Originally posted by vick
<br />I never has that happen on an el grande, but if you nedd to you can borrow a tube till Mr Bill sends a replacement.
Those tubes are not the sturdiest items in the world..Fact is, I'm a bit surprised that more of them don't get squished in handling and end up in the shop a little elliptical??
The problem that I see with trying to reshape them is the following. You might get them back to nearly round....not quite but close enough to glue them in a blank and get them on a bushing for turning. But if the tubes were a few thousandths out of round, when you pressed in the nibs and couplers, the tubes would be forced to round and there might be some cracking of wood or stresses set up that would cause future cracking. I'm just sort of talking to myself, here. Never had a wood pen crack from a tight tube fit so I don't know how much movement a wooden barrel can tolerate. However, I have lost a couple of Corian barrels where the fit was tight so I'm real careful, now, to be sure they are a loose fit.
