Primitive Archer
Main Discussion Area => Bows => Topic started by: crumrw on July 22, 2021, 11:21:55 pm
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Well, after nearly 10 years out of the primitive archery world, I've made it my mission to hunt this year with primitive tools I make. I've started two bows in the past. One was an Osage self bow that George Stoneberg was helping me build when life took some turns on me, and I had to abandon my project. Got so close to finished too! I hope George ended up finishing it and getting some use out of it. I also attempted a really nice bamboo backed ipe that blew up on me during tillering.
Well long story long, here I am making what will hopefully be my first complete Osage self bow from wood I split and sat outside for about the last 10 years. It has some bug damage so I had to go down about 7 rings, but I'm finally at a point where I have a ring chased. It's pretty knotty and has pretty substantial propeller twist. My worry comes from the number and location of the knots, and how much I'm going to have to heat and bend things to line up. Should I keep going? Should I find a new stave? Should I make a board bow first? Feeling a little in over my head on this one.
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I can’t really tell much from the pics, so I will generalize with my thoughts on this. The easiest approach is a board straight, knot free Osage stave. That gives you the best chance for success, and you already know this. The more knots you add, and the less straight it is, the higher the difficulty factor and you know this as well. So THIS, is the stave you have. Knots are entirely workable on good Osage. Even troublesome knots in troublesome areas, but the likelihood of loosing one is greater. That is true for any veteran, and even more so for folks with very little experience. Draw your bow out, and post the pics. Good quality, close up pics. The layout could make or break it.
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As long as you don't pretend those knots and flaws aren't there, and don't shave it flat, you will be fine. Any flaw that exists treat it like a hole and leave fresh wood around it.
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I’ve been leaving one ring up around each knot and then worked them lightly to the knot with the edge of a knife. I feel pretty confident I haven’t violated the ring I chased, though I’m a bit nervous how the knots are going to affect the tillering.
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Just leave the extra width at the knots, to compensate and tillering will take care of itself.
Its osage, so its very resilient as long as you take your time and don't get ahead of yourself.
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How wide is your layout, it doesn't take much osage to make a bow, if you could narrow your limbs you could go between the knots.
Mine are always 1 1/4" wide, I have made them 1 1/8", my friend makes slinter bows down to 7/8" and has no trouble getting 55# bows.
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You will get some great help here on that stave from many folks...I wish you luck and am happy to hear you want to hunt with your Primitive Bow...I will begin by saying that I would recommend following the already split grain around those knots...Follow that grain my friend
Don
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I'm going to go in the opposite direction. I would put that stave aside, get a good clean board (if you have access) and make yourself a well tillered board bow to hunt with this year. Get a little more experience then tackle that stave. Good luck whatever your decision.
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Is this your first bow? Jawge
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Agree with Don. Don’t cut thru the knot. Swing wide around it.
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Is this your first bow? Jawge
If it makes a bow, this would be my first complete one, though I’ve gotten a self bow to a the tiller tree with help before and unfortunately moved locations before I had the ability to finish it.
Here’s where I’m currently at. The second and third photo shows a knot in the side wall that has me a bit concerned. It lies right at the end of where one fade will be. It didn’t seem too deep so I might be able to work it out a bit and stay within 1-1/2” with still.
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I'm going to go in the opposite direction. I would put that stave aside, get a good clean board (if you have access) and make yourself a well tillered board bow to hunt with this year. Get a little more experience then tackle that stave. Good luck whatever your decision.
I may end up doing just that. That being said, I'm ok with this one failing as long as I learn something along the way. I hope it doesn't though :D
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How wide is your layout, it doesn't take much osage to make a bow, if you could narrow your limbs you could go between the knots.
Mine are always 1 1/4" wide, I have made them 1 1/8", my friend makes slinter bows down to 7/8" and has no trouble getting 55# bows.
Trying to stick with 1-1/2" width until about 10" from the tips where the taper will begin to 1/2".
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Looks like you are making good safe moves so far. Keep it up!
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Heck yea go for it. You ought to see the wood I use.
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Heck yea go for it. You ought to see the wood I use.
Lol, Well if you're from Whitehouse, TX this came from pretty close to you!
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Wood is 7 times stronger in thickness than in width, I make mine with a slightly rounded belly and can get just about any poundage with a 1 1/4" wide bow. Avoiding as many anomaly's in your layout should be your primary concern. I have never made an osage bow 1 1/2" wide, I have made about 150 of them 1 1/4" wide.
With 1 1/2" wide your limbs are going to be very thin.
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Wood is 7 times stronger in thickness than in width, I make mine with a slightly rounded belly and can get just about any poundage with a 1 1/4" wide bow. Avoiding as many anomaly's in your layout should be your primary concern. I have never made an osage bow 1 1/2" wide, I have made about 150 of them 1 1/4" wide.
With 1 1/2" wide your limbs are going to be very thin.
Good to know. 1-1/2” was my safe width, and I’ll plan to reassess once it’s to that point. I’ve got one limb down to 1-1/2”, and because of a few edge knots I tried to remove I’m down to 1-1/4” in a couple places. I’ll probably end up at about 1-1/4” just by the way this thing is starting to lay out.
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Some updated pics. What do y’all see?
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More progress…belly side pics
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Keep on keeping on brother. Sometimes you pick the stave; sometimes the stave picks you. That stave picked you. Don't question it, just proceed the best you can and make a bow out of it. Looks great so far.
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Perfect layout!
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Tell us about the knife, you have been knapping a while?
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LOL! What is it about guys in Texas using the orneriest, nastiest staves of osage? This looks like something out of George Stoneberg's private stash!
