Those "laugh VERY hard at yourself, or go crazy" errors

[DogVilleDane]

You guys probably know them - the errors we sometime makes, were you either laugh VERY hard at yourself, smack yourself in the head, or SERIOUSLY starts thinking about why you EVER started building bows and arrows *LOL* ... Yup - that's the ones!    

Well, I just made another one of those about 45 minutes ago.

I had just taken a new BBI down from the form, and because all the glue-clamps were also placed on the same table, the only place to put the glued bow was partly on the shut-off belt-sander, and partly on another table. Made no difference, I needed to use the beltsander to remove the rest of the glue, and  align the Ipe and Boo anyway, so the bow was in the correct part of the room.

I just needed to work a little on some arrows before going further with the new bow, so I finished that, and the last little piece of work on those arrows were matching them precisely in length. One of the arrows was about 1/4 inch longer than the other arrows - but "No problem, I will just use the Disc-Sander on the side of my beltsander, and get that length the same as the other arrows in a couple of seconds...

Yup, you guessed it - I thought it strange that the beltsander sounded like when I sand down a piece of wood when I turned it on ?!? ... and about 3 seconds later, I saw the new bow still sitting partly on the table, and partly on the (now turned on) beltsander    

One very fast reaction later, and the result was "only" a groove about 1mm thick, and 1,2 cm. long across the belly of one of the limbs, where the beltsander had supported the new bow.  Unfortunately in the inner to mid part of the limb,  it is still to be seen, if this new bow is salvageable    

This is right up along with the first time I followed Sam Harpers buildalong for a BBI, including wrapping the bow in Saran wrap before clamping the bow to the form.

It all looked real good standing there on the table. I did not have a Heat-box, but that did not matter, as I had substituted the Smooth On glue with TBII, and TBII did not need heat to dry...

...After 24 hours wondering why that stuff did not dry, I suddenly became very quiet, and just started laughing VERY loud and VERY long! ...

Lesson learned from this: Glue that needs contact with the air to dry, should NOT be wrapped in Saran  

[Loren Holland]

DogVilleDane,
I wrap in saran wrap and use TBIII all the time. the glue that runs out of your joint that you are seeing doesn't have to be dry, you are going to scrape that off anyways and then clean it up with the sander.  the glue that is between the joints, is not exposed to any more air than that under the wrap and it drys. its the glue in the joint that matters, the rest doesn't dry as fast because it comes out in globs and its the amount of glue that keeps it from drying as fast. If you wait 24 hours before stressing the joint, then clean it up on the sander, you will be fine.  its whole lot less messy with saran wrap.

BTW, my worst Oh Crap moment was cutting one limb of a stave for the back to face one way, and then when i was finished cutting the profile of the other limb i noticed that i cut it to backwards of the first one

[DCM]

Cut the site window on the wrong side, my first takedown glass bow project.  And I'd spent hours and hours trying to get the limb bolt alignment pins just perfect.  Glued that mother back in with Urac, luckily I'd made a nice clean cut.  It fit back together with no more than a nice glue line, for Urac.  Didn't cut it quite as close to center as I might have.  Haven't had a problem with it, but don't shoot it much anymore.

You can patch a nice clean gouge like that.  Just fashion a piece of same density wood, don't fit it too tight, Urac likes a little glue line one of these, and more likely she'll be a-ok.  But if you are like me, I leave a core fairly generous, you will probably tiller that gouge out anyway.

[Hermann From Bavaria]

once a day i grinded a dowel for boo arrows nock insert on the belt sander. one hand turning the dowel, the oter hand pushing the dowel flat on belt. suddenly the dowel flew through my shop, the pushing hand keeps pushing - on the new, sharp, running belt...
after the pain fade away, i thougt: "how dumb a man can be?"

greets

[walkabout]

glued some snakeskin accents on a bow,without first trimming back the burlap that was underneath.needless to say that was a serious pain to fix. ive fixed trade points to the wrong end of wild rose arrow shafts,superglued a floppy rest upside down on a handle... the list continues.

[Joey V.]

My oh crap moment was I didn't put a plastic wrap barrier between my laminated limb and my form.  Cooked it for 5 hours and I ruined both the limb and the form...  Live and learn.

[jess stuart]

Several years ago a buddy wanted build a bow if I would help.  I said of course, we decided on a one piece recurve, and ordered the glass and lams.  He came over one Saturday and we glued it up.  The next day when we pulled it out of the oven we realized we had put in a taper with the thick end towards the tip.  We went ahead and ground the limbs to shape and put a string on it, talk about a weird profile.  Rather than throw it away we roughed up the glass and glued another piece of glass to it and tillered it by sanding the thickness of the glass.  Turned out to be a good shooter, and sure beat throwing it in the trash.

[Jason Scott]

I seem to often forget to put the tape on the smooth side of my fiberglass until I have already started spreading the smooth-on. It's tricky putting tape on a piece of glass that has glue on the rough side.

[DogVilleDane]

Keep em' coming Gent's - I am very happy, that I am not the only one doing those things          

Loren - Hmmm, wonder if there exist such a thing as an S bow?

DCM - I too have a bow laying in the workshop with the handle on the right (wrong) side :-) ... I was just fast to think that it was a nice gift for a left handed person, so I avoided putting it on my Dooooh-list *S* ...

Hermann - I can assure you, that you are NOT the only one, who has had intimate contact with the business part of the BeltSander...My indexfinger, my thumb, my ... (The list goes on and on, even my wedding ring is in serious need of a makeover *LOL*)

Walkabout - I think the only error I have not made yet, is sanding the footed end of the shaft as it it vere to fit the Nock, but I am SURE that it is just waiting to happen *S* :-) ...

Joey - Ouch, that gotta have hurt, I succeded in removing the block I had used as support on the Bowform (BBI), from the bowblank it was otherwise securely glued on to! (If it just would have fitted as a handle, but NO such luck - too narrow!)

Jess - Impressive, the trademark of a TRUE bowyer!! ..

Jason - He-he, I could imagine the difficulty trying to keep Tape and a Glued piece of fiberglass from eachother!

Keep em coming! :-) ...

[red hill]

Spent two days after glueing up a couple of osage billets rasping the limbs to profile.  Once I thought it was ready to floor tiller I became over anxious and applied pressure to see if there was any bend, SNAP! One limb broke completely across.