I got the deflexed yew back to 70# @ 28" and took it roving on a scorching hot day. It felt punchy. One of the guys videoed me shooting it and I heard it creak... I inspected the back and couldn't see any lifting splinters, so next shot I pulled it a whisker more (maybe 29"? ... it was supposed to be 29" draw).. I thought, I'll hold it for a couple of secoBANG. It exploded whacking my right forearm in the process.
We collected the pieces and carried on round the rove... nearing the end my calf suddenly went into spasm and I slowly limped off to sit in the shade and play my harmonica (that's not a euphemism) until everyone finished. We then sat around chatting and enjoying a cool drink.
I think there were two problems whith the bow, a knot at the centre was much deeper than I suspected, but even if filled would probably have still failed. I suspect the real problem was the sapwood was too thin.
Being a small diametre stave (smallest in the upper limb) the back needed to be rounded to follow a ring, by flattening it a bit I left it V thin down the centre about 2mm. (see diagram).
To try and see if this theory is true I sawed some cross section through near the 2 main breaks. It seems there was plenty of sapwood at the grip, but it was thinner near the knot and at the other break... that's the problem with a stave , it's not nice and even so it's difficult to draw sound conclusions.
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