All Bamboo Hill Style

[simk]

This is my take at the fancy all bamboo Hill-Style bow.
Not yet sure what to think about the all bamboo thing. Somehow feels and shoots like a very soft yew.
Got massivly underweight also - thought 16.5mm would easy make that ordered 60# bow - I was wrong and only got 40#.
Will start over with 19mm and do more intense heat treating.

cheers

[simk]

the limbs are made of 5 layers of boo while the grip is black locust.

[Pat B]

All bamboo makes a nice looking bow. Maybe your next try will meet your intentions. 

[willie]

This is my take at the fancy all bamboo Hill-Style bow.
Not yet sure what to think about the all bamboo thing. Somehow feels and shoots like a very soft yew.
Got massivly underweight also - thought 16.5mm would easy make that ordered 60# bow - I was wrong and only got 40#.
Will start over with 19mm and do more intense heat treating.

cheers

nice work as always, simk

what part of the culm is on the belly side of the belly lam?

for all who might be interested in bamboo:
https://sunsethilllongbowsandleather.blogspot.com/2023/09/getting-into-basic-hill-style-longbow.html

[Hamish]

Did you use commercially available boo lamelles for your core laminates? If you did this may be why your bow was under weight. Like Willie's article mentions it can be unevenly distributed power fibres.

For best chance of success I would heat temper the core and belly slats, glue up with a slight reflex.

If you go to a lot of trouble you can split, and glue up narrow sections with high content power fibres into a belly slat. Its a lot of work.

For the commercial boo slats my results were exactly the same as your description, like soft yew. Very pleasant to shoot, light in the hand, but took more set than I expected(I only made unreflexed bows at the time, so a little reflex would have been a good idea.