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Deep cook on white wood bows
superdav95:
Hey gents. I’ve been experimenting with the level of cook on my white wood. I’ve been varying the way I set up my bake and coal bed. I have been playing around with times and distance from the surface of the coal bed. I’ve found that with the deeper cook that penetrates most of the way through the thickness of the bending portion of the limb (the working limb) the more performance and retained reflex. This is not an absolute and there are some considerations to account for. If it’s a self bow then I’ve only been going to about halfway through maybe a little more. I’ve been careful to avoid charring the back as it will have explosive results and not in a good way. I’ve done a few that have survived a very deep cook but it’s on the edge of failure. The better self bows have had a medium cook and were better for longevity and still shot well retaining some reflex. As for backed white wood, I think going deeper on the cook has some benefits. The last bake session I did for some experiment bows had two of them get a little deeper on the cook. I decided to back one of these. This little bow was a sliver of wood at only 1.3” wide and needed some side laminate wood to build up the handle. I had some paduak red wood and thought it would look good. I think that for longevity the backed bows are a great candidate for a deep cook. Just some observations that I’ve had. I’ve had some guys wonder if their cook was deep enough. Consider the deeper cook if backing and medium if it’s a self. Keith Shannon and Thad beckum go into some detail on this if you do a google search. Here’s some pics of my latest backed bow with a deep cook. It shoots very well. It’s around 50lbs. 68”ttt asymmetrical. I’ve still got some finishing to do on it but it’s mostly tillered and good to go. It holds 4” immediately after unstringing and climbs to 4.5-4.75” after about an hour or less. It’s mass is 530grams It has good early string tension and smooth draw. Still more tests on this one but it looks promising. Here’s some pics showing the side profile of the cook through the limbs of 4 recent bows done showing the depth of cook. From darkest to lightest. They all shoot good but some a little better. Be interested to hear from others on this and your findings. Cheers.
superdav95:
A few more…
superdav95:
Here’s some better pics of the side by side comparisons.
superdav95:
One more
bassman211:
Some say that heat is heat whether with a heat gun ,or by fire hardening. Some will never try the process. Maybe because they are happy with heat gun results. Others swear by the process. Some have tried belly heat treat over an open fire by holding the bow in hand. The big advantage of fire hardening a bow to my way of thinking is that you can get a good shooting bow from green to finished sapling in a short period of time. No real stave work. Cut a green sapling ,and go to work. You show some nice examples of how fire hardening works to different degrees.. It may convince some others to give it a try. Good post.
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