If your desire is to make a wood bow, you are going to need some tools. This article will deal with the tools used in the making of natural-wood onepiece bows (not backed, laminated, or board bows). I will reference Osage a lot in this article because I use it a lot, but the principals of tool use work for all the woods, whether whitewood or yellow. I once competed in a contest where the only tool one could use to fashion a bow, from start to finish, was a hatchet. This included acquiring the wood, cutting it to shape, tillering the limbs, and even cutting in the nocks. It took me approximately nine hours to make my bow using the hatchet (for the record, my bow came in third out of nine submitted in that particular event). However, if you aren’t interested in going quite that primitive and want to be able to make a few bows, I suggest getting several specific bow making tools which will make your job much easier.

A selection of draw knives: the one on top, the Sorby, is the author's favorite; the third and fourth from the top can also be used as scrapers.

In my opinion, there are two types of tool groups. Group One: tools that are pretty much indispensable, in that it would be difficult to make bows without them. Group Two: tools that are not absolutely necessary but nice to have, enabling one to make the job of bow building just a bit easier. Each bowyer has his favorite tools and each individual decides in which group a particular tool belongs. As you acquire tools, you may think you are buying for Group Two but end up using your purchase so much you find, at least for you, it belongs in Group One. I will cover the tools I consider Group One and mention tools I consider Group Two as well.

To begin, you must decide whether you will cut your own trees for staves or purchasing your bow wood. I suggest purchasing your first couple pieces of wood from a reputable seller (if you don’t know anyone willing to give you a couple pieces of good wood). Make sure you explain to your wood source that you are a novice bowyer looking for straight, clean Osage with around seven to nine growth rings per inch. You may pay handsomely for such a piece of wood, but, take my word for it, in the long run it will be worth the money. A knotty twisted piece of wood with 30 or more growth rings to the inch will be a very difficult piece of wood for a novice to work. Save that until you have a few dozen bows under your belt. Once you’ve made a bow or two, you can decide if you are truly interested in making more. Making a wood bow is a lot of hard work. Many, after making their first, decide it’s more work than they are willing to put forth and they’d rather buy bows made by someone else. Make just one and you will soon realize why a good bowyer asks as much as he does for a “simple wood bow.”

If you decide you are going to be making quite a few bows, it would benefit you to start cutting your own wood. If you do, the first tool you will find indispensable is a chain saw. Now, I suppose you could use a double bit axe to fell, cut free, and trim an Osage tree, say ten to twelve inches in diameter, but I’m pretty sure you’d only do it once before investing in a good chain saw. In addition you will need a hatchet, a maul, and at least four steel splitting wedges. Six wedges would be even better.

There’s nothing worse than being twenty miles from home, a quarter mile from the truck, standing in the middle of a fence row dripping sweat (even though it’s the dead of winter), splitting a big Osage log you’ve just brought down, and having all your wedges stuck head deep in the cracks of the stubborn wood. Don’t ask me how I know. Chain saw, hatchet, maul, and wedges are most assuredly Group One tools.

Once you have a supply of aged quarter splits, it’s time to get them down to near bow making dimensions. For this step, you will need some way to hold the quarter split while you are working on it. Most bow makers use a bowyer’s bench, with a large clamp the wood. These are Group One tools for most. Some use a small three- or four-inch vice bolted to a workbench. I use a steel pedestal mounted five-inch swivel vice with both hard and soft jaws bolted to my workroom floor. For me, the pedestal wood securing category, and I really don’t know how I ever made bows before building this tool. My bowyer’s bench has been sitting in my shed unused for years now, relegated to a Group Two tool.

To begin the wood removal process, some bowyers will use a band saw for cutting bow staves to length, to width, for removing excess belly wood, and for removing bark and sapwood from the back. I avoid using power tools when making bows, but other bowyers have no problem using them. Each bow maker should make up his own mind on that subject. Personally, other than the initial felling of the tree with the chainsaw, I make the rest of my bows using nothing but hand tools. I enjoy the process of making bows; using my hands and the hand tools of the craft is part of the process for me. If I were making bows for a living, perhaps I would choose the quicker, easier electric power way, but enjoyment, I stick with the tools I enjoy using.

