water curing wood

[JW_Halverson]

None the less, both are "bowed".   


BOOM.

dropping the mike as I leave the stage

[Aaron H]

None the less, both are "bowed".   


BOOM.

dropping the mike as I leave the stage

As he walked off the stage, no one said a word.  All you could hear was the sound of disappointment. 

[Badger]

  The only thing that bow and violens have in common that I can think of is that they both like low histerisis wood. The only problem is that most low histerisis woods also tend to chrysal.

[E. Jensen]

What is histerisis wood?

[Drewster]

joachimM, interesting articles you attached to your post.  The "Wood Conservation" article states "In anaerobic waterlogged environments, however, wood undergoes profound chemical changes and alterations that result in a significant loss of strength while retaining overall shape and form."  It doesn't state how long this "significant loss of strength" takes to happen.  Do you have any research data on the time line for these changes to take place? 

If it starts to take place fairly quickly, then water curing wood seems like a highly undesirable process.  Anything that weakens wood is not good for a bow from my point of view.  Perhaps some of the chemical and physical changes that take place in this process do help the resonance of wood which is so highly desirable in a violin, but I still haven't seen any evidence that this "curing process" will help a bow preform better.

It does make sense that storing a log or stave under water could delay shrinkage and checking of the wood until you have time to properly process and dry the wood.  Beyond that, I don't see much advantage.

[bubbles]

Could it have possibly been a technique to help get the bark off of a stubborn stave?

[JW_Halverson]

What is histerisis wood?

Hysteresis (in bowmaking) is internet friction within the wood that explains the difference between the energy necessary to draw back the limb versus the slightly lower amount of energy it returns when released.  Best example of this ever was exhibited by hanging a known weight from a rubber band.  Measure the length of stretch and write it down.  Now hang another known weight and measure again.  When you remove that second weight and measure the amount of return, you see that the second measurement is greater than the first.  The rubber band did not return to the exact length as before it was stretched.  That is due to elastic hysteresis.  The entry on Wikipedia for hysteresis explains it better than me, but just for starters a shorthand explanation is "internal friction in the wood that robs you of a portion of the energy stored". 

[JW_Halverson]

....as opposed to hysteric, which I tend to become as I get close to a deadline for a bow trade.

[Pappy]

Deep/real deep.
   Pappy

[Aaron H]

Internet friction?   

[JW_Halverson]

Internet friction?   

That's in the knapping posts.

[Dakota Kid]

I have no idea if what I am about to say translates to wood curing/ drying or not, but they are both plants and are made of the same types of cells more or less so I suspect it does.

I water cure certain medicinal herbs and teas for multiple reasons. First it will remove water soluble materials that would remain trapped if simply dried. Sometimes this is necessary for taste and other times essential for survival/ health reasons. The second reason is that after soaking in water(that is changed daily for 3-5 days), the controlled dry time afterwards is reduced to a few hours from it's normal 5-7 days. The reason most likely that plain/pure water evaporates faster than water full of dissolved material. This only works on herbs and plants who's desired chemicals/substances are not water soluble. Otherwise, you flush out the good part.

If water curing had any advantages to primitive man, I suspect it's the reduction of dry time. Transporting and caring for staves would have been burdensome, especially if we're taking nomadic cultures. Plus if one is in desperate need of a bow, waiting a year is not an option. I've actually noticed this quick dry phenomenon before with drift wood. A piece of completely water logged wood washes ashore and is dry a few days or a week later without much checking. I've been meaning to try water curing a stave and I may have just been motivated by this thread. 

[JW_Halverson]

How many bows are made of drift wood?  The Inuit were forced to use it, lacking a whole lotta anything treelike in their environs. Even they ended up using all kinds of engineering miracles in order to get a reasonable shooting bow from it. 

[wapiti1997]

I suppose that hiding staves in water would keep the enemy from finding them and keep the bugs off of them so you could bring them out in the winter when the bugs were dormant..

I know wood sure looks different that has been under water for 30-40 years..

[Dakota Kid]

How many bows are made of drift wood?  The Inuit were forced to use it, lacking a whole lotta anything treelike in their environs. Even they ended up using all kinds of engineering miracles in order to get a reasonable shooting bow from it.

It's a far cry from a piece of naturally occurring drift wood to a fresh cut stave that was carefully cured in water. I would imagine most driftwood was standing dead wood for quite some time before it made it's way to the lake. I wasn't suggesting using driftwood to make bows, I was simply using it as an example of how quickly wood dries after some of the starches, sugars, and waxes are removed. I am going to keep my eye out for a piece that may be bow worthy. I haven't noticed any yet, but old driftwood root clusters certainly have amazing figure once they are squared off and sanded. The make really nice knife scales. The major drawback of driftwood is it's really hard to identify what species of tree it was with no bark or leaves attached.