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boo backed bamboo bow
Hamish:
Have you seen any of Meadowlark Adventure Gear's Youtube videos? He does lots of boo back and belly bows. He will even do some tillering on the belly, usually only to tweak tiller, rather than large adjustments. Too much work you risk going through the power fibres and exposing the softer fibres to compression.
superdav95:
Hey Hamish. Ya I have checked his vids out. I do like his methodical approach. He’s made some really nice bows. He normally uses a core wood more often if I recall and with a power lam riser on his builds. I’ve done these type builds too with some success and failures. Always some failures. The biggest issue I had and I think him also was splitting of the thinner strips of boo at the riser ramp. What ive done to combat this is heat in this ramp on the slat before taken down to final dimensions. This allowed me to get more safety in that area. I also heat treat mine more heavily than I think he does. We shall see how mine goes as I tiller it out more. You are right about the belly power fibers. I’ve made that mistake on a previous attempt. It actually stress fractured on me as I was trying to get it to brace. Hence the failure on that build. I also used to torch the belly rind side and I don’t do this anymore since a failure there too. Cracks developed. Instead now what I do for the belly lam is do a much deeper cook on the flesh side leaving the rind side alone. I will go with the cook long enough however till I see a shiny glaze appear on the power fiber side. This indicates to me that it’s a fully cooked from the inner out to the outer rind where the lignins and pectins ooze out and harden. When it cools it’s actually like a laqure hard finish on there. I’ve had better luck doing it this way.
Hamish:
Good info, "I will go with the cook long enough however till I see a shiny glaze appear on the power fiber side. This indicates to me that it’s a fully cooked from the inner out to the outer rind where the lignins and pectins ooze out and harden. When it cools it’s actually like a laqure hard finish on there. I’ve had better luck doing it this way."
Yes Joddy, from Meadowlark focuses mainly with a wooden core, power lam's as you mention. He has mentioned the same problems, you clearly have watched his videos, and taken in good lessons.
It's good to see people experimenting. High risk, though the reward is high when you are successful.
superdav95:
Worked a bit more on this bow today and got it braced. The outers were a little stiff and still may in fact be a little bit stiff yet. I pulled it to around 22” about a dozen times or so to work in some of the changes I had made to balance things. Seemed to take to them well and looks better now. Slightly positive tiller on top longer limb which I’m fine with and may work to maintain that moving forward. It feels about 45-50 lbs at 22” now by feel but may be a little shy of my 70lbs target. We shall see. I left it strung for about 45min after pulling it some to see where it settled. prior to the changes and getting it braced i had around 3.5" reflex. I now have around 3". we shall see what i can retain when done. I don’t have a way to take video that would be worth anything of me drawing it at the moment. I’ll see if my camera lady can help take some video. Here’s a clip link from YouTube showing how braced.
https://youtube.com/shorts/7HgF1IWLxxQ?si=VBuy_zlHTp_FG1Uw
Link to pics
https://share.icloud.com/photos/0bc8fUTd1PD_rYq9_TNk9wKyQ
Hamish:
Looking really good so far.
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