Glass Flaws Bug You?

[Swamp Yankee]

Originally posted by lpcjon2:
Flaws sometimes can not be helped, but pen marks like that drive me nuts! It could always be worse.

"pen marks"???  Not sure I know what that means.  I'm not particulary concerned about the barely visible streaks you see to the left of the original photo, but the cross grain white marks around the knot that may or may not be a glue/wood failure point.  Not that the bow will fail, it probably won't, but it is uglier than a routine surface scratch or ding to me.

[Brock]

your drawing on the picture to show the white marks...he was joking!  

If I pay top dollar for a very long wait...then yes I dont want them there but if it is a mark that I would NEVER notice unless shown by someone...then it is what it is.

I recently bought a brand new Robertson Fatal Styk from Dick that he reduced due to it having two of these really small marks like you would get on a fingernail.  It is clear glass over juniper so where the dark red is you can see it...took me two weeks to find the marks with casual search.

Until I read this thread I had not worried or thought about it since...and to be truthful never noticed or searched for them on any of my other bows I have bought new (Jeffery, Habu, Noble) as all my others were pre-owned.

To me, not a big deal...if I pay $1500 for bow and it has one or two that are very noticeable due to location or size....not going to make him do the bow over but may ask for a slight discount due to the imperfection.

They are hunting bows...not meant to be hung in the Smithsonian.  

[Swamp Yankee]

"your drawing on the picture to show the white marks...he was joking! "

Doi, woosh, right over my head with that one.  

[Blaino]

Yes! Some things in life just don't add up and this is one.  "We" put a man on the moon 40 some odd years ago but, they can't come up with truley CLEAR glass.....  

[zipper bowss]

Its not that they can not produce CLEAR glass.They can. Like Wingnut said, it's just that the clear glass market is very small and not worth their time or effort to make improvements. From what I was told. When the major producer of clear glass in the USA was asked about improving the quality of the clear glass the over all theme of the message was "Suck it up your lucky we make the stuff at all".
I have been told that the streaks happen when the powder that is on the fiberglass strands does not get completely blown off before it is layed up into the sheets.I took it as that powder was there to make the strands come off the spool better.    

And YES it bugs me too.All we can do is cull the stuff we can see and do the best we can with what is left.
Bill

[tzolk]

Wish I would have seen this thread before getting a Bocote lam bow from Dwyer. Fortunately there is only a small wiggle near a knot on the belly. Hardly visible. Otherwise he did a great job!

[LimBender]

Pretty lamination.  I already have some dings worse than that from hunting with my 10 month old Zipper.   I sometimes get called out for not taking the best care of my stuff, but I don't see it that way - I just use stuff for its intended purpose and stuff happens.

[Cyclic-Rivers]

I prefer to shoot my bow, not look at it!

If people are that torn up over Character, why do they get clear glass?   The marks all depend on the eye of the beholder but not on the be-shooter!

This is actually good to know, if I ever need another bow, I will just ask bowyers if they have limbs or bows with a lot of marks art a reduced price.

[Gen273]

I like a bow that is a Looker, but a small mark or two in no big deal to me.

[Alvey]

Originally posted by Leland:
I love a pretty bow too,but how it shoots matters more than how it looks.If it's just cosmetic don't let it get you down,they all get dinged up sooner or later.Just enjoy shooting the bow.
Leland

x2

[Alvey]

Originally posted by LimBender:
Pretty lamination.  I already have some dings worse than that from hunting with my 10 month old Zipper.   I sometimes get called out for not taking the best care of my stuff, but I don't see it that way - I just use stuff for its intended purpose and stuff happens.

 x2

[Flying Dutchman]

I hate it when that happens. It is not the bowyer, but the quality of the Gordons glass. Most of my bows have it. In the beginning they are not there, but sometimes they dissapear out of nothing. I also have one bow where the glass looks like it has hairline cracks about one ich long. The bowyer assured me it is just cosmetical. Still I don't like it, because it is not what we are paying for.

[LongStick64]

I hate it and admit it bugs me, but it's not anyone's fault, it's part of the bow.

[Bladepeek]

There's probably a simple answer to my question that I should be able to figure out, but wouldn't it be possible to put glass (clear, colored, carbon, whatever) over the core and then the fancy veneer over the glass?

Naturally it wouldn't be as durable, but with the veneers as thin as they are, it doesn't seem as though it would rob any measurable performance over having the glass on the outside of the veneer.

[S.C. Hunter]

The small ones don't really bother me as much as the big long streaks. I like for the wood to show on my bows but even then I prefer more of a dull finish. I also like the black or brown glass as well. I see some beautiful bows but would not drag some of those through the woods.

[xtrema312]

It does bother me, but I try not to let if bother me all that much.  The one with the most I have ever seen is my personal favorite bow.  It has some streaks and mars from use and a bunch of bubbles on the back of both limbs.  The veneers, I forget what they are, have a bunch of knots.  Those knots produced a bunch of white spots.  I have probably shot that bow 40,000 shots and 3/4 of those shots after the bubbles started to show up.  So far so good. One thing for sure, I will not have to worry about hunting it and will like not sell it due to how it looks and how much I have shot it.  Early on when I first owned it and some bubbles showed up, I thought about selling it.  I stuck with it because I figured it would be hard to sell with the glass flaws.  I am kind of glade now that it has it's flaws because that did keep me from selling it then, and I would never sell it now due to other reasons then the flaws.   I may get some skins on it one of these days to dress her back up again.

[Birdbow]

Yes it does. I have a real shooter that I'm considering camo dipping because of it.

I hate those spots but I know it just happens sometimes too.

Bisch

[xtrema312]

Originally posted by Swamp Yankee:
Am I the only one who gets really annoyed at visible flaws in clear glass like this?

 

Like that?  Not so much.  But like this, yes!    

[Buemaker]

Too bad good things sometimes do not last. Some years ago Bjorn Bengtson of Sweden produced the worlds best bow glass, absolutely clear. They do not produce it anymore, it was a little more expensive than Gordon's, I guess you can figure out what happened. Luckily I still have some of it. Bue--.