? redoing fretted BL as lighter bow?

[snedeker]

Has anyone scraped off the frets/chrysals on a bow that has so suffered to go for a much lighter bow?   How deeep to the compresson fractures impact?  I have a boo backed BL from last year that I stuch the short string on way too early -- sometimes I get a wild streak or something and just say, hey, I bet that could be full braced right now!    Have a buddy's daughter that wants to shoot and its a reall pretty bow right now at 61" long, 45#/27".  Wonder if I srape it down to 30# at 25" for her I'd get under the frets.

I have only had frets with backed BL, not selfbows.

Dave

[DanaM]

I'd say its worth a try anyway.

[Pat B]

Dave, I'm working on an osage bow that developed a fret just above the handle. This bow was an experiment anyway so I reduced the thickness,eliminating the fret(I thought) and retillered it to a lightered weight. The fret has reappeared along with a smaller one next to it.
  The boo backing adds extra stress to the belly so I would be Leary. I believe a lot of it has to do with the particular piece of wood you are using.  What I have done on boo backed bows that did fret is grind down the belly(one was hickory the other yew) into a thin mid lam and add a new belly lam and retiller.   I've done 2 like that and both have turned out to be excellent shooters. Pat

[medicinewheel]

i guess pat is absolutly right: if the bamboo overpowered the belly on your bow, it'll overpower a lighter bow even more. flatten the belly and glue on a stripe of hardwood like osage, hornbeam, massaranduba and you'll get a really nice bow. you may want even induce more reflex that way!
frank

[George Tsoukalas]

No, Dave,  you can't scrape them. Well you could but that would make them worse. They have 2 causes. if they are localized to a particular area they are happen when part of the limb bends too much in relation to the other. The remedy is to leave the frets or chrysals alone and retiller the rest of the limb to fix the bend. You'll have to retiller the lower limb too. That will lower weight. There's one another way but that's the easiest. The second cause is if the design is off (too narrow, short) then the frets will  be spread out over a larger area perhaps the entire length of the limb. That bow is toast. Frets will eventually result in the bow folding on itself-literally. Happy news ha? Jawge

[snedeker]

I kind of figured it was doubtful but the hurt is old  -- its been leaning in a corner for a long time.  Maybe I'll try a belly lam on it some day.

Thanks.

Dave

[George Tsoukalas]

Are the frets  localized or over the whole limb? Jawge

[Justin Snyder]

Just a question, not a suggestion. Can you re-tiller the bow then add a extremely dense wood belly lam?  Justin

[snedeker]

Fret are localized to limited areas, especially near the handle on one limb where I pulled it with a hinge.

Ithe fretting was all during tillering and it is now in good tiller     It could be sanded off level and a lam applied.

Dave

[George Tsoukalas]

Yes, sounds like it would work. Jawge

[Hillbilly]

One of the first bows I made was a locust that I fretted the crap out of with a hinge outside the fade. These were major chrysals running nearly all the way through the wood. I took it down to about 25#, and it has been shot probably a couple thousand times and is still together. My wife used to shoot 3D courses with it, and I shot it a bunch drawn way past its draw length just to see what would happen, but nothing ever did except it took some set.