzled just looking...

Interesting to see where the limbs failed.  Thanks for the pics!
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Offline fusizoli

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Re: Sometimes they go BOOM
« Reply #3 on: February 18, 2011, 03:21:40 pm »
Marc I'm glad U show us those. They had very nice contrast! I think those woods wouldn't be your fauvorite backing  ::)
Oh yes I forget to say WOW  :-\
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HatchA

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Re: Sometimes they go BOOM
« Reply #4 on: February 18, 2011, 03:22:18 pm »
Am I right in thinking you've marked up an arrow for use as a draw length measurement/guide/thingy?

I guess none of the bow pieces hitting you classifies them both as "lucky breaks"... ;)
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Offline aero86

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Re: Sometimes they go BOOM
« Reply #5 on: February 18, 2011, 03:27:40 pm »
what choice words did you use?
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Offline Elktracker

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Re: Sometimes they go BOOM
« Reply #6 on: February 18, 2011, 03:30:52 pm »
Wow thanks for shareing, im glad you didnt get hit by any shrapnal :o  It is unfortunate but it is cool you got it on cam :)
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Offline NTProf

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Re: Sometimes they go BOOM
« Reply #7 on: February 18, 2011, 03:35:14 pm »
This scares me! If a bow blows up on an expert like Marc, what are the chances that one will soon blow up on someone like me!
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HatchA

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Re: Sometimes they go BOOM
« Reply #8 on: February 18, 2011, 03:40:34 pm »
Quote from: NTProf on February 18, 2011, 03:35:14 pm
This scares me! If a bow blows up on an expert like Marc, what are the chances that one will soon blow up on someone like me!

*waits for Jawge to come say his trademark words...*   ;)
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Offline Matt S.

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Re: Sometimes they go BOOM
« Reply #9 on: February 18, 2011, 03:45:16 pm »
It's sad to see that happen, we can all share in that pain. As commadore said, this is a good reminder that breakage even happens to the best bowyers, which helps us less experienced bowyers from getting too discouraged when it happens to us.

The photos getting the breaks in action are  :o Really glad you didn't get hurt!
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Offline Timo

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Re: Sometimes they go BOOM
« Reply #10 on: February 18, 2011, 04:44:13 pm »
It happens! Times like those one wishes to have a movie camera rolling, just to see the exact spot where the failure starts.

Glad to hear you came out of those explosions unscathed. O:)
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Offline Marc St Louis

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Re: Sometimes they go BOOM
« Reply #11 on: February 18, 2011, 04:51:50 pm »
It's interesting to see that both limbs let go at the same time on both bows.

I was speechless on both occasions

The Bubinga was an experiment but the Massaranduba has been used by other people for backings before, it sort of surprised me when it let go.  On both occasions the RH in my shop was not that low

I did mark that arrow at every 1" of draw, I have 3 arrows set up like that.  The lines on this one stands out the best

I have caught 4 bows exploding on film, 2 of them pretty well right when they let go
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Offline toymaker

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Re: Sometimes they go BOOM
« Reply #12 on: February 18, 2011, 04:52:34 pm »
That's a bummer! Looks like you just about got a jointer stuck where you shouldn't have one :o
good luck on the next ones! How did yo get your camera to go off at the right time? Is it a video camera and you just grabbed the right frame?
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Offline Del the cat

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Re: Sometimes they go BOOM
« Reply #13 on: February 18, 2011, 05:04:27 pm »
..Boombinga  :o
Thanks for sharing, just shows it happens to us all.
Very considerate to do it on camera.
Del
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Offline tattoo dave

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Re: Sometimes they go BOOM
« Reply #14 on: February 18, 2011, 08:13:48 pm »
Sorry about your bows Marc  :'(, but that makes me feel better. It was less than a few hours ago I had the same problem. Mine was hickory bow with hickory backing.
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Rockford, MI
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