Not again! I'm done with BBI

[Monkey Wrench]

Ugh.  Been burning the midnight oil on this bow, and it was going much better.  I had it tillered to about 45lbs at 28".  Then...well...

    http://i919.photobucket.com/albums/ad35/MonkeyWrench2010/ipefailure002.jpg

    http://i919.photobucket.com/albums/ad35/MonkeyWrench2010/ipefailure003.jpg


  Please resize pics to 600 pixels or less.  Sorry to hear about the bow.

[Monkey Wrench]

Compression failure.  Anyone tell me what I did to cause this?  The tiller was the best I've ever done, and I was zeroing in on the final weight.  I'm actually too depressed about it to be upset.

[don s]

that sucks. from the picture ,your limb looks perfect. that is, it doesn't look as though it has any flaws. i don't know what to tell you as to what could have went wrong. i would be sick too. i feel bad for you. don

[StoneAK]

Man That sucks badly I hate seeing this because I love using Ipe. Do you have any of the tiller pics or whole bow pics?

[Pat B]

One of the last hickory backed ipe bows I made fretted just like that, deep and long. It was a 68" longbow that was 1" at the widest, rectangle cross section and even tiller. It fretted all the way through the ipe and almost all the way across. I think I'll stick with selfbows! d;^)

[evildocrsx]

It's kinda hard to see, but maybe you left your bamboo to thick maybe?

[Diamondback59]

im hear ya pat i my self am stickin with my yew,juniper, osage, hhb and maulberry forget the rest every dang boo iv made iv had plms with so no more brock

[John Scifres]

I remember about 10 years ago when I first heard of BBI, there were very similar discussions as I am hearing all across the Bowyer's Bench.  It scared me away from trying back then.  But I know people make bows from it.  Good luck on the next one, whatever wood it is.

[fujimo]

still fixable- doesnt look like the back has been damaged.
check out 4ests save on his recent bow- thats what i would try. seems a pity when you have put in so much work already.
really sorry chap.

[Monkey Wrench]

Sticks, sorry about the pixel size thing.  I assumed since they posted they were the right size, I'll fix them today.

[canopyboy]

Ouch.  That picture looks way too familiar.  Don't know if you've seen the good bad and ugly thread for ipe, but I've drilled mine out and added a bamboo back to try and save it.

As for using ipe again, jury is still out.

[NTD]

All these failures make me wonder if you guys might be getting something that's not actually Ipe...

[Sal]

That's a really ugly fold, more than a fret. I doubt that even pine would fret that bad.  I'm puzzled.  

I've made several ipe bows, ipe is good.  Perhaps its a flaw in the wood, but I'm really puzzled.

[Monkey Wrench]

It had to be a flaw in the wood.  Not that I'm a great bowyer or anything, but it is easy to tell a pretty good tiller from a crappy one.  Lord knows I've seen plenty of crappy ones coming from my garage...lol.  This one was spot on though, or at least as good as I'm going to be able to do it.

[SEMO_HUNTER]

You didn't happen to get your Ipe from the same place as Canopy Boy did ya?
Seriously, cause that could have been a bad run with lousy material? Just a thought.

If your tiller was good the only thing that would appear to have caused that was a flaw in the wood itself and nothing that you did wrong. CB went through two bow builds with that type of failure before he realized that it was a flaw in the material and not him that caused it.

Sorry for your loss, I know the feeling but haven't had the Ipe fail on me yet........knock on wood!    

[Roy from Pa]

Not sure if it would make a difference, but why do you leave the sides of the bow limbs square? I put facets on the back and belly sides of my wooden bows. However looking at the pictures, there seems to be a different color variation or pattern just to the right of the crack.

[SEMO_HUNTER]

Good eye Roybert and a good point. I round my edges a bit more than the pic shows, I was told when I first started building bows that a round edge is much stronger than a straight/square edge. Gives it less chance of pulling up a splinter and I try to smooth that round edge down till it's smooth like butter sometimes down to a 400-600 grit.

[Bowjunkie]

It looks like there was an inclusion in the wood right there running across the limb. Just to the right of the fracture, right up against it practically, there appears to be the remnants of some type of pin knot, change in grain, or something similar running across the width of the limb.

That's the risk you run with quartersawn wood. Any little flaws like that will run the width of the limb and are ultimately 'more fatal'.

Utilizing such a piece with a totally flat belly/rectangular cross section seals the deal.

My guess is, this inclusion would have been much less a factor, you'd have likely never known it was there, if the piece was rift sawn and the bow's belly was fully radiused.

[bigcountry]

I heard horror stories like this when I built my first one.  I think much of it has to do with the IPE.  I ended up trapping the limbs to give the belly alot of wood.  

The folks I see with alot of frets usually have rounded belly.

Sorry to hear it.  Get back on that horse.  Your a good bowyer.

[Adam Keiper]

That type of failure seems indicative of a pin knot running across the bow, but I can't discern one in your pics.  Then again, ipe seems to have peculiar failures.

I've built 2 BBI bows; a r/d bow and an ELB.  Both developed weird grain separations (not chyrsals) on the belly during final tiller/shoot in.  I had just a couple of very miniscule ones on the r/d bow, which is still shooting.  But the separations were much deeper and extended all up and down the limbs on the ELB.  I initially tried some belly patches, but more showed up so I decided to quit throwing good time in after bad and abandoned it.  I've never seen such a thing with other woods, and I have no plans to use ipe again.  I won't miss using it either as I've never encountered a wood that seemed so splintery and impaled my hands and fingers with so many needle like shards.