Congratulations to simson for winning March BOM contest with his golden chain tree take down 53#/28"!!!!
Here is the link to his build: http://www.primitivearcher.com/smf/index.php/topic,38380.0.html
Here is what simson had to say about his bow and his build: This bow is made of billets, which are split out of an 40" and 3" diameter sapling. You sure know, golden chain tree has a wonderful contrast of heart and sap wood. So I decided to leave at least on tips and fade area a natural grown overlay of sap on the bow. Unfortunately the next ten or so rings just below the the sap were rather thin and very spongy because of the high ratio of early wood - I had to work down to the good rings.This is the reason for the relative high overlays and the high crowned limbs (back side of limb only about 1" away of pith center). Because of the high crown I decided next to try a hollow limb design again, in this case excessive. The limbs are only two rings thick, but heavily crowned / hollowed out. The back side has cured to a darker color than the belly and sides - it was laying around for months, belly and sides shows the fresh lighter color because of tillering. After a few further month the color of the heart wood will be a chocolate brown. This is my first try on a take down. It is done with self made take down sleeves, which came out a bit too bulky for my taste. Next time I will try some smaller diameter pipes. The billets were too small to fill the the depth of the sleeves, so i glued on some leftover pieces from this stave. The lower limb looks a bit weird just below fade, but the bow is well balanced and shoots very good. I'm absolute surprised. This bow pulls so smooth and is incredible fast - I don't know is it the extreme design or the bow wood. I will search for a small diameter osage and try the same design - then we will see ...
specs: 65,5" ntn, 5" braceheight, 53# / 28", stingray leather inlayed as arrowpass, string: 6 strands of 452X strengthened at the ears..enjoy ... simson
Here is what some forum members had to say about his bow:
Now that is totally amazing. I still can't figure out how you could even tiller that bow. What beautiful wood. That is one of a kind for sure. Thank you for sharing. Dean
Very special indeed very nice. Tell us more about the concave limbs please. Stunner. dwardo
Beautiful Simson! Love everything about it. Looks a lot like Black Locust. Those concave limbs are really influencing me. Got a couple I'm trying. randman
Very nice Simson. The concave limb design is quite impressive. And the takedown system is nicely excecuted. Gordon
(http://i162.photobucket.com/albums/t253/cbergerman/640/BOM/Mar_13/self_small.jpg) (http://s162.photobucket.com/user/cbergerman/media/640/BOM/Mar_13/self_small.jpg.html)