Primitive Archer
Main Discussion Area => Bows => Topic started by: TimberTinker on August 03, 2019, 05:35:39 pm
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Hi all,
New aspiring bowyer here. I'm just starting out and I'm on my second board bow thus far.
First bow story:
The first was a 64" red oak bow from a 2x1x6 board and it catastrophically failed around the fades at roughly 30 lbs. Limb snapped clean off and sounded like a gunshot! Luckily I was 20 ft away from the tillering rack. I'm pretty sure the limbs were too narrow at only 1.5" and the design probably wasn't right with a thick handle section so no bend there and I had width taper start about half way down the limb and I was also tapering thickness. I was trying to achieve about 40-45# weight... never made it there.
Second bow story:
Second is a 70" red oak bow from another 2x1x6 board using the same design minus the thick handle section so it's bendy through the handle. It's looking quite nice but I'm afraid to draw past 30# given the first bow's fate. Problem is I think I'm almost to a finished taper, and I haven't pulled to the full 40-45# nor have I pulled it to 28". I've only pulled to about 33# at about 22" in fear of another failure and I'm pretty sure it's too late to try for 45# at this point without risking another failure. I'm probably going to finish this one off at a safe 30#.
So my question is: At what point during the process should I pull to my desired weight? I need to get there much sooner, before I fear the limbs being too thin or whatnot. I'm starting to understand the idea that you pull your desired weight at a shorter draw and then tiller to your draw length, but if I pull 45 or 50# immediately after floor tiller will I risk damaging the wood because there is still TOO MUCH wood on the belly or could it crack because there's not enough bend? Obviously if I see an issue like a hinge or something I will stop pulling but where is a good place during the whole process to test the desired draw weight?
Any help would be much appreciated!!
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Always pull to the full draw weight unless you can see a problem that needs correcting, then only pull far enough to see the problem. Once you've got it sorted it's back to full draw weight.
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Agreed :OK
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Problem is I think I'm almost to a finished taper,
What do you mean by finished taper?
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Sorry, not sure if I used the term the right way, but by finished taper I basically mean I've got a really nice looking bend, perfectly even limbs down to the mm, no issues, etc. but I'm getting pretty thin near the tips and I'm pretty sure I've gone past the wood's potential to handle my intended weight because I never had the guts to pull to that weight early in the process. ::)
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Like DC said, draw to your draw weight from the beginning of the tillering process. That way you'll never come out underweight. So after a good exercise routine check draw weight every time you put your bow on the tiller tree.
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I'm not a board bow person but if you started with a decent board and have decent tiller a 70" bendy handle will go a lot further than 22". Can you post a picture? Do you have it braced to full brace height?
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As an alternative, and this isn’t meant to contradict anyone else’s method, but I never use the scale early on so for me the draw weight is unimportant. I am focused on the bend. The tiller. Only at a short distance. Is the braced shape right? Once it is pulling 15 inches or so with good tiller I take it to the tree and check the weight. Even then I won’t pull it to full draw weight. I just extrapolate what it will be based on the weight it’s gaining per inch. 5 pounds per 2 inches?? Where does that leave me at full draw. I just keep the tiller even and keep inching forward on the draw length. If I do my job right, I hit target weight a few inches short of full draw. A good bit of exercising on tree and it typically settles in with a bit of sanding. It’s not a better way, just a different way.
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Hi DC,
The bow is currently braced at about 5" and in the second picture I'm pulling it to 30 lbs at about 18-20". I've managed since the picture was taken to get it to 33 lbs at about 22"
The right limb is a little lower in that picture but I've since corrected that with the last couple passes with the scraper.
The bow feels like it really doesn't want to bend further which makes me hesitant to pull more weight at this point in the process. (33 is the max I've put on it, which is the reason for this post, I feel like I'm going things all backwards adding weight at the end of the process.)
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/48451421097_9a79e4097d_b.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2gPuctg)20190730_133019 (https://flic.kr/p/2gPuctg)
(https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/48451266656_f2f361562a_b.jpg) (https://flic.kr/p/2gPtpyu)20190730_134839 (https://flic.kr/p/2gPtpyu)
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From that pic... it's not bending in the middle. Maybe you don't want it too, but it's easy to throw away a lot of potential limb length by having an unnecessarily long handle/fade area which just makes the rest of the limb work so much harder.
