Koa Side Fiasco

[Jason Lawson]

I'm really not sure what to do here. I bought a set of koa b&s shipped directly from hawaii and it obviously must have been pretty humid where it was shipped from, as the Koa immediately started cupping in my dry Minnesota 40% RH basement. I figured I would just let it sit for a few weeks before working with it to let it acclimate and whatnot and it would be good to go, but I guess I was wrong. I bent the sides and everything seemed to be going just fine until I took the second side out of the bender. It broke right along the lower bout as I was taking it out and I wasn't thinking and hastily CA'd it back together as it was a pretty clean break. The break would be pretty hard to see if it weren't for all the CA I used. The first side had no cracks in it when it came out of the bender, but I have had them clamped in the mold for a week now and a couple of other cracks have started to open up on both sides. My only thought was to reinforce the sides and then inlay some sort of motif into the lower bout area of the sides where all the cracks are, but I have no idea what to inlay. Is this potentially a good idea or should I scrap it and start all over with a new set of sides? This is some extremely beautiful koa and I don't want to just toss them, but I don't know how crazy I am about doing a lot of inlay in the sides, let alone what to do that will look classy and as if it were planned. Also, I am planning on keeping the sides in the mold for a couple weeks with a humidifier blasting to try to get some moisture back into the wood, but I'm worried that the wood will not recover from the brittle state it is in. I have previously bent Black acacia with the same amount of figure with zero problems. Does anyone have any ideas or advice about this? Thanks in advance.

[Mark Swanson]

I think it's salvageable. I'd fill those little splits with matching dust, and when you sand the CA glue what is left will mostly go away under the finish. It'll be hard to notice anything with all that crazy grain.

[Michael Lewis]

Mark is right, as usual. Also, some reinforcement on the inside before closing up the box is appropriate.

I use a outside form for assembling bodies, and for things like this I use a heat blanket and two sheets of stainless, make a sandwich (from the outside, metal, wood, blanket, metal) and with appropriate blocks, sticks, or pieces of wood as clamping cauls force the sandwich against the body form once it is all up to heat, and let it cook for a few minutes. I use big C clamps and reef them down pretty tight . This forces the wood into a very smooth bend, closes most feathering and some cracks, and eliminates any ripple across the sides.

Make careful notes of where the open places are so you can find them when you remove the sides from the body form. I suggest hot hide glue to do the repairs, put a bit of waxed paper over them, and clamp the sides into the form again with at least a metal sheet on the outside surface. The results will probably amaze you when you remove the side the next day.

Remember that hide glue will show less than other glues when under finish.