big bang

[Arrowind]

Keep making bows! I've always enjoyed seeing your other bows and have been inspired by your skill.


Besides bowling is not nearly as fun. 

[George Tsoukalas]

It happens. Start another. Jawge

[swamp monkey]

Looks like dry rot to me, Simpson.  I had some hickory a long time ago, do the same to me.  Looks exactly how I remember it.  Sorry for your losses.   

I agree the way these broke is a wood problem not a design problem.  You have my sincere condolences.  In my estimation it was not your fault, the wood had a flaw you could not detect until it was drawn repeatedly. 

Keep makin' 'em!

[Sidewinder]

Sorry for your loss, if its any encouragment I think it was failure of the wood probabley from being too dry. I'm far from a wood expert but after looking at those pictures I think it was poor material. Those delaminations look to me like the wood just gave up. Not that I want to make excuses for you cuz your a big boy and can handle your own explanations. I say just get back on the horse and "ride son ride". Danny

[trad bow]

I hate that for you. Probably to dry as the persimmon I am working on just separated this afternoon in about the same way. My moisture content on it went down to 2% according to my meter.

[Badly Bent]

Not what I would expect to see from any of your bows Simon, had to be a problem with the wood. Black locust?

[ksnow]

When I first started making bows, I was using cedar, in the form of fence rails.  The first 6 broke exaclty like that, now I know that wood was way too dry.  It sucks to have two in a row go, just jump back in and start a new one.  That breaking pic is awesome, even if it is heartbreaking.

Kyle

[missilemaster]

Sorry about that man, if nothing else, thats a cool full draw shot!

[Bryce]

Simson I feel your pain. Maybe a little more, the bow that blew up in my hands today not only whacked me on the head really good but it was a friends bow
Had a long history and who knows how many animals its taken..... I felt like the worst person.
Good story to tell though.

[k-hat]

Were they sister staves?  Interesting they both broke in the same fashion and the same place.  That leads me to think dry rot as well.  Had one do that to me as well.  Had it tillered out and almost shot in.  I could almost swear it was on shot 100 the thing just fell apart and folded in my hand as i approached full draw.  Stinks but keep building!

[coaster500]

Simpson I feel your pain

[Pappy]

Now that's a break. Dry rot or just to dry I would say.Sorry but it happens. 
   Pappy

[WoodMunkey157]

That wreckage is too much too much to bare!

With karma the way it is, the next 5-10 bows you make will be flawless...you've set yourself up for some success now!

[PatM]

 It's a shame that they  reached such a finished stage before blowing up. It looks like lower quality wood, particularly in the early growth and also too dry.
 There is no such thing as "dry rot" actually... unless you consider it as wet rot that has dried out. None of the decay factors for wood are active when the moisture is low enough to be considered dry.

[simson]

Fellas, thank you a lot for your nice words and searching for the reason of the blow-up.

After seeing the pics, I realized that the blow-pic was on the wrong place (it was not the first but the second bow). I edit the posting.

Yesterday I was in too excited to realize that I haven’t put in sufficient info about the bows /staves. Sorry for that, I will do it now:
Both bows are elm, I think you call it whych elm. The staves came out of a bunch of elm staves I have harvested 5 and 6 years ago, will say seasoned enough. Could not say if these two were sister staves, but could be. I have built several bows out these staves, the elm flat posted recently also came out of these. Both had no visible flaws, rawhide was in order too. Both were shot a few times and were on the tiller tree to do the force draw curve.

I have a hygrometer in my shop, which I will test if it says the truth. It always shows a relative humidity of 50-60%, I think this o. k.

After some thinking about the reason, my result is this is a way too extreme design for that draw weight and bow length. I have built it too narrow and too high crowned. This was over the limits for elm with drawweight of 74# (69” ntn) and 96# (74” ntn). But damned, they were elegant. I have loved the tiger camo from the first and the natural setback of the second.

Again, many thanks for your input here.

The first shock is over, time to look forward. I will try another two other bows out of that bunch, also aiming for higher drawweight elbs, but a little change in design. I think of a flatter D-profile with a wider back, or perhaps trapping and flat belly. Let’s see what happens …