Heat treating after an oil finish

[upstatenybowyer]

I have this HHB bow that's just about finished up and after a long round of shooting I notice the string alignment needs a little tweaking.

So I clamp it to my straightening caul and use my heat gun very briefly on one spot. I didn't think this would effect the tiller much cause it was just in one spot and only for a minute or two.

Low and behold that one spot bent a whole lot less, significantly effecting the tiller. I fixed the problem by going over the rest of the bow briefly with the heat gun.

All this got me thinking that the 6 coats of tung oil on the bow may have made for a much more dramatic effect from dry heat. The wood got much hotter with the oil finish and perhaps since I really took my time applying the tung oil, it had penetrated the wood deeply, causing a much deeper heat treating.

Anyone have any experience with this?

[BowEd]

I've noticed better heat treatment heat treating bows that as staves had their backs shellacked a couple of times.So much so that after a heat treatment the back will be stuck to the form melting the shellack to the form.Could be heat sneaking around to the back but not totally though IMHO.
I really think there is something to that.

[PatM]

Worth noting that bamboo flyrod makers tend to give their rod blanks a soaking and even pressure treating with an oil/varnish/sealer treatment which after curing stiffens the blank and reduces any tendency to set.

 I would think that a heat treated polymerizing oil will act similar to the way that the natural resins and oils in Osage shore up the cell walls and help give it its unique qualities.

[JonW]

I use a lard/pitch mixture when heat tempering. I believe it helps.

[Onebowonder]

I use a lard/pitch mixture when heat tempering. I believe it helps.

Got a recipe JonW? - OneBow

[TimBo]

Just pitch some lard on it!

[JonW]

No recipe Eric. Prolly 2 parts lard to 1 part pitch. I shoot for the consistency of paste shoe polish when melted and cooled off.

[BowEd]

To me some resins would be beneficial.

[PatM]

To me some resins would be beneficial.

 That's the principle behind the flyrod blank treatment. The typical mixture is a penetrating marine sealer mixed with a resin based varnish perhaps thinned with a  solvent. The idea being to get the mix deep into the fibers and cells and then set and polymerize there as well.

[BowEd]

Some sort of pitch mixture would also help make things more water proof also I would think.Also being acceptable of a finish.