You are on the right track, because you diagnosed your own problem... (didn't have the guts to pull to full weight to start with).
Look at it this way... it will survive being pulled to full weight early on because it is thicker and it will only get to a short draw length so it won't over strain the wood. It also allows you to see any problems early.
The hard thing is getting your eye in, getting used to seeing the curve.
The bottom line is... if you want a 50# you have to pull it to 50# at some point, the sooner the better as long as you don't see a problem.
Del
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Del thanks for the critique!
This is why I turned here. I see what your saying now that you pointed it out, it looks like I have a 16" handle when it was supposed to be a 10" bendy handle. I can't get more bend because I'm not utilizing the full limb. I think I was too focused on getting the bend that i already had perfect I missed the elephant in the room.
Thanks a bunch everyone! Still don't think I'll hit my target weight but this could still be a decent board bow in the end.
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When I started bowyering my body seemed to have a stop at 40#. It still does. When a bow got to 40# every nerve said it was going to break. To fix the problem I put a 2:1 pulley system on my tree. Now my body feels 20# when the bow is at 40#. It worked. 99% of my bows are still 40# because I comfy with that but I have made a 105# warbow.
Maybe your natural stop is 35#. :D
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Do not pull to full target weight until the limbs are bending well.
I actually don't pull to target weight until 25" for a 26" draw. But it took years to be able to do that.
Jawge
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The main thing to remember is not to pull the stave more than your draw length. I rarely pull it to the intended draw strength until the last stage of tillering. Badger has some theories about how not to cause any set by not pulling it too much too early. You probably can simply back the bow with linen or hide before you pull it fully. You will be much safer that way.
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Why pull a bow all the way to 20 inches and 50lbs, when you can pull it to 12 inches at 35lbs and, at least in my mind, accomplish the same thing without stressing the wood as much. If at 12 inches I am at 35lbs, and I am gaining conservatively 2 lbs per inch, then I am at 65 lbs at 27 inches. I need to shed 15 lbs, so scrape where needed and then recheck the tiller. Good at 12? Pull to 14 and check it. 35 lbs at 14 inches? I am 11 lbs heavy. Scrape and repeat. Inching your way up to full draw length and full draw weight. I’m willing to consider that this way is less effective if some one can explain why.
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I do that sometimes,,.and pull it closer to draw weight as I get the tiller even,,knowing that the bow is gonna shift or stabalize,,,.as the draw gets longer,,.pulling it to full weight at end of tiller process,,.just something I do to keep strain to a minimum at the start of tillering,...it may not be effective,,.but I feel better :BB
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Hey Brad. The way I tiller is not recognizable to my buddy Curt who showed me how to do this 25 years ago. We all find ways of accomplishing things and incorporate these things into the process. My goal is to keep set to a minimum during the build. Keeping the tiller good from the get go, and avoiding stressing the wood unnecessarily. I asked the question earlier in earnest. What am I missing by not pulling to full weight early? I don't think of any of these things as the "right way" or "wrong way".
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Are you using a grid behind your tiller board? I use a brick wall to check and mark for corrections.
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I guess I take for granted that floor tiller time is when I try to get both limbs bending evenly. On the tree with a tiller string I try to get it closer. At low brace I try to have both limbs bending evenly and together then all I have to do is get to my intended draw weight. A lot of this comes with experience but getting most of the kinks out(metaphorically)earlier helps to achieve a well tillered bow of the desired draw weight.
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Pat...I think your method is more common. I too get everything right on the floor tiller (that came after years of practice). Even with an ideal tiller early on, I don’t pull to full weight until the last inch or 2 of draw length. Jawge mentioned he does the same. Is there an advantage to pulling it to full weight early on?
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Once I started pulling to ultimate draw weight as I tiller my bent sticks started becoming bows with that desired draw weight. For me it works. It may work differently for others.
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Thanks Pat. I hear what you’re saying completely. We find what works best for us generally follow that path.
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I usually get the bow strung pretty early I guess,, so have to scrape to get the weight down,, so I can usually hit my weight or more no problem,, now sometimes that tricky sinew stuff will mess me up,, )P(
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Yep. And sometimes I just mess it up without any decent excuse. 😶
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When you tell her a bowl out at a lower weight you really have no idea what that boy is going to do once you put the full weight on it so it's very risky. You stand a very good chance of coming in late or getting a hinge
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I get my bows on the long string early at full draw weight from the first pull and start with the gizmo. The gizmo starts you on the right path from go and makes the whole process much more predictable and easy to finish. The worst is when you start out of balance and try to chase an even bend.
