Sinew backed osage recurve- does this look right?

[sulphur]

ok after i posted the ?? about tite bond 3 and sinew (man what a thread)  i decided on hide glue.  this is my 57" osage recurve after i applied the sinew.  What a mess!!  Does it help if you comb it out before and while your appling it??  i mean it looks ok and will probably work but i would like it to look a little neater.  this is two courses and i will add a course of fine shredded stuff tomorrow.  this stave has lots of reflex  i hope doesn't gain much more will curing.  what do you guys think?? this is my first time with sinew.

[Dano]

A guy can get pretty anal about laying down sinew, but just as long as you don't have any big gaps it should be fine. One more layer to fill gaps oughta do. You can see why most people will cover it with skins or something. It might gain a tad more reflex, it's good you didn't lay it with the bow in reflex. Now all you got to do it watch it dry for a month or so.

[sonny]

it generally looks like ____ when you first apply it but when it's dry it'll look a lot better.....

[wodpow]

when I start to get the white in my  sinew it some times means that the glue didn't get deep enough into the fibers and displace the water that was used to wet the sinew .It only happened to me after I started laying down small hanks of sinew fiber and not separating them well enough for the hide glue to displace or mix with the water that was used to wet the sinew. then the water evaporates and you have sinew with not a lot of glue and it looks white I just sand it down and smooth it down then rub  some slightly thinned hide glue to the back and most times the white turns the same as the rest of the bow.As long as it sticks it's all good to me and can be sanded and the gaps filled in.

[Pappy]

Looks pretty good to me,fill a few of the gaps and it should be fine.Good luck and keep us posted on how it goes.
   Pappy

[PatM]

 I have posted this tip a dozen times and it never seems to catch on.
 Put your sinew on all at once as neatly as possible and use a generous amount of glue. Take inner tube strips and wrap the bow from handle to tip with the tubing wrapped so that the edges meet but don't overlap. Just use a slight amount of tension. Apply the tension as you pass the wrap across the belly and lay the tubing  across the sinew without pulling the sinew to one side.
 Then warm the bow with a heat gun set on low or place it in the sun. The excess glue will ooze out. Allow the bow to cool and then unwrap it. The backing will be perfectly crowned and smooth. You can re-wrap it a number of times if you feel you can get more squeeze out.
 No sense sanding down your sinew to get it smooth. It's too valuable to turn it to dust.
 After I remove the rubber strips I re-wrap the bow in cotton cloth strips to keep it tightly pressed to the wood and tie the bow into greater reflex to insure it doesn't pull away from the wood as it shrinks.

[wodpow]

I have used electrical tape sticky side out and wrapped the whole bow after the main application of sinew it will be like rubbery and will flatten out smooth under the tape and leave it on for a 4or5 days in a reverse bend so it stays stuck and starts to shrink down when you take off the tape it will not have the white color.I put it back in a reverse bend   to help the shrinking sinew to stay stuck for about three weeks or longer. mostly I will only sand it if Iam going to put skins on it and want it nice and even and smooth and to take out the spiral pattern left by the tape.

[Pat B]

The problem with using electrical tape is that it does not breath so the moisture in the sinew and hide glue can only go into the wood. This will cause it to take longer to cure. I use old bed sheets ripped into 2" wide strips to wrap, others use ace bandages, both of which will breath and allow some of the moisture to evaporate.
  I would be afraid that the electrical tape would allow bacteria or rot to set into the sinew and hide glue before it had a chance to completely dry.

[wodpow]

There is some gap in the tape but not much for the moisture to escape.