Main Discussion Area > English Warbow
What advantage is there in multiple laminations?
markinengland:
Grant,
Interestingly the longbow that recently set a new 432 yard distance was bamboo backed, Iroko core and Ipe belly. Iroko because it is failry light and stiff.
Mark in England
backgardenbowyer:
My triple laminate field bow has hickory back (for tension) lemonwood belly (for compression) and the core is balau which I cut from a decking plank and is relatively light for a hard wood. It's mass is 22ozs. I'm just finishing a bow of very dense ipe backed with bamboo and at a similar length (though higher draw weight) it has a mass of 24ozs, and that's without the nocks and handle binding. I'm thinking that yew would be a great core because of its light weight, whereas osage which I've seen used in the core of triple laminate bows would be poor because of its density. Cedar sounds an interesting idea and they have some at our local wood yard, I did wonder about meranti - which is plentiful, sold as the generic light red coloured "hard wood" here and is really very low density for a hard wood its pinkinsh in colour and would look stunning with ipe.....maybe next time.
Does it matter if the grain of a core is flat ringed, edge ringed or bias ringed - anyone know?
Stan
grantmac:
I'm not sure about most Cedars. I think the only one that is recommended for bows is Eastern Red, which is really a Juniper. I think Douglas Fir might be worth a try as well, I've got acess to tonnes of it so why not?
Aso for grain I think that it most likely doesn't matter, but it maybe more stiff with the rings in a vertical orientation.
Cheers,
Grant
markinengland:
The intelligent use of a degree of Perry Reflex will reduce the mass of a bow for its draw weight quite considerably. This can be done with a bow with more than three toral lams, but apparently usually isn't. In my opinion, if all the thin lams are glued together all at once with no induced tension a massive performance advantage is lost, even if glued into reflex. If some of the lams are glued together into a whole belly and then forced into reflex when glued to the backing lams then Perry Reflex tensions will be built in and performance increased.
Stan,
Have you got TBB4 and read Steve Gardners chapter on bow mass? A hickory backed Ipe bow can outperform and weigh less than a self yew bow of the same draw weight.
Mark in England
grantmac:
So your suggesting glueing up the belly and core then pulling them both into some reflex with the backing? You could go one further and glue-up the core and belly in a small amount of deflex, which is rather common with R/D designs. Then your added reflex would give you just enough tension for a small amount of resting reflex. I'm going to have to play around with this. I have a 66" 40-45lbs ELB in my mind, I want speed and stability. Of course this isn't the forum for that kind of girly stuff, so I'll set-about an 80lber at the same time.
Cheers,
Grant
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