Primitive Archer
Main Discussion Area => Bows => Topic started by: NicAzana on June 22, 2019, 04:13:45 am
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Hello everyone here at PA!
I've been a lurker for a while now on these forums, and finally got a reason to post something. I'm in Denmark, and have only buildt one bow before, an english longbow that still shoots after 4 years, bow turned out too light (~27#) and took quite a lot of set, due to some tillering mistakes (learned lot though).
Now I'm trying out a Møllegabet type bow, which I thought was appropriate as a Dane. The stave is (I think) european yew, which i bargained for with a groundskeeper in a famous danish cemetary in Copenhagen (where Hans Christian Andersen and Søren Kierkegaard are buried, among others). As you can see below, it is not very ring dense and has rather light colored heartwood, but I wanted to give it a shot because of it's history, while some elm i harvested this spring dries.
Stave: (https://i1255.photobucket.com/albums/hh629/Mr_Azana/IMG-0001_zpshm4ubkod.jpg)
I've got it profiled down (left the tips wide for string alignment correction), and reduced to around 1 inch thickness measured from the quite high crown (I'm a little paranoid about it turning out too light this time). It's 65 inches ttt and 2 inches wide at the fades, fading to about 1.5 inch at the lever fades. Top limb (away from me in the images) is 0.5 inches longer. The handle section is 7.5 inch including fades. With ~15 inches of working limb, 1.5 inches of lever fades and 11 inch levers. I kept the levers a little on the short side because of all the knots. Target weight ~50#, though I wouldn't get upset If it ended up at 45#.
I'm getting a little worried with the knots in this piece; there not that large, but several are quite punky, and they're in bad places, close to the edges and in the working part of the limbs, so I'm basically seeking advice on how to deal with these. Also, anyone (Mr Cat?) have experience with european yew of this sort? Am I wasting my time here?
Here's some closeups of the problem areas:
This is probably the one 'm least worried about. It looks like it won't be in the finished limb, but am I screwed if a corner of it remains in the belly edge in the end?
Knot#1: (https://i1255.photobucket.com/albums/hh629/Mr_Azana/IMG-0008_zps4ayped5l.jpg)
The top one here is the same as above, however it is in the middle of the working part of the limb, and will definitely end up on the belly edge, unless I reduce thickness a lot. The bottom knot is rather small and not as punky as the others, but goes right through the limb. I left some sapwood on the top of the knots, when I reduced it from ~1/2 inch to around 1/4 inch.
Knot#2+3: (https://i1255.photobucket.com/albums/hh629/Mr_Azana/IMG-0012_zpstdjpbphp.jpg)
These are my main concern. Twin knots going from belly to side, right out of the fade in the working limb..
Knot#4+5: (https://i1255.photobucket.com/albums/hh629/Mr_Azana/IMG-0014_zpscht2aldt.jpg)
Thank you for any advice you might be able to contribute, I hope I'll have much more to show in the future, and thank all of you for all the help and inspiration you've already unwittingly provided me!!
Nicolas
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One more thing.. The stave has some deflex, that I would like to remove before I tiller it. Maybe recurve the levers very slightly (~1 inch), mainly for looks. The problem is that most of the reflex is right around the are with the too knots... Can use dry heat for this task, or should I steam it, one section at a time?
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I've had plenty of experience with Yew like that. Dig out any punky knots and plug 'em (make sure you get down to clean wood... no point doing half the job.
The important thing is the sapwood, if that is clean then you should be fine.
Don't worry about colour or ring density. I've made a 100# warbow with English Yew that was 3 pings per in ch in places, but the wood was dark, I've seen pale tight grained Yew. Treat each piece on it's own merits.
Either steam or dry heat works well, if the corrections pull out, then fix them in place with heat treating, dry heat slow and steady until there is a slight colour change. Protect the sapwood from any dry heat tho'.
Del
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Thanks for the advice Del. So, with the punky knots that go from belly to side, should i just dril through with an appropriately sized drill, and then epoxy a yew plug through?
Does it have to be yew, or can i plug it with anything? I'm getting ideas of plugging it with either some old ebony wood i have lying around, or maybe epoxy mixed with charcoal.. May be even something that would make the two knots look like a set of eyes...
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Should i fix the knots before or after heat-bending? Won't the heat mess with the glue?
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Should i fix the knots before or after heat-bending? Won't the heat mess with the glue?
Do the heat work first. But if you are worried that the knots will cause a problem during bending do it before, and if necessary do it again after... gotta be willing to do things more than once if necessary.
Del
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Welcome to PA Mr Azana. I'm afraid I can't help you with the Yew. Have never had the pleasure of having a Yew stave. Del is the man though. He won't lead you astray. And he has a good sense of humor to.
Bjrogg
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No experience with yew...ever sadly. One day I will remedy that, but I made an Osage bow a few years back that had these types of knots. Multiple knots on both limbs. Several exited along the side of the limb leaving a void. Not ideal to say the least. I took scotch tape and damed (is this a word? damned, dammed, made a damn dam)) off the edges and filled with CA glue. I added a bit of sinew to several. I don’t think it did anything, but it’s in there. Peeled the tape off and hoped for the best. Probably my favorite bow. It’s special. Never a problem with it now 4-5 years I think. There’s a post on it with some pics of the voids. “Knotty Boy”. I don’t know if yew will hold up the same, but food for thought.
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Welcome, Mr Azana, welcome indeed!
Del will shepherd you through this process, he's a great guy. If you start to get spooked, put down the tools and go wander through his blog for inspiration, laughs, and curiosities: http://bowyersdiary.blogspot.com/
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The pic was in a "Work in Progress" thread for the bow trade that year and hard to locate, but here you go. I don't know if Yew behaves in the same way as Osage (Osage being Royalty and all ;) ) so let Del guide you thru all of this. I offer this as just food for thought in case it might help.
