osage cracks

[Catnapper]

Hey all, been a while since ive been on the site but i have a question. I have a 4 year old osage stave sitting in my garge that is 61" long and about 2" wide. After working it down to a single ring on the back i notice some hairline cracks on the side of the stave about mid limb. these cracks run vertically ( up and down the limb toward the nock end). they are about 1" long. will the bow likely break here? i can work it down to another ring but not sure if i will have enough wood for a stiff handle if i do that. i fill them with superglue so they wouldn't spread and they do not appear deep. i have had cracks on the back of an osage bow running along a limb that have not affected the bow but wasnt sure if the ones on the side would cause the bow to fail. thanks for any help!

[Catnapper]

by the way they do not appear to be running toward the back or the belly but parallel with the back and belly

[Eric Krewson]

Every bow I have attempted with a side cracked stave failed, every one.

Here is an extreme example; I had one small side crack in the handle of the stave I selected to make a sinew backed R/D osage bow out of. You know how it goes, " man what a pretty stave, that crack is in the handle, it won't be a problem", I talked myself in investing the time and effort into this complicated project.

Everything looked great until the sinew had a week or so drying, then the osage started delaminating. The cracks got longer and deeper until they encompassed most of each limb side to side.  I tried filling the  huge cracks with urac and clamping but that rescue attempt failed as well.

Here is one of the "smaller" cracks.



Bottom line, side cracked wood has never worked for me, hopefully others have had better experiences with it than I have.

[crooketarrow]

  Those are wethering cracks where the stave was'nt sealed and mosture excaped there more than other places.  Longer the crack the deeper it go's. I made a few bows with cracks most of the time you can elimitante them as you work the stave down.  IF THERE NOT TO BIG SUPER GLUE WORKS. But glue before you start beening your limbs.
   ERIC with a crack that long and deep I would'nt ever I temped it. You have to beable to judge the wood before you start.

[Pat B]

The side cracks are generally "wind shakes". They occure while the tree is growing. Like Eric said they aree usually a bad thing in bow wood. Can you get below those cracks. If so the stave should make a bow.

[George Tsoukalas]

Those are shakes or separations between rings or layers. They are probably done by the wind and the swaying of the tree. Jawge

[blackhawk]

If its 2" wide,I wood first reduce the width down to an 1 1/2" and they may go away,which wood be way easier than chasing more rings. That also could be a drying check,they do happen on the sides as well if it loses moisture to fast.

[DarkSoul]

Catnapper, could you try to go one or a few rings deeper into the wood, effectively removing those cracks? I don't know how much thickness you have to work with, but you don't need to use the first heartwood ring below the sapwood of osage. You can easily go deeper into the wood, if that means you'll lose the cracks.

[Buckeye Guy]

Wind shakes =85% crop failure and way to much stress for a youngster the rest of the time !!
Have fun
Guy

[BowEd]

I had a hairline one an1 and 1/2"s long.Filled it with super glue and it held but in the Bowyers Bible it talks of this and they called it a luminar crack where a growth ring delaminates[for whatever reason] and they called it fatal.Looking at yours I would say it is fatal and solutions to leave it on the floor sound like the solution if possible.

[Eric Krewson]

Crooketarrow, Like I stated in my first post, the crack in the picture is one that developed as the sinew dried. The only crack visible in the stave when I started was about a 1/4" side crack in the handle.

I am pretty good at judging osage having cut 30-40 trees and and prepared around 300 staves over the years.

[Catnapper]

Thanks for all the input... I was looking at the stave last night and I might have just enough to go Down a few more rings and still get a stiff riser section. Even though it's more work I would rather do that then spend many hours only to wind up with firewood!

[crooketarrow]

  I've cut dozzens,dozzens and dozzens on OSAGE TREES and have never seen cracking in live trees unless it's wind related where it's been damaged. AT LEAST THATS THE WAY IT IS IN WV. Those are drying cracks.
  ERIC
  Then you know that there's only one thing that cause a check like that. And if it came after you worked it down and put the sinew on. And it came after the stave IT was'nt seasoned enough. The sinew did'nt do it.
  If you've got 300 staves out of 30 or 40 tress they must have been huge trees or you saved everything you could have. I have over 100 staves and sold and traded over 200 to 250 staves. And it sure was'nt done with 30 or 40  trees. But ofcorse I only save # 1 staves. 

[Eric Krewson]

Holly Smoke! This thread had changed to a "my osage pile is bigger than your osage pile" thread.

I have cut between 30-40 trees by myself but most of my cutting has been a group effort. No telling how many trees my group of friends and I  have cut together, dividing the wood up later.  One time we cut for a month straight on 650 acres that was about to be turned into a golf course. At times we had as many as 5 guys working at once, almost every day. We saved everything, the good the bad and the ugly. I sure got sick of looking at osage after that outing but didn't want to bulldozers to get to the wood first .

Back to the topic;

Side cracks have been a harbinger of doom for me, don't care what caused them, when I see them, I make file handles out of that piece of osage instead of bows.


 

[tom sawyer]

Theres a lot of stress on the individual growth rings and when there is a weakness in the form of a crack for whatever reason, the growth ring on the back of the bow wants to pull free and slide over the growth ring inside it.  Sometimes that spring wood makes for a poor "glue line".

I've seen wind shakes in wood, a lot of times you'll see a little discoloration that makes the crack look a little red.  Those are probably just shakes that aren't recently developed though.  I suppose a side crack could develop from rapid drying if you shaped a green stave into final form.  Using seasoned wood, one wouldn't expect this.  I've also noticed that older trees seem to be a little more brittle and prone to this kind of delamination.  I like a nice 8-12" diameter tree for this reason.

I'll testify to Eric's extensive experience with hedge.  We all have our experiences and interpretations of results.  For my own part, I have the luxury of having wood available and so I throw down a blank when I see anything too funky show up.