Broken Broken Broken....

[Arrowind]

Some of you know I've had a string of bad luck going this year with my bow building.  But I KNOW why each of the other failures happend and have come to terms with it.   But knowing why is a good education.  Still frustrating but still a step forward.  I can even smile about it knowing I messed something up but not knowing why is just agonizing. 

Yesterday I actually said in my garage / bow shop "I'm not going to do this anymore."   

After spending a few hours tillering I broke a bow.  Hickory - 66" Mollie.   2" at the fades tapering to 1.75" where the fades for the levers began...Should have been an easy success.  Even with my tillering skills at my current level it should have held.  Hmmmmm.   I cannot for the life of me figure out why it broke.  I did trap the back quite a bit so maybe that's why...not sure.   

This followed a bow I broke a few weeks ago which was also Hickory - 72" long bow.  This one I heated in about 3 or 4 inches of reflex and backed it with burlap.  about 1.5 inches wide to just past mid limb and tapering to 3/8" at the tips.  Man I wanted to shoot that bow...it started creaking and cracking on the long string at about 45lbs at 16"!  What?  I thought well maybe the moisture content was way too low due to living in AZ and heat treating the belly.  Still it seems strange to fail that early on....  as an experiment I did NOT heat treat the bow above to rule it out or at least give me some info on if it was that or not.

Now the one thing that is clear in my mind is that both bows came from the same board. (I have only made board bows).

I told my wife about this and she immediately said "must of been a bad piece of wood"  "some unseen flaw in the wood probably...." she continued.  - She doesn't build bows but this does seem to make sense.... 

Please someone tell me this sounds familiar.  Have you ever come across a stave or board that by all observation looked excellent but then had no success??? 

Fortunately I had a good night sleep last night and woke up wanting to make more bows....but I have to say I am rattled and my confidence in making bows is at a new low. 

[mullet]

 I feel for you. I've broken my share of them. I have built one board bow and it ended up breaking. I haven't built one since. I enjoy working with staves or laminated bows more.

[RBLusthaus]

I had a bad batch batch of urac once, so your theory sounds legit to me, but maybe try one from a stave instead of a board. 

Russ

[Don Case]

Could you post some pictures? The pros here could probably help if they could see the damage. It might also help me avoid the same thing. 
Don

[artcher1]

Once you learn a little more about hickory you'll realize what's going on Arrowind. Hickory, although as tough as they come, is one wood that degrades faster than any other whitewood. As a rule of thumb, you want to fell the tree, quarter out and seal it's ends. Then store properly.

But when you buy it in board form, it's been logged first, stored in a landing, probably in some muck and mire, transported to the mill, piled again in perhaps some more muck and mire (for however long) before being processed. See where I'm going?

Good hickory will take a great bend without breaking. When it does brake it just kinda collapses. I think you now know what happens with bad hickory.

Wise to always do a bend/break test on some scrap before proceeding with any hickory you purchase...........Art

[MWirwicki]

Try a stave, Archer.  Chase a growth ring and go from there...
Sorry 'bout your loss(es).

[blackhawk]

+1 Art.....here in PA we have lots of woods and logging,and loggers are not kind to trees...trees will get drug out with the skidder over our rocky ground tearing up big sections off the bark...then the trees can sit for a week or two easily on the ground in a huge staging area where the trucks pick them up then off to sit n wait in another pile at the mill etc...so playing with lumber/boards is a gamble and a crap shoot....

And anyone that's been making bows for a good while has gone thru those kinds of streaks and growing pains,even after you think your skills are good...woods wood...its like a box of cracker jacks ..and that's what makes it fun is its unpredictability even if you do have a lot of knowledge in bow making...I feel your pain....been there more than I'd like to admit the best therapy I find is to immediatkey start another...usually when one breaks (or two or three in a row)it motivates me even more,and adds fuel to the fire

[Arrowind]

I feel for you. I've broken my share of them. I have built one board bow and it ended up breaking. I haven't built one since. I enjoy working with staves or laminated bows more.

Hey Mullet,
Thanks.  I definately want to learn to work a stave.   The issue i have is living in AZ we don't have a lot of bow wood growing around here.
I did cut a nice straight peice of juniper that has been sitting in my garage for almost two years now.  I'm looking forward to giving that a shot.
I have to admit that I love board bows.   I have made about 30 (mostly Hickory) and comparatively speaking few have broken.  I'm used to hickory taking massive set before breaking not just cracking when it's bent to half draw...just seems weird.

