Primitive Archer
Main Discussion Area => Bows => Topic started by: ber643 on August 13, 2007, 08:38:52 am
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OK - Partially kidding. Anyway I finally was able today to start on the very nice Osage stave that friend Mike Brooks found for me to learn on. I really enjoyed it. I had seen it before, and Mike sowed me very basically how to start out with the Draw Knife. Today we got serious and I really started learning what, why, and how to proceed. These will not be quick lessons as we can only get together every so often (like next weekend I'll be on a trad shoot). So this may be a long drawn out process but suffice to say after this first half day I would love to lay into it every day until I finished a bow or the stave beat me into the ground. Mike does the teaching and observing, I provide the elbo grease and do the learning, I hope - I learned a lot today - IMO. Here are some pics of the stave and my beginnings, for those interested.
Here you can see the stave has some nice natural setback or deflex starting out:
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v689/ber643/Stave01.jpg)
In this one, you can see the little patch of cuttings at stave center from when I first took the Draw knife in hand for an intro, some time back:
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v689/ber643/Stave02.jpg)
Here you can see that I am lucky enough to have pretty wide Growth rings and new growth areas revealed. We felt I stood a good chance of using the first clean (actually the second one, I guess) growth ring and we proceeded with that assumption:
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v689/ber643/Stave03.jpg)
Here are a couple of shots of my first attempts at Chasing a ring on an osage stave. Got just about half of the back nicely exposed this afternoon (I'm a slow, hopefully methodical worker - LOL:
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v689/ber643/Chaseing01.jpg)
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v689/ber643/Chaseing02.jpg)
Finally, here are the shavings from my first day attacking this poor unsuspecting, and (I feel) beautiful stave. Hope you enjoyed my first halting steps on a selfbow:
(http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v689/ber643/FirstDaysShavings.jpg)
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Pretty cool bernie. all good things take time. I'm sure that you will end up with a sweet bow. Keep us posted eh.
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Good start,Very nice growth rings,you shouldn't have any problem chasing them.Take your time and you will get a feel for it pretty quick. :)
Pappy
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That is a pretty piece of wood. Like Pappy said, nice growth rings. Keep us posted on the progress. Justin
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Very nice piece of wood. Looking forward to your posts.
I feel I have a lot more control chasing a ring to have the stave clamped lower. Just a thought or just me?? ???
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Bernie, you are amazing! Enjoy. Jawge
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Thanks for the comments and encouragement, friends. BTW, this will be a shorter bow (60" as I recall) but that's good as I do not have a short Wood bow. Lowell, Yep, Mike mentioned that a lot of folks do but he likes it up where he can pull into his chest - and see better. He told me to try both ways - but as soon as he said "see better" it made sense to these ol' eyes, at least for a start. My arms were tired after - lol - but we went out and shot some and I did OK, so I guess it wasn't too bad ;D
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Makeing shaveings Bernie,I hear ya!I'll be starting on my second selfbow towards the end of this week.Gotta get that tillering tree set-up.Keep us posted I like build alongs.tradrick
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Thata way "old Brother" looks like Mike is teaching you well. Pretty peice of wood, oughta make a fine bow.
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That looks like a primo piece of 'sage. Have fun!
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Thanks so much TR, Dano, and HB. All your comments mean a lot to me.
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Way to go Bernie.He sure started you out on a nice piece of wood.You might be able to get a piggyback stave off the belly.Looking forward to seeing your progress.
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He certainly did, mullett. Don't know about the "piggy Back" for this amateur, just yet. He keeps kidding me about how am I gonna learn anything from a stave that's so free of defects, knots, characvter, etc. I told him it was probably enough for this ol' hoss to try to absorb in one outing. We have discoverd a couple small whoopdy-doos already that'll most likely add a little character. Also looks like, in running a center line test, we probably will have to heat one end to bring it into line before lay-out. Gonna really be interesting in any case.
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Looking good, Bernie. I echo what was said before, real nice peice of wood there!
Sean
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It super cool to see ya makin a stave bow Bernie. This is going to be alot of fun to watch. Keep it coming young man! ::) ;D ;)
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Nice piece of Osage. You're doing great
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Thanks a bunch, Sean, JBell, and Mark. Hope to add to it within a couple weeks. Going to a shoot in Burlington, NC (Sissipaha) this coming weekend, though.
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Its just not anyone who can have such a pile of gold at their feet. Keep going, it looks like a really good stave. Auggie.
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Yes, I thought that even the shavings were pretty - am I hooked or what - :D