Recurve Repair

[ShorterJ]

I was originally going to ask for tiller opinions, but while taking pictures of my bow I broke it.  The string comes in contact with the recurve at brace.  I noticed the string was not completely centered where it contacts the belly, so I pushed it over with my thumb.  Doing so caused the string to slip off and flip around to the back of the bow.  This pulled the recurve down and cracked it on the belly.  I pushed open the crack some, and filled it with super glue and held it back together.  I also plan to wrap around it.  This is a static recurve so the tips are thick and do not bend.  Since the tips are thick/not bending plus it cracked from bending in the opposite direction, do you guys think this will hold?  Has anyone had experience with this type of break?  I figured it may be different than most cracks since it didn’t crack from drawing the bow but instead cracked from bending in the opposite direction.  Shouldn’t this mean when drawing the bow it will pull the crack back into place rather than opening the crack up deeper?
HT Hickory~62”ntn
56#@28”

[Hamish]

I've never seen that type of damage before. Super glueing the crack and a thread binding where it lifts should make it safe and functional.

Eric is a master regarding tip repairs. I bet he could come up with something that would make the repair nigh on invisible, so you'd never know there was a crack.. Hopefully he will chime in soon.

[bownarra]

I wouldn't have used CA in this instance but your fix should work. I would use a quality epoxy. Tiller it without wrapping it. Wrap it afterwards if it makes you feel better! But good glue would be stronger than the wood in this scenario.

[ShorterJ]

I agree with you on the strength of epoxy.  I used superglue because it was the only thing I could think of that would run down deep into the crack.  I’m not aware of any epoxy that has a runny, watery texture like that?

[Eric Krewson]

You can take off the damaged wood and glue on a long overlay from the tip past the break, this is a real pain to do because you have to bend the overlay to perfectly match your limb.

I replaced a cracked limb tip this way but wouldn't want to do it again.

[ShorterJ]

I never had the desire to go that route, but it looks like you were very successful. Beautiful result!

[Eric Krewson]

This was a bow I made for one of the top lady shooters in the country who was also a great friend, the bow was special to her, she broke the tip stringing the bow improperly. Because she loved the bow so much, I told her I would try to fix it. After the fix she won several years in a row with the bow at the nationals at Cloverdale. My fix gave up the ghost a few years and tens of thousands of shots later.

What I started with and Julia with her bow;

[ShorterJ]

Very impressive! Do you remember how you fixed it?

[Eric Krewson]

The pictures above of me bending overlays are of this formerly broken tip bow and how I fixed it.

[superdav95]

That’s very cool Eric.  Is that Osage laminations on either side of orig bow wood?

[bownarra]

If you were going the lam route better to use thinner lams.
Really no po9int to doing all that though. If you glued it back together then ground a 1/16th or so off the belly side then added a thin lam (that would conform to the recurve, not so thick you have to try and heat  bend it the same as the recurve) you would have a bombproof repair.
As for thin epoxy, you would simply heat it up gently. It will then flow.

[Eric Krewson]

The broken bow was osage as are all the parts I used to fix it.

[Marc St Louis]

Looks like that was done using dry heat on the recurve.  Crazy glue and clamp will fix it