Monday 5 March 2012

Knot Work

Once bitten twice shy.
The nasty knot near the tip of one limb has me worried.
The knot is going to be about half the width of the limb and I don't want to risk it snapping.
The belly is good and sound, I've drilled a small hole through into the pocket of black unsound wood in the core of the bow to help cleaning it out.*
I'm not too worried about the compression (belly side) but I don't want a big weak area in the sapwood which is waiting to snap.

A while back I patched the back of a Yew bow which had a tiny lift in the sapwood so I decided to use the same ploy (See 31st May 2011). By flattening the area with a rasp I can see the extent of the knot better and I can the fill it with yew dust and epoxy, drill and peg it and then finally overlay a sliver of sapwood about 3-4mm thick taken from an off cut of the same wood.
This should strengthen the back and give me confidence to make the tips of the bow a more usual profile rather than leaving a ton of excess wood which would make a pretty feature but rob the bow of speed.
You can see in the last pic, I haven't removed all the sapwood as this would create a discontinuity and a weak point. I've also flattened along to the pin knot on the left as I though I may as well patch over both. (I've taken off a little more since that pic)

*The hole through from the belly side also allows the epoxy and Yew dust to squeeze out as it's rammed in from the other side, this shows me that I've got it packed well in and avoids any air pockets.

PS. I posted my parcel today, The lady helping on the touch screen pressed 'Retail and Lottery'... clear as mud! She agreed the system was bonkers.

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