My tool of choice for removing the bark, the sapwood, for reducing a quarter split to near bow dimensions, and for removing excess belly wood is a large drawknife. This is a necessity—a Group One tool for me. I use a Robert Sorby drawknife out of Sheffield, England. Strong steel and a wide thick sharp blade with deep tangs all the way through the handles make this drawknife a real workhorse, capable of hogging off lots of wood in a
short period of time. Running into a knot is not a problem for the Sorby. It cuts through them. Even though it can remove wood like a rabid beaver, by using a more delicate hand, one can also remove the bark and sapwood down to just above the growth ring you wish to use for your back. I do have another much smaller drawknife made in Sweden that I use for delicate drawknife work and for scraping. This is a Group Two tool for me: not necessary, just nice to have.

For cutting the bow stave to length, I use a standard cross cut handsaw, which for me is another Group One tool. Without using a band saw, there are few options for cutting off two ends of a quarter split. The cross cut saw is fast and efficient for this purpose.

Once the bark and sapwood are removed, the next tool you’ll need is one for scraping the back into a single clean growth ring. There is only one tool for this—the steel cabinet scraper. This Group One tool comes in different shapes, mainly rectangular and gooseneck. I have dozens of cabinet scrapers, but if you are like me, you’ll find among the dozens there will be one or two that you prefer for how they feel in your hand and how they shave the wood. You will find yourself instinctively reaching for them whenever scraping is needed.

The next step is bow layout. For this, you will need something for measuring, something to use as a straight edge, and of course a pencil. Any sharp pencil will do, as will any ruler or wooden yardstick. However, for making a lot of bows several tools will be indispensable. A carpenter’s chalk line for laying out the initial centerline down the crown of the stave is a real time saver. A forty-eight-inch metal rule is essential for laying out long straight lines. For bow dimensions, you can easily measure from your centerline. These are Group One tools, no doubt. However, I found the wooden rulers, the yardsticks, and even the metal rule lacking because the back of a stave is naturally curved and not flat.

As result, I came up with a specific ruler designed just for making bows. I called it a “Bowyer’s Rule” but on the internet archery boards, it got nicknamed Ferret’s Floppy Ruler. If you go to the Primitive Archer Magazine’s website in the “HowTo’s and Build-a-longs” section of the message board forum, search “Ferret’s Floppy Ruler-PDF File” (or Google that name) and there is a PDF file for downloading and printing your own. It’s a handy tool for making bow layout a snap, especially for beginners. Things like limb widths (3 different sizes), tip width, nock location, handle width and length, and fade lengths (2 different sizes) are all marked on the bendable ruler for accurate and easy bow layout. It’s a Group One tool for me, and I believe it will be for you as well.

Once you get your stave to near bow dimensions, you will need a tool to reduce belly wood in order to get your limbs bending and to shape your handle, fades, and dips. My Group One tool for this job is the Farrier’s rasp (a large rasp for flattening horse’s hooves prior to shoeing). This rasp, with different coarseness of teeth on each side, will remove large amounts of wood without causing excessive damage to the wood. Use one side of the rasp for hogging and the other side for smoothing out the gouges from the first side. Group Two tools in this category include the Nicholson #49 and #50 rasps, the four-in-one or four cornered rasp (rounded on one side, flat on the other with four different grades of rasp depending on which side or which end of the rasp you are using), and the 10" half round file (rounded on one side/flat on the other).

For filing in your nocks, there is basically one tool that is universally used— a chainsaw blade-sharpening file. A little 5/32-inch round file. For me, this is another Group One tool. I have at least three or four of them. Just as the cabinet scrapers, for some reason, one file will become your favorite.