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51-1/2" BL shorty build-along *finished!!!*
huisme:
I've been floor tillering whenever the temperature gets above snotsicle degrees Celsius and have an almost-sortof uniform bend, but for the purpose of this buildalong I'll be using my mirror for actual tillering and a crude tillering stick to show you the changes. Later. For now, it's time to get some knocks in the tips, which I've kept about as big as my thumb to this point.
My method of eyeballing knock placement really isn't advised. I use my thumb to decide the horizontal axis, the knocks, which must be square with the axis of the whole bow, NOT THE ANGLE OF THE TIP, and make small marks on the edges of the back.
I mark a point on the belly, which I dumbly didn't take a picture of, and file from the back toward that point. Once the knocks are deep enough to hold the rat-tail rasp in place well I start filing from belly to back because that's how I usually get my smoothest knocks for some reason.
Once I've filed the knocks deep enough that I think they'll hold some bailing twine and/or my tillering string I go to work roughing the tips with the easy side of my rasp. The tips, past the knocks, can be as thin as you can make them without scaring yourself, and the back can be violated to round it out since it's past the string and won't be under tension like the rest of the back.
I check several times between sessions of ten or so rasps to be sure I'm thinning things evenly. I tend to line my tips up with the grain, rather than with the axis of the bow/knocks.
The roughed out bottom tip is about the size I want it since it'll probably be abused more than the top.
The top knock gets a friend to hold a stringer, since anyone smarter than me will tell you to always use one. at first this makes the upper tip kind of thick, but since the stringer knocks aren't going to be holding a string through shooting they can be relatively shallow.
There's a little more to remove, but it's just fine for tillering.
Obviously I can't tiller properly while watching the camera and pulling with one hand. I saw in the mirror that the tips are bending a little less than I like, and an area around a knot I heat treated has become too stiff for its own good.
String length is something you should always consider. I say shorter is always better because the shorter the tillering string is the more alike the pull will be to the finished bow and short string. So I was lazy this time. That's a giant string.
The handle is bending about as much as I'll want it to later on so I'll leave it alone, but beyond that this string really is too long to tell me anything. I have a weird habit of starting the tips and mid limb waaay overwight and the inner limbs just way overweight. It's currently pulling thirty pounds at three inches, which means there's a lot of wood to come off before I pull it any farther.
huisme:
I wouldn't call this part four. More of a goof ::)
I lightened the bow by taking ten scrapes with the course side of my rasp, cleaning as little as possible with the fine side, and then removing the rasp marks with my machete as a scraper. I'd usually use my draw knife, but I let someone barrow my clamps.
It's still a little stiff in the tips. There's some slight reflex just as the limbs start tapering, so they'll always look a touch stiff, but this is too stiff. Things have come to a pause, though, as I noticed I'd overdone the string alignment.
The string used to drift to the other side :o I've since heated into shape and have it in the bathroom to sit through shower steamings, meaning I'll get back to tillering in another day or so.
I've been posting this buildalong on reddit's /r/bowyer in the hopes that it'll help some of the squirrels over there. Any tips for things I should be including to help them along the most?
huisme:
I haven't done much scraping on account of a banged up knee, so here's the currently off-balance tiller. You can see, especially in the drawn shot, that the upper limb is stiffer than the lower, which is the opposite of what I want.
I don't usually pull at a bow if I see something wrong with it to avoid set, but this can be a sacrificial lamb.
For this careful, slow tillering I would usually clamp my bow to a bench and just scrape at the belly according to how I mark the wood, but my clamps are with a friend.
I hold the bow in one end with the tip on something that won't damage the wood, like softer wood, and use the other hand to hold and move the edge of the machete up and down the length of the limb, varying pressure depending on where I've marked the bow for more removal in stiff areas. Having the concave and convex edges on my machete allows me to remove wood in pinpoint or broad areas, and lets me shape the belly faster.
Sometimes, though, a scraper jumps. It happens less with my draw knife than it has with my machete, but it's easy enough to fix.
The easy side of my rasp goes over the lumpy patch very gently and no more than necessary to level the wood.
After the rasping I scrape the area before checking anything. A clean surface allows me to check for chrysals, which are very common in black locust.
I hadn't done much adjusting in this shot, but there's a little bit of difference. This mostly shows how slow and methodical tillering is supposed to be as this represents half an hour of work.
Now I'm going to have to accept that this bow, with this much mass, at this length, with these flaws, at these dimensions, is going to take some set.
This limb has a relatively uniform taper and no real trouble from knots. It will take set, but very evenly.
This limb comes out of a knot and is more narrow out of the knot than the rest of the limb, telling me it's going to take set in the inner limb. It's pretty reliable that the part of the bow that takes equal weight on less cells is going to take more set.
This is that knot. I knew it'd be trouble eventually because I had to get it bending. At least it'll be pretty!
A couple hours later (which I should have photographed) I have some pretty major differences. The upper limb is obviously still slightly stiff, but the bend is uniform enough to avoid chrysals and draw fully. I'm at fifty one pounds at twenty five inches, almost my draw length and pretty much what I was aiming for,.
And as you can see set looks about how I predicted.
Total set pre-heat treating is about an inch. That's actually less than I was allowing for; I expected two inches of set at this point. I'm going to give it a light sanding and toast the belly again, hopefully removing some set.
huisme:
It was a pretty straightforward heat treating, sanding and poly finish. Got it to one and a half inches set, which is pretty good for the fifty five pounds I managed to keep on her (friend wanted sixty, I called him crazy but said I'd try). Ended up shooting crazy fast and smooth with those thin tips, and my friend loves the stringer slots on the upper tip ::)
55@25"
511/2 TtT
2" widest point, ~1/3" at knocks
Bendy handle
Ten strand B-50 (per friend's request, guy doesn't like my skinny strings >:( )
Crogacht:
Damn. Came out pretty well I think.
What are you using for your long tillering string???
Also, what do you usually use for your "thin" strings? Fastflight?
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