Drilling out knot with crack

[bassman211]

I would poke around on the knot to see how punky it is. If it is bad I drill out to clean wood, and use a mixture of red bottled super glue  ,and saw dust ,and pack each layer in tight. That fix has saved my a.. on many a bow builds.

[PeteC]

 The cracked knot is on the back of the bow slimbob. Yesterday I super glued it and left a tiny ridge on top of the crack. I let it cure all night,sanded the little glue ridge just a tad,(trying not to mess up my tru-oil job),then braced it and shot at least 200 arrows through it. The first time I hit full draw there was a tick from the glued crack,but I can't tell where it popped loose.Every thing still looks good,with no visible cracks. It never changed the whole shooting session. I feel pretty good about it now. I am hoping to hunt with this one this year,but w'ell  see.GodBless

[scp]

The cracked knot is on the back of the bow slimbob. ....

Just incredible. I think most people assumed the knot is in the belly. Where in the limb is the knot?

[bentstick54]

Being the knot is on the back of the bow, and you heard a tic, I would keep shooting with caution. I would also wrap over that area as a safety precaution if I was going to continue shooting it, and I would if it were mine.

[bentstick54]

Here is my 1st osage selfbow that I built. 63” ttt, tillered out to 57#@28”. After shooting for awhile I decide to see how it would shoot at 29”. Well that didn’t go well, and it lifted a big splinter, 1/4”wide and 1/8” deep at a cluster of pin knots. This was about 4 days before I was going to an out of state shoot, and this was my only selfbow. It survived the shoot, and when I got home I wrapped over it as a precaution. That was 10 years ago, and I still hunt with it.
I did take the wrap off about 5 years ago, and reduced it to 50# due to a bad shoulder. It showed no sign of the splinter lifting, so I refinished it, rewrapped it, and am still hunting with it. I did retire it from the 3D circuit in hopes of keeping it from further damage.

[SLIMBOB]

Yeah, I assumed the belly. Only a guess, but I would think it will just get a little bigger until it finally goes. Hope I’m wrong Pete.  Might back it with rawhide.

[bassman211]

I also thought it was the belly which for me would put a whole new light on the subject now that I know it is the back. This is just me , but when I run into that problem, and have enough stave left 36 to 50 inches, and the rest of the stave is clean I wack it off at the knot ,and make horse bows.

[PeteC]

 Well , out of somewhere around a hundred self bows,I have never left an island ring around a knot on the belly.I build flat belly bows, and only leave an island around a knot on the back if it's steep and there is a danger of violating a very thin ring on the knot. I have wrapped many bows that lift a splinter,or have a windcheck near the edge,but I can't see wrapping a knot with a crack perpendicular to the bows grain. But I could be wrong. I also have quite a few bows with knots with parallel cracks that have lasted for years and are still in service.Sorry I did'nt make it plain in my description. God Bless

[PeteC]

Also, I shot an hour and a half today,and still no change in the glue job. That's probably a total of no less than 400 arrows since glued.

[bentstick54]

Osage is some strong stuff. You may be OK with it the way it is. I would just keep my eye on it to see if the crack should start growing. It may last for years, you just never know.

[bassman211]

Pete I really hope that bow lasts you a life time.. I have patched bows that are still shooting fine, but I have had more than my share of self bows blow up at full draw, and some were from knots on the back of the bow coupled with improper tillering. Now I hunt for clean staves no matter what kind of wood it is, and if the back looks questionable to me I will sinew back it.  I like making horse bows , also, and if I have to cut the stave I can mostly still get a bow out of it.