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I appreciate all this feedback, so thanks to everyone who's contributed to the conversation!
I'm new and inexperienced so my biggest fear is having another bow explode later in the process because my resulting tiller midway through at 30# can't handle being increased to 50#. After making 25+ bows I'm sure my tillering will improve and I'll have enough understanding to be able to afford changing my process to reduce set and other fine tweaks, but right now I'm wanting to know the best way to tiller as a beginner so that my bows survive the whole process and draw at the target weight and length when all is said and done.
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One thing I'd suggest if they are still around is study your failures to see why they failed. Then with the next bow you might be able to eliminate that problem. As long as you learn something from a failure it's not a real failure.
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the best way is to get the limbs bending even, and that just takes practice,,you'll get there,, :) also consider making the bows longer and wider,,,it will increase your success rate,,, as you gain experience, you can make bows on the edge of breaking,, :D
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After some research I've concluded...
Don't pull it to full draw weight if it's going to explode ::)
Del
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Like Pat B and Brad said - overbuild, study your failures, don't hurry, and heed Del's research conclusion. Don't pull to draw weight until the tiller is right, and exercise the bow before each tiller and draw check. Btw, I got lucky, and my first bow made weight, and tiller with a lot of help and advise! It shoots better than I do (SH) :BB. Also, have fun!, and breathe!
Hawkdancer
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If you floor tiller out to where the bow is pretty close then you want to make sure that your tiller is even before you go to full draw weight. On the other hand if you know that all parts of the limb are still too strong then you can go right to full draw weight regardless of the balance in the limbs
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yes that works,, I have even gone past full draw weight, and changed my mind,, to a lower weight,, and still got a pretty good bow,, (-S
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As an alternative, and this isn’t meant to contradict anyone else’s method, but I never use the scale early on so for me the draw weight is unimportant. I am focused on the bend. The tiller. Only at a short distance. Is the braced shape right? Once it is pulling 15 inches or so with good tiller I take it to the tree and check the weight. Even then I won’t pull it to full draw weight. I just extrapolate what it will be based on the weight it’s gaining per inch. 5 pounds per 2 inches?? Where does that leave me at full draw. I just keep the tiller even and keep inching forward on the draw length. If I do my job right, I hit target weight a few inches short of full draw. A good bit of exercising on tree and it typically settles in with a bit of sanding. It’s not a better way, just a different way.
Slim, I have experimented with a very similar method. I look closely at the bend at brace height before pulling further.
Just curious about what you do after you make the initial weight measurement and the extrapolation?
If your extrapolation comes in much heavier than the target weight, do you remove wood before proceeding further (than the 15")?
How much "extra" weight do allow, to be removed as you get closer to full draw?
I think its cool that we can compare various methods without the "only way" attitude creeping into the thread :)
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Hey Willie. So, I do this differently today than I did as little as 10 years ago. Just an evolutionary thing that has worked for me. Most of my tillering is done from floor tiller to 15 inches or so. I want the floor tiller to be good enough to go to low brace if possible. Then I fret over the brace shape getting it right. From there keep the shape good out to around 15 inches, an inch at a time, all on the tiller stick. Once at 15 inches with near perfect tiller (as good as I can get it) I take it to the tree and exercise and weigh it at 15 inches. It has never been pulled beyond that. If at 15 inches it is say 40 pounds, and I am shooting for 50, I am 15 pounds heavy or so. Scrape where it needs it. I will start getting the fades to work a bit as well. Then check the tiller on the tree at 15, and then 16 inches and weigh it again at 16. 40 pounds at 16 inches, I am 13 pounds heavy or there'bouts. Repeat the scraping and check again going to 17 inches. 40 pounds at 17 inches, I am 10 pounds heavy. I just keep inching upwards in draw length until I am at 27. At 25 or 26 inches I will hit target weight usually, and it settles in at 50.
I believe this stresses the wood less than the alternative. Making weight is rarely an issue because your not doing much shaping toward the end. That has all been done early on. The last 10 inches is just even wood removal with sanding to finish it out. Never had a hinge just show up late in the game.
Lastly, I don’t claim this is a better way, nor do I claim to have invented anything new. It’s just what I do.
