lilac

[rkeltner]

I have gotten a hold of some lilac for boy building, pretty big pieces, at that. the larger is over 2 inches in diameter and over 6'6". the smaller is similar length and not much smaller than 2 ". the larger one has only a little bit of crookedness and should be easy to straighten with heat. the other will be more difficult but again, shouldn't be extremely hard. my reason for this post, is that I've heard that lilac,, while being a premo bow wood, has some special rules for building with it. soooo.....does anyone  have any experience with lilac, and does anyone have any good advice. [excluding sending it to you!!] 

[Marc St Louis]

I cut some many years ago and put it aside, whole and bark on, for awhile to dry out slowly.  When I went back to check them out, must of been at least a couple months later, every last one of them had split in a spiral.  Now I know it makes a great bow as I have seen and heard of people making bows out of some.  My understanding though is that you need to work it down to rough bow dimensions right away and that, supposedly, stops the splitting

[DuBois]

I have a few staves but have never worked one. The smaller ones that didn't check like crazy I wrapped in a tarp with bark on for a few days after sealing ends, then debarked and slathered with shellac and back in the tarp with a little loose to get a little air. Had a couple get mold this way though too so be careful of that. I clamped em to boards before the last time in the tarp and peeped daily (couldn't help it  )

I did end up with the biggest one I ever saw and it survived. over 4" diameter and about 7' long with a natural gul wing curviness that I am not sure what to do with yet so I will wait until I am more skilled.

That's about all I know. Good luck.

[DuBois]

Also, I didn't wrap the big one and it didn't check. Just slathered with shellac. Made me wonder if bigger check less?

[simson]

lilac is great bow wood, heavy and dense. Drying staves is a problem. It can split within 30 min after cutting the stve.
you should seal it at once, leave it in the bark and put it on a place where it can dry slowly. About 80% of mine lilac was propeller twist, hope you are lucky.

design: I would suggest deep ALB or ELB design and heavy weight bows. Or short flat bows (bendy handles) under 50"

[redhawk55]

I treat lilac like Marc has suggested.
Cut it, work it down to rough bow dimensions and fix it at a straight square timber.
Doing so I' ve never had any splitting.
I do so with all those smaller diameter easy cracking woods like blackthorn, hawthorn, euonymus.........
For the understanding of that treatment I learnt a lot reading the books of Mike Abbott: http://www.living-wood.co.uk/
Michael