Sapling stave question

[Fred Arnold]

How do all of you that make sapling bows prep them for drying/curing. With staves I generally seal the ends, split, remove bark, and then seal the back. With a sapling how would it cure out if you seal the entire surface?

[BOWMAN53]

the osage sapling i made i was kinda force into reducing it to rough dimensions cuz it was starting to check pretty bad. id say get it to rough dimensions seal the back then strap it to a board belly up

[wizardgoat]

What kind of wood and whats the diameter? I leave the handle whole, and remove belly wood to the pith, depending on thickness. I leave the bark on my yew and ocean spray saps, but remove it on my vine maple, cuz it rarely checks.
seal the ends well, and seal the handle area extending through the fades about 5 inches, it WILL check through the handle

[Benedikt]

I built a few saplings yet!

I always removed the bark, sealed ends and back, and cutted out the widht, but doídnt touch the handle, so I always had a bit scope when the wodd disorts.

[George Tsoukalas]

Cut it. Seal the ends. Wait a week or so. Remove bark. Remove belly wood with hatchet and get it bending a few inches.

No sealing except for the ends is what I have done.

Jawge

[BOWMAN53]

quick someone add something totally different and confuse ole freddy lol. dont ya just love the variety of answers you get one here.

[PEARL DRUMS]

Cut it. Seal the ends. Wait a week or so. Remove bark. Remove belly wood with hatchet and get it bending a few inches.

No sealing except for the ends is what I have done.

Jawge

Same here.

[Pat B]

If 2" or bigger I saw in half with the bandsaw and bind the 2 halves back together with air spacers between the 2 halves. Seal the ends and leave the bark on. Be sure bugs don't get into the bark.

[dwardo]

Cant tell you how to do it but I can say how not too.
On stuff 3 inch across I have gotten away with splitting/sawing, bark on and working down over a few weeks and months, bit at a time with porous woods. With yew this has been a dramatic failure with sever belly checking from green.
My best quick reduction with yew has been to rough out to a bow shape in one hit, bark on the back until near dry.

My novice guess is that woods like yew just do not lose moisture as evenly causing checking. Most white woods being "porous" allow a faster acclimatisation to RH. Just my findings.

[Fred Arnold]

I cut 3 this morning and sealed the ends with TB III. All were between 1 1/2 to 2" in diameter.
With all of the advice I decided to experiment.

I soak sprayed with insecticide and ratchet strapped the elm sapling to a straight tree outdoors so that it should dry fairly straight without warping.

One of the black walnut I stripped the bark and cambium layers and moved it into my shop to dry as it sees fit and the second BW I left inside with the bark intact to remove in about a week.

I didn't feel any of them were large enough to warrant splitting with the band saw.

Thanks for all of the advice and I'll let you know how they look in about a week.

[DarkSoul]

Despite the variety of answers you've gotten, no-one recommended you to strip the bark and leave it round. No-one recommended you to dry the wood outdoors. Do what the others told you. You don't have to split them down the center with the band saw, but remove at least a third of the belly thickness, so you won't get drying checks in the back. This is especially important for the black walnut sapling where you removed the bark from. A round sapling with the bark removed WILL check badly very quick. Reduce it to near the pith to greatly reduce the chance of checks forming.
Drying outdoors is never good, especially in such unsheltered conditions. The sun might hit it, the rain will poor down on it, bugs consider it a free meal (despite the bug spray), and fungi are not bothered by bug spray. Move all three staves indoors (or a shed/garage), and remove some belly wood from all three of the saplings.

[Badly Bent]

For what its worth Fred I've cut more than a dozen black walnut staves in the last few years and removed the bark right away and split if big enough or hatchet to pith if small diameter after glueing the ends. No sealer on the back or
a coat of shellac on some and have not had a single check in any of them. Mind you all were cut in early to late spring
if that matters. Cut some 3" - 5" ones a few months ago and treated this way with no problem, I do keep them stored
indoors though in my mostly damp shop.

[Fred Arnold]

I'm not trying to ignore the suggestions given. What I'm trying to do is adapt different tecniques and approaches I've seen used along with slight variances on each stave. Here is a technique used on an old post that I had stored away in my favorites list.
 http://www.primitivearcher.com/smf/index.php?topic=9871.0