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I wanted to clarify for my own peace of mind, when you say you are 15# heavy at 40#@ 15,, you would mean that if you pulled the bow to full draw it would be about 65#@ 26,, making it 15 pounds heavier than your target weight of 50#....? at the longer draw
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Yes, exactly. I just do the math as to what the bow WILL be pulling at full draw, though I have not pulled it beyond 15 inches or so and not more than 35 lbs. or so. If the tiller is good, I have yet to experience one going out of tiller at the end. It's usually just a matter of keeping things even in small increments at that point.
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Thanks for sharing, Slim
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After about 150 shots and some finish sanding I put a scale on it. Pulled 48 lbs at 27", my draw length. It would probably pull 50 at 28"? It is plenty quick with cedar shafts.
I have some more room to bring it closer to center shot so I may take it in an 1/8".
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Why pull a bow all the way to 20 inches and 50lbs, when you can pull it to 12 inches at 35lbs and, at least in my mind, accomplish the same thing without stressing the wood as much. If at 12 inches I am at 35lbs, and I am gaining conservatively 2 lbs per inch, then I am at 65 lbs at 27 inches. I need to shed 15 lbs, so scrape where needed and then recheck the tiller. Good at 12? Pull to 14 and check it. 35 lbs at 14 inches? I am 11 lbs heavy. Scrape and repeat. Inching your way up to full draw length and full draw weight. I’m willing to consider that this way is less effective if some one can explain why.
You cannot accomplish the same thing by projecting the weight. You don't know for sure how those limbs are going to react to full draw weight until you put full draw weight on them. I use full draw weight from the very beginning and all through the process, no surprises that way.
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Steve I offer this respectfully. What you suggest has not been the case. I have tillered bows to full draw weight early. The bows tillered in that manner behaved as you would expect. Normal, no surprises. I quit doing that 8 or 10 years ago. I now do them as I have described and they behave normally. No surprises. I can’t say conclusively that it can’t happen, only that it never has.
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I use full draw weight from the very beginning and all through the process, no surprises that way.
I thought you would do it like SLIMBOB because of your no-set-tillering theory. I guess I have no idea what your theory says about the current topic of pulling weight.
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I still get surprises from time to time..sometimes good ones,,. )-w(
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I use full draw weight from the very beginning and all through the process, no surprises that way.
I thought you would do it like SLIMBOB because of your no-set-tillering theory. I guess I have no idea what your theory says about the current topic of pulling weight.
For the majority of my years I did the same as slimbob, only the last few years I started working at full draw weight from the start. I like it better. The big difference is that I can't floor tiller it as far as I used to and go to the tiller tree when the bow is still pretty heavy. I would have an occasional surprise where when I started increasing draw weight the limb would start taking set. I first started using it on heavy ELBs and then just started doing it on everything. I had a lot of close calls when I was floor tillering close to weight, more than once I had to tiller the bow around 1 slightly weak spot i created floor tillering too close. At the full weight method I don't have to be as careful, I just start off strong and stay strong until I hit my draw length. For me it is more fool proof.
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I use full draw weight from the very beginning and all through the process, no surprises that way.
I thought you would do it like SLIMBOB because of your no-set-tillering theory. I guess I have no idea what your theory says about the current topic of pulling weight.
It still works the same with the no set tillering method, you find a benchmark and then go back and check it after drawing to full weight and see if it changes.
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My usual draw weight target is just 40 pound. If I pull hard on a bow at the long string stage, there is a good chance that I can pull it way over 40 pound just to see if it will bend at all. I just hate to look at the scale all the time while I pull on a bow on the tillering tree. Frankly I hardly ever use it anymore. I just tiller the stave without putting on the string to the short string stage. Then I tiller it short stringed to even out the bend, usually for less than an hour each time. I do not pull on it hard unless I am close to my draw length target. Then of course, I have never made a perfectly tillered bow. It sounds incredible but I read somewhere old master bowyers never even stringed the bow until it was all but finished. I guess they were doing perfect no-set-tillering.
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I used to take it to floor tiller with my draw knife and then usually do no more than about 20 min tillering to finish it up.
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That is closer to what I do Steve. never 20minutes,but sometimes it's nearly finished shortly after floor tiller. If the stave is straight and there is no heat straightening to do, then it's nearly done after floor tiller.