'New'? Knot Filling Trick

[Del the cat]

I expect someone has done this before, but maybe not documented it.
I'd been wanting to try it for ages, I'm doing a longbow and there are a fair few nots to plug.
An ordinary plug looks a bit obvious with straight grain going across it, so I used a small branch of Yew to make a plug from the heart wood with it's natural circular grain. The plug looks just like the original not, but it is clean and solid, where the original had a black powdery layer all round it, so it wasn't solid with the parent wood.
I cleaned up the area around it to show it off... the bow is still a long way from finished.
The pic shows the plug and the small branch it was filed from.
Sorry if this is already well known trick
The knot goes in towards the sapwood an makes it bulge, but had almost grown over leaving just a tiny hole showing. I cleaned out the hole to sound wood and loaded it with yew dust/epoxy mix, so that when I pushed in the plug it filled any voids and oozed out of the small hole in the sapwood.
Del

[Newindian]

Even if it is well known you just taught it to all us new Bowerys

[Holten101]

Its new to me.-)....awsome trick

Cheers

[dragonman]

good idea....very smart..

[Badly Bent]

Nicely done Del, that looks like it belongs there. Makes sense to me but probably would not have thought of it myself, cool beans.
Greg

[Holten101]

The technique also allows for the awsome opportunity to repair a knot, within a knot, within a knot;-)

Cheers

[druid]

I didn't know this. I never repair these things but it is good to know. Thank you Del! 

[JW_Halverson]

An amazingly obvious solution....once someone has shown it to me!  My hindsight certainly does not need glasses.

Another added benefit:  it's more aesthetically pleasing than the straight grain plugs, too.

[dmenzies1950]

I've been building bows for a long time and never thought of that! Man that looks good! Thanks for sharing that with the rest of us. I'm sure I'll try it next time I have a loose knot!   Dale

[PaulN/KS]

Ryan Yoon, a very talented young bowyer, made some tapered osage plugs to patch the knot holes in a cedar bow that he made at Mojam this summer. The contrast looked pretty cool...
Del's version looks great too, you have to look pretty close to see that it's a patch.
Nice job!

[Del the cat]

An amazingly obvious solution....once someone has shown it to me!  My hindsight certainly does not need glasses.

Another added benefit:  it's more aesthetically pleasing than the straight grain plugs, too.

It's the aesthetics that I was really after as some of my bows have so many plugs they look like my grandmothers patchwork quilt
I love those simple obvious things that make you wonder why you never tried it before.
Del

[Bowman]

This is a very smart solution. I have a yew stave that maybee need things in that way. Very clean and aesthetically. 

[simson]

super idea! that looks very natural. I would be careful when the hole/plug goes that deep (into sapwood). IMO a plug can handle pressure forces, but not tension forces.

thanks for sharing the idea

simson

[Del the cat]

super idea! that looks very natural. I would be careful when the hole/plug goes that deep (into sapwood). IMO a plug can handle pressure forces, but not tension forces.

thanks for sharing the idea

simson

Yes indeed, I was careful not to remove any of the sapwood.
Del

[turtle]

Great idea. Guess i was never smart enough to think of sticking a knot into a knothole.