Wrapping a chrysle

[PEARL DRUMS]

If you want that maple to stay I suggest tapering it from center out and let that ipe stay at least 1/4" thick at its thinnest.

[tattoo dave]

So I just had the same problem. Backed some ERC with bamboo, and ended up with all kinds of chrysles.

Tattoo Dave

[mullet]

I've had and seen Ipe chrysal sometimes for no reason.It comes from overpoweringthe Ipe, belly wood and the wood itself is not always uniform. Just recently I backed a bamboo backed Ipe bow with one course of sinew because it had lifted a splinter. I shot it about three times and noticed it had chrysaled on both limbs where you wouldn't expect it, right at the Fades. I'm still shooting it and it hasn't broke yet, but,,,?

There are different grades of Ipe and the small pin knots are very hard to see. When you have a small knot it doesn't take much to chrysal or break one.

I'd say wrap it, soak it in super glue or, wipe the spot down real good with oven cleaner or acetone and heat it lightly and feather some super glue in the crack and shoot it.

[rossfactor]

Just thinking here, but I'd say that wrapping and supergluing won't do much to help a bow that is chrysling-here's why I think so:

Chrysleing is caused when the back overpowers the belly and you crush a line of belly cells. Its like an intense dose of set in a small area. Fibers and glue won't replace crushed wood cells.  It might help protect the back from breaking (which could happen if the belly was too weak), but it won't reverse the damage done at this point. You can't add stiffness back to the belly of a bow without a wood patch and I have considerable doubts about the wood patchs (but thats for anothe post).

I've had bows that chrysled (especially locust) and still shot for years.  However, Pearls right, it always gets worse over time.  Just my 2c.

Gabe

[RobWiden]

    I think I would scrape out the chrysal and glue another slat of ipe on the belly, then retiller. A chrysal is not like a broken bone, it won't heal.

[mikekeswick]

The bow chrysaled because it's bending far too much into the handle on the right hand limb.
If your bows are chrysaling it's because the belly is being asked to take too much compression.
As mentioned before chrysals almost ALWAYS have a stiff spot between them and the tip.
I would suggest slowing down and not using a 50 grit drum....
Rasps/files/scrapers and sandpaper are your friends!
Ipe can take a hell of a lot of compression BUT ONLY in a bow that is well tillered - put it on the belly of a bow with hinges and it will chyrsal just like any other.

The first thing to do with a limb that has chyrsaled is to look tipward and remove the offending stiff section. DO NOT touch the chyrsal unless you are going to do a proper patch. If you just cut a small kerf and fill it then the CAUSE of the chyrsal is still there. Wrapping a chrysaled section of limb is going to do absolutely nothing other than hide your mistake....
Good luck.

[Prarie Bowyer]

If you want that maple to stay I suggest tapering it from center out and let that ipe stay at least 1/4" thick at its thinnest.

Maple is double tapered on both sides.  Thickest is 3/16 in the center and just under 1/8" at the tips.... I think.Somethign like that.

[Prarie Bowyer]

I've had and seen Ipe chrysal sometimes for no reason.It comes from overpoweringthe Ipe, belly wood and the wood itself is not always uniform. Just recently I backed a bamboo backed Ipe bow with one course of sinew because it had lifted a splinter. I shot it about three times and noticed it had chrysaled on both limbs where you wouldn't expect it, right at the Fades. I'm still shooting it and it hasn't broke yet, but,,,?

There are different grades of Ipe and the small pin knots are very hard to see. When you have a small knot it doesn't take much to chrysal or break one.

I'd say wrap it, soak it in super glue or, wipe the spot down real good with oven cleaner or acetone and heat it lightly and feather some super glue in the crack and shoot it.

Great.  I just got a new Ipe board.  It has two worm holes in it, 3-4 pin knots in it, and a  big dutchmans plug in the middle.  The plug I'm less worried about becasue Torges says you can use those to fix wood before it's used.  Still I'll place it in the riser section of the next bow.  On this bow I'm going to try the saw kerf idea.  I don't know why it wouldn't work.  The torges patch works well and if you think about it it shouldn't work at all.  You have two mated semicircles.  A male and a female.  The female is flexing against the male such that it pinches the plug and thust pushes it out. That can't happen here. 

I've shot the bow a fewtimes and drawn it to 28 and 29" on the tree and they don't seem to be growing.  I'm thinking it's like those cracks on a car window.  If your relieve them they'll stop creeping.  Filling in with an Ipe wedge that is well fitted should almost dissapear.  I nkow Horn is AWESOME in compression and I could fill it with that but it would be an obvious patch.

There was grain runout across the belly and that creates the twist when drawing.  Took some fiddling and luck to get it all out.  Next time I'll wait before cutting in the arrow shelf.  It's a pain because the twist showed up late in the process.  Probably the outer portion of the limbs could be bending more so I reduced them.

[Prarie Bowyer]

The bow chrysaled because it's bending far too much into the handle on the right hand limb.
If your bows are chrysaling it's because the belly is being asked to take too much compression.
As mentioned before chrysals almost ALWAYS have a stiff spot between them and the tip.
I would suggest slowing down and not using a 50 grit drum....
Rasps/files/scrapers and sandpaper are your friends!
Ipe can take a hell of a lot of compression BUT ONLY in a bow that is well tillered - put it on the belly of a bow with hinges and it will chyrsal just like any other.

