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I recently had similar blowout on some lacewood. I set up my pipe bender, and unbent it to close the blowout, then glued it with CA. After the CA cured, I used the pipe bender to complete the bending, and it came out fine. With hand bending you can feel what is happening with the wood, and difficult woods will bend much easier.

Al

I'd say that you were bending too cool, I usually run my mahogany up at about 300degF.

Colin

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I don't believe in anything, I simply make use of a set of reasonable working hypotheses.

Ditto what Colin said Todd! I had a good bend at 310F...

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http://www.presnallguitars.com

Looks like a lot of runout too...but my guess would be the heat being too low also.

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"I want to know what kind of pickups Vince Gill uses in his Tele, because if I had those, as good of a player as I am, I'm sure I could make it sound like that.
Only badly."

    The wet kraft paper method will eliminate this. If you are too dry and not hot enough you will potato chip the grain
john hall

Although I don't have as much experiance as the others I would agree that the temp should be a bit higher.I bend mahog. at 300.

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Anderson Guitars
Clearwater,Fl. 33755

    When I bend mahogany I too like more heat. You can take this to 350 without scorching. Let the heat penetrate for a few minutes, keep the wood damp till it is bent and I think you will be okay.

Honduras mahogany can drive you nuts. Some pieces bend great, and others just don't.

I just bent a set of Cuban, which is even worse, and found that doing it in stages really helped. I pre-bent it partway by hand, and let it sit for a day or so before putting it in the machine. The 'up' side went fine, and I had only a little trouble on the cutaway, which I bend by hand anyway.

Todd, a possibly comforting thought--you now have several "top" pieces for a run of all-mahogany guitars.

Steve

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From Nacogdoches...the oldest town in Texas.

http://www.stephenkinnaird.com

Might as well be honest--I have no idea what to do for a mahog topped guitar. The only hardwood topped guitars I've built were Koa, and I pretty much treated those like spruce. But that was because they weren't as stiff as a good piece of spruce. I suggest testing your mahogany for stiffness... then take an educated guess.

Steve

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From Nacogdoches...the oldest town in Texas.

http://www.stephenkinnaird.com

One thing that can help reduce the guesswork is Dave Hurd's 'Left Brain Lutherie'. He goes through the subject of deflection testing in exhaustive detail. He does give some numbers that might help indicate what you should see, but, more importantly, he tells you how to figure out what will work for you by finding your own data, either measuring your own or somebody else's guitars. Some of it is a heavy slog, but I think it's worth it.