osage "delaminates" between ring lines

[troutremble]

I roughed out a bow from a lower quality stave to get some practice before I started on my better ones. Then I made a great little 40# bow from a sliver of this same stave which several of you gave advice/comments on. The success with the sliver led me to try and finish the original I had roughed out. Despite being carefull a hinge developed in one limb. I tried to fix by removing wood everywhere but the hinge but it seemed to only get worse until finally "delaminating" between ring lines mid limb for about 6" and the limb folded like cardboard. I suspect there was just a weak spot there, I'm still learning but don't think I really did anything wrong. On to the next one I suppose, was told awhile back I'd never get good at this if I was scared of breaking stuff.

[razorback]

sounds like a good learning experience. I am working a stave that is marginal and has some lamination issues. I'm hping to get a bow out of it but am not to confident of a bow. I am confident that I will learn a lot from it.

[Eric Krewson]

In my experience, osage with side cracks will fail every time. I have seen these cracks in a dried stave, roughed out a bow and completely cut away the bad wood only to have it return in a finished bow. Any osage staves I see now with side cracks becomes firewood no matter how good the rest of a stave appears.

[Paul/KS]

Yep,
Osage staves tend to hide surprises...
Not all of them good. Better luck next try.

[bigcountry]

wonder if sinew wrapping a a place like that would help.  I know it would make tillering closer to immpossible.