Main Discussion Area > Bows
Pounding or soaking sinew
loefflerchuck:
Mounter- You may be right about the bow surface but Willie- the glue and sinew form a more and more complex pattern of bonds over the course of months and even over a year. That is the reason I'd rather use shredded lofty sinew for highly stressed design.
I am however soaking some sinews to jump on this wet splitting fad. I've only used it for thicker handle wraps and such. Some California tribes used this method and who knows how many more. Pounding and shredding has just been the "way" to do it since the first how to book came out on backing bows in modern times.
Taxus brevifolia:
There's a rat in separate
PatM:
--- Quote from: loefflerchuck on May 02, 2018, 10:48:48 pm ---Mounter- You may be right about the bow surface but Willie- the glue and sinew form a more and more complex pattern of bonds over the course of months and even over a year. That is the reason I'd rather use shredded lofty sinew for highly stressed design.
I am however soaking some sinews to jump on this wet splitting fad. I've only used it for thicker handle wraps and such. Some California tribes used this method and who knows how many more. Pounding and shredding has just been the "way" to do it since the first how to book came out on backing bows in modern times.
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That is still up for debate as to how much increased complexity of bonds happens. I believe I remember reading that the molecules need a certain amount of moisture content to do their thing so long seasoning may have been a matter of moisture cycling allowing this to happen even though dry periods likely made things inert for a while.
I do think fluffy sinew isn't as strong as it could be due to the actual collagen being somewhat mutilated.
Obviously it gets patched back together in the matrix but more intact unidirectional fibers is always beneficial in either this scenario or when making string.
willie:
--- Quote from: PatM on May 03, 2018, 02:51:39 pm ---That is still up for debate as to how much increased complexity of bonds happens. I believe I remember reading that the molecules need a certain amount of moisture content to do their thing so long seasoning may have been a matter of moisture cycling allowing this to happen even though dry periods likely made things inert for a while.
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Mason quoting Ray...
--- Quote ---"The bow-makers of both the Hupa and Klamath tribes," says Ray, "are specialists, and the trade is now confined to a very few old men. I have here seen no man under 40 years of age that could make a bow or an arrow, and only one old man who could make a stone arrow-head.
"To make a bow, the wood of a yew sapling 2 1/2 to 3 inches in diameter is selected and rough-hewn to shape, the heart side inward and the back carefully smoothed to the form of the back of the bow. The sinew is laid on while the wood is green and held in place until dry by means of a twine wrapping. In this condition it is hung in the sweat house until the wood is thoroughly seasoned,
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Did these tribes make bows not only for their own use, but have an industry for exchange/ barter? ie, specialists?
The sinew was placed on green yew?
Does "sweat house" imply a slower or damper curing environment than not in the sweathouse? Steam heat? Isn't it quite damp already, west of the cascades in Humbolt county?
PatM:
wilie, what's your current preferred method?
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