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Australian-grown English elm "war" bow

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WillS:
This is a bow that I made from the first of three staves that I received from Stuart ("meanewood" on this forum).  Stuart contacted me recently asking if I'd be interested in a trade of English yew for some elm he had, and being up to my eyeballs in yew and going through a bit of a meane wood obsession phase I couldn't possibly say no! 

Stuart had come across from Australia and we met outside Salisbury Cathedral to do the bow stave exchange - a more medieval scenario would be hard to find!  The elm (which is English elm, grown in Adelaide I believe) was beautiful and snaky and exactly what I was hoping for, so to do it justice was a relief.

This one came out around 80lb at 32" and took no more than 3 hours from rough stave to finished bow.  The bow was essentially finished before it was bent at all, with the nocks fitted and the sanding completed.  It was braced fully and taken to 25", where a few scrapes were required.  The belly was then toasted, and as soon as the wood was cool the bow was taken to 32" to check the shape, at which point it was toasted again and finished.

It's super light in the hand and surprisingly small - just 26mm deep and 34mm wide in the handle.  Within hours of completion it was snapped up by Nick Birmingham or "big bow brum" as he's known on YouTube and will be going off to Germany with the Free Company Of Aquitaine in a week or so.

The bow is 74" nock to nock, fitted with cow horn sidenocks and finished with a simple pine resin and beeswax compound. 

















Here's a pic of Nick shooting the bow in, when he came to collect it.

penderbender:
That a beauty wills! I really like that clear nock! Cheers- brendan

Ruddy Darter:
Very nice WillS, the tiller looks great.  8)

 R.D.

loon:
Beautiful! And not too long!

Did you not toast the tips? would that make them brittle?..

WillS:
To be honest, I usually just find that the tips could always use more bending so I tend to stop the heat treatment about 5" from both ends.  I'd much rather have a bow with slightly whipped tips than one where they're too stiff!

I don't think it makes the wood brittle however - you're not toasting to a char, just getting a good deep heat into the cells.

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