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Thanks for the advice Del. So, with the punky knots that go from belly to side, should i just dril through with an appropriately sized drill, and then epoxy a yew plug through?
Does it have to be yew, or can i plug it with anything? I'm getting ideas of plugging it with either some old ebony wood i have lying around, or maybe epoxy mixed with charcoal.. May be even something that would make the two knots look like a set of eyes...
I prefer to pick out the manky stuff with a ground down needle file, that way you can avoid cutting into the flow of the grain. I like to fill with Yew dust and epoxy, using a fairly dry mix... the assumption being that Yew dust will more likely have similar properties to the parent wood... I sometimes add some walnut dust if I want it to look dark.
These 2 posts from my blog may be of interest :-
https://bowyersdiary.blogspot.com/2012/01/mystery-knot.html (https://bowyersdiary.blogspot.com/2012/01/mystery-knot.html)
https://bowyersdiary.blogspot.com/2012/01/filled-knot.html (https://bowyersdiary.blogspot.com/2012/01/filled-knot.html)
Del
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Wow, thanks for all the great help! This is turning out to really be a nice place to hang out.
Del: Thanks for the sound advice: I've already been to your wonderful blog numerous times, just didn't find any on knots that were exactly like mine:) What kind of epoxy do you use on knots?
Slimbob: Thanks for going through the trouble of finding those photos for me, what a beautiful bow! I actually thought CA glue was a bad filler that wouldn't cure in a layer that thick. I guess I was wrong. Did you use a special brand, or did you do it in steps?
I think I'll try the heat first, as it doesn't have to bend very far. I'll go for just straightening it, with no reflex in the working limb, for safety. Then I'll dig out the knots and evaluate from there. I don't really enjoy the looks of tjose sawdust plugs very much, however, I'll enjoy the broken bow even less;)
I probably wont be able to do much in a while, but I'll post you guys an update as soon as I get anything done.
-Nicolas
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I don't like the looks of the sawdust filled knot either. I saw an article where they used a small diameter branch as as the plug. It looked like a solid knot. I tried it once and my results were less than stellar but someone with more talent should be able to pull it off. I think that using the centre of a larger branch(so the wood was more consistent) might be the way to go.
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I use Loktite CA glue. I heated the bow and the glue. It sucked it up and I kept adding glue until saturated.
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First things first - welcome aboard Mr Azana! These folks have a wealth of knowledge! And humor! It must be a result of working on a never ending addiction! Can't give any advise on plugging knots, but am wondering whether a plug taken from an off cut and aligned with the bow grain would be too conspicuous, or even hold?
Hawkdancer
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I use a rapid epoxy (but not Araldite Rapid).
I'm currently using stuff from Poundland as I've found it is as good as the brand names (probably imported from the same factory!
Del
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Hi again everyone, so I found some time during the last weeks to do some work on the bow.. Man! becoming a family father has taught me how spoiled for time I used to be...
So, naturally I ended up taking a bit of everybody advice, and therefore also in a way nobody's, depending on how you look at it. I started by straightening the deflex out with dry heat i a couple of sessions, and also added a tiny amount of reflex in the levers. Some of it straightened out afterwards, but it's stayed straight, and has a slight curve to the levers that looks elegant, so I'm pretty happy with it:
(https://i1255.photobucket.com/albums/hh629/Mr_Azana/Profile_zpse3wyzizy.jpg)
Then I dug out the knots, which turned out much easier than I expected, I just dug at them with an old awl, and the whole thing popped out basically by itself. Cleaned it up with some rolled up sand paper.
Now I don't really like the look of those sawdust plugs, so I tried a combination approach: I mixed up some epoxy with a bit of powdered charcoal, which I put at one end of the knot "tunnels", and let that cure. Then I mixed some epoxy and yew dust like Del said and put that in the middle, and then covered that up with more epoxy and charcoal. I don't really know whether it was worth the extra effort, I guess the most strain will be at the belly surface, but we'll see whether it'll hold together. At least it looks pretty. Some of it will scrape away during tillering though, so...
(https://i1255.photobucket.com/albums/hh629/Mr_Azana/Knots_zpsgrpjarmm.jpg)
So know I'm starting to floor tiller a little; It's just about starting to bend slightly. I'll probably get it on the tree as soon as possible this time, as I don't really feel that I have a good feeling for floor tillering, and I'm a little paranoid about going underweight on this one. Got the handle shaped yesterday; my first bow had a pretty simple bulbous handle, but this time I wanted to try something elaborate. I got inspired by some bows made by a certain administrator on this site. Epoxied a little riser on from some scrap yew. The sapwood was the only bit wide enough, but it looks neat I think, and I'll probably ad some sort of wrap. Glue line's not perfect either, but it is sort of hard to get it perfectly flat with only sand paper...
(https://i1255.photobucket.com/albums/hh629/Mr_Azana/Handle_zps5lofgmpo.jpg)
Thanks for all the help so far, I hope I'll be able to post some tillering pics soon;)
/Nicolas
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For future work, it is more important to get the bow tillered before making your handle pretty. If for some reason the bow blows up or you have another fatal flaw all your previous work is for naught. Also leaving the handle area blocky gives you a place to clamp the bow while working and tillering. Rounding all the edges is prudent early on in the process even if you have to do it again later because you are eliminating sources of splinters lifting as the bow is stressed.
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Hi Pat
Yeah, I wasn't planning on it, but then my new tillering setup wasn't ready, and I had some time, and I wanted to work on the bow. I'll definitely round off the edges a little more before I get it bending more. They're already beveled some, but I see your point about getting them more smooth.