So is hickory a pain to keep moisture down

[Pat B]

 If your house has central AC/heat it has climate control.

[bassman]

I keep them in  my computer room at 70 degrees year round hanging on a wall. Seems to work.

[Hawkdancer]

They make climate controlled houses?!?!  Also, what is it they call air conditioning? It seems to be pretty rare up here. 

Well, if you are down Maine, they might call it central heating!  Way out here, it is central air conditioning, real neat just put the thermostat at the desired temperature and relax; some models even control humidity!  Not at all primitive! . We are having fun with this!  I used spray on Helmsman spar urethane on my hickory, but haven't kept any records on performance.  Seems to shoot just fine, though
Hawkdancer

[darinputman]

I haven't made near the bows some of you folks have but I do try to advance the craft every chance I can. I always figured that was one of the main objectives of bow making forums.
   I just decided to put the fire hardening process to the test and see if I could use it in my bow making and found out that I could. Although I didn't find that it helped my hickory bows to stop taking on moisture, I can't say that it didn't slow it down some. It definatly aided me in correcting and reflexing an unruly hickory stave without spending lots of time on the heat gun.
 
 

[Onehair]

I have gone through the same heat treating hickory experience. Our humidity is usually in the 90% range and no matter how many times I dried out the bow it began to take on moisture. Eventually the bow suffered. I have taken some hickory scrapes and tried different finishes. Number one is epoxy. I heated it till thin and applied to the scrap hickory. 3 months later it will still not measure on my cheapo meter . Number 2 is Odies oil. I love this stuff but it does take time to get the full effect. It has never gotten above 7%

[Pat B]

One of the main bow woods for the Eastern Woodland folks was hickory. How do you think they dealt with it and why would they prefer hickory over less susceptible bow woods?

[Tradslinger]

I'm talking out of my rear end now most likely but the Native Americans did have fires burning all the time for cooking etc. So maybe they kept them near the heat, kind of like a constant thing. I know that they rubbed in all kinds of oils and greases. Mink oil? the oils used by waterbirds to keep their feathers waterproof? So much of this info has been lost but you know that they had something figured out, they had to.

[Pat B]

Oils and greases keep water off of wood but water isn't the problem. The moisture that does affect bows is humidity, water vapor and that doesn't necessarily happen overnight but over a longer period of time.
 

[Fox]

One of the main bow woods for the Eastern Woodland folks was hickory. How do you think they dealt with it and why would they prefer hickory over less susceptible bow woods?

pat, my best guess at this ( also I have no clue what im talking about, just a hypothesis) is that the people long before us like the eastern woodland hunters didn't mind much if there bows took a fair amount of set... and also worn't there bows mostly as tall as them? and bent threw the handle? cause that would be a pretty overbuilt bow wouldn't it? my guess is they liked hickory because of its durability, and a bow with a few inches of set would kill an animal just as dead as a reflexed one... right? 

[Yooper Bowyer]

Keep in mind that these people where probably stronger than the average modern archer, so they could get better cast simply by using heavier bows, and they could also get closer to game than most of us can.  The lack of chronos probably had something to do with it too

[Pappy]

Hickory will suck up moisture that for sure but with a little extra care, such as keep in the dry when not using it, un string when not shooting it and a good sealer on the bow , I use 7 or 8 coats of tru oil and a last coat or 2 of satin polly. If I know I am going to be out in bad weather for a while I will wax it with a coat or 2 of Turtle wax, it will be fine, made and hunted with a bunch of them, just takes a little more care than Osage, I don't think it is any worse than Elm.
 Pappy

[bradsmith2010]

Pappy, i know its gets plenty humid and rainy where you hunt, been there,, good advice, thank you,,

[gutpile]

I was at a tribal meeting ..Tsalagi... one of the elders told me that they used to bury their bows in a mud embankment by a creek.. Locust was the preferred wood here..In Ga.. that is what he told me..  I guess burying the bow for about a month made it easier to work ... .. not sure.. I did see an article a while back where a guy submerged his bow in salt water to do basically the same thing...if I remember it hardened the wood inside and made outside easier to work.. gut

[Allyn T]

Keep in mind that these people where probably stronger than the average modern archer, so they could get better cast simply by using heavier bows, and they could also get closer to game than most of us can.  The lack of chronos probably had something to do with it too

Wouldn't heavier bows just take more set?

[PatM]

Keep in mind that these people where probably stronger than the average modern archer, so they could get better cast simply by using heavier bows, and they could also get closer to game than most of us can.  The lack of chronos probably had something to do with it too

Wouldn't heavier bows just take more set?

 Based on?