Back Chrysalling

[Cody Cantrell]

I have a osage self bow that I have been working on and I used dry heat and mineral oil to bend it into a reflex deflex profile.  On the back of the top limb about 2/3 of the way to the tip there is some very small chrysalling.  Has anyone had any experience with this.  Should I fear this bow coming apart on me?  Thanks for any help.

Cody

[Frenchymanny]

Hi Cody,

Can you post a picture?

F-Manny

[Pat B]

What you are calling chrysals are probably drying checks. Unless you have bent your bow backwards severely. Chrysals only appear on the belly because they are compression fractures.
   Generally speaking checks are not lethal to a bow unless they run off of the side. You can put some super glue in the checks and they should be OK. Pics will help with the diagnosis.   Pat

[Cody Cantrell]

Sorry no pics.  I put reflex into the bow with heat and ended up getting chrysals in one spot on the back.  They aren't drying checks.

[Pat B]

If you put chrysals in the back then the bow is dead in my opinion. By doing so you have violated the grain and when strained it will break at that spot.
   Pat

[buckeyebowhunter]

yea chrysalls suck, they happened on my first selfbow, and i didnt think much of them at the time but they continued to get worse as I kept shooting and then my bows back started to splinter. So there isnt much you can do its just one of those things

[Eric Krewson]

My primary osage bow started getting tiny back chrysals in several places two years ago. This is after 5 years of hard use and over 100K shots. I had never seen back chrysals before in any osage bow so it came as a surprise.

Here is the latest crop of back chrysals from this year.

 

I put a sinew wrap over the area and kept shooting. More appeared on the other limb so I wrapped them as well. When the third place showed this year I made myself another bow. My bows performance hasn't changed and I hate to make a wall hanger out of it so I am going to bamboo back it in the future.

Here is my patch.

   

[Frenchymanny]

Thanks Eric for the pictures. I have a question for you:
What are the specs of your bow?

F-Manny

[George Tsoukalas]

Those are cracks. I've had those on backs. Chrysals are compression fractures on the belly by definition. They go across the grain. Drying checks run with the grain. Usually on the belly. Cody, sounds like you got over zealous with the bending. You cracked it. We can't give you a fix unless we see it but a sinew wrapping seems appropriate. Jawge

[Eric Krewson]

The bow is 65"NTN, started out at 65#@25" but I have retillered it several times as I became a better bow maker, narrowed the tips and dropped poundage as I got older. It is 58#@25" now.

I call them chrysals George because they look so similar.

[Frenchymanny]

Thanks for the info Eric

[Dano]

This must be thin ringed stuff we're talkin about, Huh?

[Eric Krewson]

Mine is thick ringed, best osage I have ever used. The bow still does't have any string follow after all those arrows.

[Cody Cantrell]

Sorry for my abscence.  Thats what I was afraid of Pat, I believe what I have is chrysaling because of the induced reflex, I think George is right got a little over zealous with the bending.  Dano the ring count on this bow is 4-5 per inch.  Eric, that is a good fix.  I was wondering about a rawhide backing ?  A couple of years ago I watched Brad Merkel at MOJAM apply python skins and he said they were like rawhide and snakeskins rolled into one.  They are a little pricey so I was not sure if I should spend the money on it.  Thanks again.

[Dano]

Well, "over zealous" will get you every time.  :rolleyes:

[Pat B]

The problem with frets in the back is the grain is "broken" and therefore will separate when it goes into tension. That will cause the back to break. A sinew wrap should be enough support for the frets but I doubt that rawhide alone will. I've never dealt with frets in a bow back so my answers are only speculation.     Pat

[John Scifres]

Are they in the working limb?  How much did you bend it?

I've bent a bunch of osage and never had this problem except on extreme static recurves.  There's got to be something more going on here.

[Buz-AL]

Sinew it!  Of course, its sometimes hard to get sinew to stay down as it dries inside a reflexed bend.

Rawhide will just rip apart over a hingy spot. It'll hold splinters down, but won't have any effect on a hinge.

[Cody Cantrell]

John they are in the working limb, almost at the top of the working section.  
When I bent it I bent reflex in first.  I put about five inches of reflex in it.  Then I deflexed it so it ended up with about 2 inches of reflex left.

[John Scifres]

Wierd.  New one on me.  I'd be worried.  But, sinew is magic.