Argg, I am an idiot... I got this bamboo backed warbow with a couple cracks....

[Badger]

  I feel the way you do about bamboo, I tend to get a tad more speed out of them but doesn't seem worth the failure rate. I know a few guys who sell bows, the boo backed are the most popular but a lot of them are letting go somewhere between 1st shot and 500th shot.

[toomanyknots]

  I feel the way you do about bamboo, I tend to get a tad more speed out of them but doesn't seem worth the failure rate. I know a few guys who sell bows, the boo backed are the most popular but a lot of them are letting go somewhere between 1st shot and 500th shot.

It's just a lot of work to put into something to have random failures for seemingly no reason I can see.  I mean with this bow I might of been asking for it, but with good hickory I would figure it would of lived. The bow finally failed by the way. I had it out to 102# @ 29". Pulled it to 30" (on my pulley assisted tiller tree) and I heard a crack, got scared and let go of the whole thing, haha. The patch at least held the bow together. If cracked lengthwise from the patch leading down the limb. When I took the patch off, I could see it was cracked pretty bad. With the shorter length I think I could of called it done at 28", and should of, but than it probably would of went latter on anyway. And it seems dumb to make that heavy a draw weight bow with a normal 28" draw length. This is the second warbow I have killed in a row. The first was basically the same trilam woods as this one, but with a jatoba belly. Which, as ADB kindly let me know before hand that it was going to do, , it chrysaled really badly.

EDIT: And I broke my darned scale too when I let the pulley go, now I gotta buy a new one of those...   

[adb]

  I feel the way you do about bamboo, I tend to get a tad more speed out of them but doesn't seem worth the failure rate. I know a few guys who sell bows, the boo backed are the most popular but a lot of them are letting go somewhere between 1st shot and 500th shot.

I've completely stopped using bamboo, and haven't for a few years. Too unpredictable.

[toomanyknots]

back it and shoot it!

I was thinking I could of sanded the boo off and re-backed with maple or something, but then I would have to re-nock, maybe re-tiller... alas, I am lazy. 

[mikekeswick]

Very interesting to hear about the failures.
I've never had a problem with bamboo apart from it checking sometimes when put in a heat box to cure glues. Although that was my fault for using it when it had too high a moisture content.