[Arrowind]

I had a bad batch batch of urac once, so your theory sounds legit to me, but maybe try one from a stave instead of a board. 

Russ

Hi Russ,
thanks.  I've had too many board bows work out to blame it on "board bows". I'm always inclined to blame it on myself first...what did I do wrong and how can I learn from it?  In this case I'm starting to wonder if it was the material because I just can't think of what I did wrong which is really what gets to me.  Or I did something wrong and just don't know it.  But I feel like I did everything right or enough right things for both of these bows to have been successful....  It's a lot like 2+2 doesn't equal 4 anymore.....   I do understand what you are talking about.  Staves have a much higher potential for success though I don't have first hand experience building one from a stave.

[Arrowind]

MWirwicki - Thanks.  I fully intend to at some point in the future that's for sure.

Art and Blackhawk - thanks, I have another piece of wood cut out to look like a board stave steamed in some deflex/ reflex have a handle glued on and ready to tiller from the same piece of wood....I'm thinking of tillering it to see if it breaks....if so I'm inclined to believe it is exactly what my wife suggested and you guys have supported "a bad piece of wood."   I really just want to set it aside and move on....

I'm used to hickory taking soooo much punishment you almost don't need to know how to tiller and you can still make a bow.  That's why I've been using it to teach scouts to make bows....glad they aren't using this wood.  The source I use for lumber usually has very high quality wood....but I think this is "bad hickory" as you've suggested Art....it just seems to break too easily.  It's almost like it's a heavy saltine cracker.

I guess I've been lucky this whole time.

Blackhawk - thanks.  I appreciate it.  I actually did wake up more motivated and plan to go after it with more intensity.  I thought I knew what I was doing...I even thought I might be getting good at this...if anything I'll go a  little slower tillering at least....but I do intend to start a few more.

[mikekeswick]

Once you learn a little more about hickory you'll realize what's going on Arrowind. Hickory, although as tough as they come, is one wood that degrades faster than any other whitewood. As a rule of thumb, you want to fell the tree, quarter out and seal it's ends. Then store properly.

But when you buy it in board form, it's been logged first, stored in a landing, probably in some muck and mire, transported to the mill, piled again in perhaps some more muck and mire (for however long) before being processed. See where I'm going?

Good hickory will take a great bend without breaking. When it does brake it just kinda collapses. I think you now know what happens with bad hickory.

Wise to always do a bend/break test on some scrap before proceeding with any hickory you purchase...........Art

+1

I would also say learn to walk before you try to learn to run. Make simple bows with no reflex, no bells and whistles just a plain old pyramid or parallel limb model.

[Del the cat]

As Mike says keep it simple.
I've been making bows for about 50 years and I still haven't got round to makin' a Molly... 
Why? Beacause why would I want to make a bow that concentrates all the bend into 1/3 of the limb?
Accident waiting to happen IMO, same as fancy recurves and such like... wait until you have the basics under youtr belt ans these fancy bows can be fickle.
Just try stringing a pyramid vs something with heavillt flipped tips and you'll see what I mean.
Staves vs boards vs laminates.... there's pros and cons to each and you don't get ow't for now't.
Staves can be free but have their problems, boards... well they are easy in theory, but you don't know what the wood is like.
Del

[artcher1]

 "Why? Beacause why would I want to make a bow that concentrates all the bend into 1/3 of the limb?"


That's how I build all my bows Del. When shooting light weight tackle, using heavy hunting arrows, and having a short draw length, it's absolutely the right design IMO.............Art

[blackhawk]

@Del....I really don't understand why you continue to bash Molly's n lever bows every chance you get when you've never even made one?  I don't agree with a lot of your "unfounded opinions" of them...take a look at a lot of my bows and they disprove a lot of your thoughts and ideas about them   

[huisme]

@Del....I really don't understand why you continue to bash Molly's n lever bows every chance you get when you've never even made one?  I don't agree with a lot of your "unfounded opinions" of them...take a look at a lot of my bows and they disprove a lot of your thoughts and ideas about them   

Yeah, really. Every molle I've made still works fine, and my first was my fifth bow. My more recent ones are my fastest bows.

I think Arrowind's problem is definitely a bad board and not the mollegabet design.