I knew it was to good to be true.

[Arrowbuster]

Well I am sure many of you have read my posts of late and many of you have helped me along on my first selfbow build. I had an oh crap moment today. I sanded on the bow a little to day so I could get a coat of tru oil on it to seal. I noticed the spot in picture below. What can I do to fix this? It's on the belly about 15 inches down from tip. I know how it got there, I heated and bent some reflex to late in game. Anybody have any ideas? There is crack on back that is 11/2 inches long but it runs with grain. I superglued that. Same area.

[bubby]

Those are cryshals my friend, like the Irish guy said to William Wallace, the lord says I'll be fine but your #%!$&

[Weylin]

Those are cryshals my friend, like the Irish guy said to William Wallace, the lord says I'll be fine but your #%!$&

Haha, pretty much... Like Bubbly said, those are chrysals, or compression fractures. The wood is collapsing along those like little fault lines. There's no real repair. Most of us would scrap a bow like that. Some try to take extreme measures to fix them but generally it's better to start a new bow than to put a bunch of work into a bow that you'll never really trust anyway.

[Arrowbuster]

I scraped on it a little in that area took it down less than a 1/16 and took all signs of cracks out. Not worth retiller?

[bubby]

You can if ya want, my guess is they show up again

[Pat B]

The bow is bending too much there that's why if fretted. By reducing it more will make it fret again and maybe worst.
 The only repair I know of would be to add a patch but that's a lot of work and may not work. Since it is your first bow, keep it and study why it happened. It's only a failure if you don't learn from it.
 Now, go start another. 

[Badger]

He said he got the crack while adding reflex, he may not need to do anything to it. They are usually harmless but look bad.

[bubby]

There is quite a few of them badger, on the other hand it will shoot till it fails

[scp]

I would trap the back.

[lebhuntfish]

He said he got the crack while adding reflex, he may not need to do anything to it. They are usually harmless but look bad.

I'm with Badger on this one. The only thing I would do extra is fill it with super glue.

Patrick

[riverrat]

a little trick i tried once, cut a piece of horn. i used cow horn, heat it in boiling water to get it to bend. put it between two pieces of wood in a clamp. you want it to shape like the limb is. anyways after it dries, thin it down and glue it to that spot. leave it a inch or two of overhang from both sides. after the glue dries you may want to thin it a tad more with a file, then wrap with sinew real good. that trick worked for me on a locust bow a long time ago.

[Pappy]

I have patched them with some success but like Steve said if you done it adding reflex it may be ok,
I'd Like to see an un strung and full draw picture so maybe we could tell more. I know it's your first and understand, I have been there and would  do most anything to try and save one, but now if it is frets, I usually make cooking wood out of them. The ones I have tried to patch were for others that are where you are.
 Pappy

[Lumberman]

Bummer man, I broke my first attempt last night, pretty disheartening haha. Maybe it is salvageable maybe not but either way resolve to salvage your determination and persevere!

[Arrowbuster]

Yes I agree, if I can save her awesome if not its lessons learned. I've got a whole list of things I'm not going to do next time. All part of the learning curve. I was eyeing my next victim last night. Got a stave that's begging for the ole draw knife.

[Arrowbuster]

Here is a pic after I scraped it down with my pocketknife. I tried to heat bend it in a caul just on the other side of the knot in picture. I'm thinking the knot is why the wood done what it did. I'm going to retiller and see what I come up with. Not ready to give up yet. I really didn't go that deep to get cracks out.