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Egyptian composite build a-long

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welch2:
 ;D   It took me a while to come around to the idea of soaking horn instead of boiling them.

My idea was that boiling is cooking ,and cooking the horns in water may break down the proteins that make up the horn or at least leach some of them out . So I started boiling my horns in hide glue .(The water can't absorb things from the horn if it is already super saturated.) The cooking time seemed to go down a bit , and I didn't have to coat the horn with several thin coats of glue in order for the glue to stick.

It was a short leap from there to just soaking the horns till they were saturated and pliable. When they are ready the horns are very slimy . Then I normally heat the tub just a little (like heating hide glue :)  ) and tie or clamp the horns to a form to dry in the shape I want. The working time is longer than just boiling too.

Then I found out the Mongolians do a very similar thing with milk , and I had to try it.

Ralph

welch2:
Today I sanded the belly side of a few horn pieces flat , and trued up the belly and back of the core.





You can see the glue lines between the core laminations better in these pictures ,I think. In the next photo you can tell my core is still quite wide. So, narrowing it down to near the width of the horn is the next step.



Ralph

radius:
keep it coming, man!

welch2:
Here are crossections of a few of the originals.



And here a some profiles. The top one is a selfbow , the bottom one is the one I'm trying to copy.



And this is upper limb and nock details the bottom bow again is the one I'm after.



Ralph

1/2primitive:
This should be interesting, I'l be watching this one.

Does the milk smell after that long of sitting out?
    Sean

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