The first thing to do with a limb that has chyrsaled is to look tipward and remove the offending stiff section. DO NOT touch the chyrsal unless you are going to do a proper patch. If you just cut a small kerf and fill it then the CAUSE of the chyrsal is still there. Wrapping a chrysaled section of limb is going to do absolutely nothing other than hide your mistake....
Good luck.

Yea it's frustrating because it was looking pretty good.  Then I tackled the the twist and went to the final string.  I had it to 26-27" with no apparent problems and started scraping to clean up and getting it down to 28-29"  It was the trip to 29 that killed it.  I've already reduced the outer limbs and will be trying the saw kerf.  Mostly as a way to visualy fix the flaw.

[PEARL DRUMS]

Prarie try a few reflexed only or straight bows until you get it ironed out, then maybe head back to the R/D's and give it another whack. You have a reliable, solid combo.

[Cameroo]

Well I sgtart with a loose string then take it back to 29".  Shorten the string and work it back to 29".  By work it back I get under the bow on my knees and exercise it down with 20-30 pulls down to a screw set at my depth then I hook it over and step back to check the bend.  While bending I'm watching the limbs for areas of undue stress.

Then I move my screw down 2" and do it all over again.

I JUST made a tillering gizmo and that helped alot in the early tillering. 

When the string is short enought that I need to flex the bow to get it on (I use disposeable string and tie knots in it as I go) I tie up a real string for it.  then I work the bow down at a low brace height and try to eaven things up.  Then I twist the string to tighten it up and do it all over again.

I try to stop when the string brace height is about right and I can get back to 28"+1". 

I use a 50 grit grinding drum for the initial work and a card scraper when I get to the real string stages.  When it's where I like it I take it in and serve the string, add a nock point and such, oil the wood, shoot it with poly and make a handle wrap for it.

This advice may be unrelated, but it will definitely affect your tillering, which may be what is deceiving you.  When you're tillering, you want to get your bow to low brace as soon as possible.  If you are drawing the bow to 28 or 29" before getting to low brace, then either your tiller string is way too long, or you're just waiting to long to shorten it.  The tiller string initially should be just long enough to reach from knock to knock.  Then as soon as your limbs are moving enough to get it to low brace, shorten the string.  Tillering the bow out with a long string on it does nothing to show you the true forces that will be exerted on the limbs with a regular string.

I'm not sure what you are using for your disposable strings, but you may want to consider making an overly-long flemish string out of b-50 with a loop in one end, and an adjustable bowyers knot in the other.  Then you have one string that can be used on many bows.

[Prarie Bowyer]

It worked!  I was able to draw and shoot the bow.  I put it on the tree to look at the  limbs.  No problems were evident.  Had it at 28".  Decided I should reduce the outter thirds of the limbs for saftey sake and when I went to take it off the tillering stick that 1/4" extra draw  to get the string off the peg caused my most dramatic bow explosion.

I"m not working in a good place lately.  I'm screwing up alot of bows.  I'm gonig back to Hickory for a while.  Ipe is over rated or not for new bowyers.

[PEARL DRUMS]

Your designs are not for new bowyers. Ipe is wonderful wood. 

[Prarie Bowyer]

What is wrong with my designs?  they have all worked well in Hickory.  I wish I could quantify exactly what I am doing wrong.

I buy 3/4" thick Ipe and rip it in 1/2 after cutting my rough blanks out.  The edges of the board are radiused.  So that gives me 4 bendy handle bows (other wise there is a cove or I need to trim the radius of and waste wood.  I try to make up the difference in thickness for the draw weight I hope for in a core lamination of either maple or bamboo. 

Lately I'm trying to wrok fast and just get them done. figure things out so I can eliminate the discovery in the process and get close to final tiller and shape. 

On that one it was probably a recurve mroe than a R/D bow  becaue the tips were above the center at rest.  I figured some string follow woudl pull it back down.

I've had a few glue up problems with wood pulling down to my form despite my wedges and thoughtful rubber band placement.  I may need to make a dedicated form for these.  I hate those long flat parts in an otherwise curved limb.  Had rubbers break in the form and wind up with one recurved side and one barely reflexed side. 

Latest bendy handle recurve I got the tips out of alignmant at glue up and I shaved the belly to thin to start with.  I have generaly pretapered my belly to help get them in forms.  In the case of a recurve I need to cut the kerf also.  I was struggling to mark and saw along that radiused edge.  Bugger me. 

I can feel the emotional state from which the mistakes come from.. But as I work on more bows and will myself to come up with a great one.. it's like it fated to go wrong.

[PEARL DRUMS]

Here comes honesty. I remember your joining in around here and thats awesome! You chose a great hobby to start up. Your new and jumped right into tri-lam R/D bows before you ever learned to tiller or build a just a 'bow". Your design of chose is one thee toughest to tiller and glue up as shown by your above pics. Changing back to a more resilliant wood doesnt teach you anything about tillering or buildng, it just makes a poorly tillered bow not explode. Learn to build simple bows with reliable wood and expand upon that with bamboo, tri-lams, recurves and horn. Hopefully this doesnt come across as pompus or rude, truly not my intentions I swear. Your questions where clearly answered above and you want to blame the wood, thats simply not the case. Your talented and "get it", thats obvious. Slow her down a bit and let your skills catch up with your imagination. You will build kick azz tri lam recurves one day.