Crumrw, George moved on to other passions several years ago, but he is a very talented bowyer that took a singularly perverse joy in bizarre pieces of character staves of osage. We all gave him good-natured ribbing about helping the poor guy out with a good stave out of charity, but the truth was he was always giving away his best staves to new bowyers and kept the marginal stuff for himself. It looks like you are starting down George's road with this stick. There are worse roads you could have picked.
Good luck and keep posting progress pics as you go. I know I am invested in seeing how this one comes out, brother.
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Thanks everyone! I feel inspired to keep going in this one now, regardless of the outcome.
I’ve been knapping for probably somewhere in the 15 year range, though I gave it up not long after I stopped working with George (2012ish) due to life and stuff. Most of the stuff I knapped went to my dad, as he was so fascinated with it. Unfortunately, lost my pops last year around this time, and in the process of organizing his things I found all my knives and arrowheads I had made him. Literally, a chronological evolution of my growth through the skill set. That discovery is actually what reinvigorated my interest in primitive archery and this journey to hunt with hand made tools!
The knife blade is raw Georgetown chert collected in Hamilton TX. The handle is Osage from the same cutting as the bow. I’ll post more pics if y’all are interested.
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Well here’s where we currently sit. I’ve gotten through a few issues, and others have arisen.
I’ve roughed out the bow, cut the bow to length, and heat bent the propeller twist out and also aligned the tips. I’m feeling pretty good about how this is laying out now. One point of concern for me is that in the right light I noticed the remnants of two cracks that I had to layout one of the bow tips between are still slightly visible. I knew the checking cracks were there, but thought they had been completely removed. One of them didn’t go all the way to the back, but the other does and looks like it’s headed to a small pin knot. Is this salvageable? The top is about 2” shorter than what is shown in the pics, so the cracks are about 2-4” from the tip. Secondly, one limb is slightly reflexed while the other is straight. Is this going to cause any issues with tillering? Should I add reflex to the straight limb. Bow is now 67” tip to tip.
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Bottom pic shows the width at the crack locations. Crack that goes to the back is on the side of the bow facing down in the picture, and the crack hits the back of the bow about an inch to the left of the knot at the bottom of the picture.
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Before and after heat bending
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Keep on trucking'! if necessary, a dose of super glue in the cracks, a wrap of sinew or rawhide, and a bit of luck! I am not experienced enough to give advice, but it looks pretty good to me so far! You are ahead of me!
Hawkdancer
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That could be a fatal frack, side checks are always bad news. If you can super glue the crack and get through the tillering process It will definitely need a wrap for a couple of inches with the center of the wrap centered where the crack meets the back.
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Ok, good to know. I wonder if I work the side until that little pin knot is gone if that completely remove it. Would that be a better option, or should I just pray it makes it through the tillering process so I can wrap it? If I worked it down, it would make the bow a bit thin at that point, but could possibly take an inch off each side to get that point closer to the tip.
I misspoke in my previous post. The crack hits the back of the bow just to the right of the 1” mark, headed for that tiny dark spot (pin knot) about the width of the tape measure right of the tape.
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Something like this, maybe?
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Well I worked both sides down a bit further, because it just felt like they were both so close to being worked out of the bow. Sure enough, with a few strokes of the draw knife and few strokes of the scraper, they appear to be gone! The tip is stil currently about 5/8" wide, so I had a bit of room to play with.
Will post pics shortly.
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What it looks like now
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That should be plenty of width since your nocks will probably end up at 3/8" wide, or maybe 1/2" if you want thicker ones. Hopefully your problem has been solved...on to new ones!
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Don’t worry y’all! I haven’t forgotten about this project. I’ve made a bit of progress, including learning how to Flemish twist a tillering string, building a tillering tree, and getting a scale. I’ve also been slowly getting through the tillering process. Below are some pics of where I’m currently at. Ignore the marks on the wall, as the bow handle is slightly angled and causes the right limb to start lower. The shims I used were sliding around so I didn’t use them for these photos. That being said, the right limb is still a bit weaker than the left. Also the snakey character of the left limb makes it challenging to tiller correctly, but the photos shows that it might need to bend a bit more just left of the handle. Am I right? What are y’all’s thoughts?
First image is with the long string ( bow is shimmed in this photo). The rest are short string without shims.
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More
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good to see it's still alive! This is the point I usually start getting impatient.
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I’m about 47-48 lbs at 28” now. The brace height is a little low, so I’ll make the final string a hair shorter. Shape the handle, clean up the tips, do a once-over sanding and finish, and the critters should be running!
What do y’all use to finish your bow?
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Looking great! You’ll want to make sure you shoot it a bit and recheck the tiller again before you finish it. I really like a couple coats of minwax tung oil finish with a couple coats of Truoil over top of that.
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I've used tru-oil for ever. I just bought a can of spar varnish and it's a little easier, or at least quicker. Both work great for me.
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Looking good like others have said. Tiller looking good to. This is going to be a great first bow I’m guessing. Your not sandbagging us are you Tx.😁😁 Arvin
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That is one heckuva first bow.... before finishing it up, start with some half draw shots and work your way out to full draw shot. That way if anything changes you can fix without ruining any finsh. Again, nice work on a tough first stave, I bet we see some cool stuff from you in the future
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Looking good like others have said. Tiller looking good to. This is going to be a great first bow I’m guessing. Your not sandbagging us are you Tx.😁😁 Arvin
Lol, I assure you I’m not sandbagging y’all. I actually was at about 52lbs at 25” and ended at 47lbs at 28”, so needless to say I made a few over corrections and chased the tiller a bit at the end resulting in a slightly lower than expected draw weight. All in all, I’m still pinching myself on this one, but it ain’t over yet. I still gotta send an arrow ;)
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I've used tru-oil for ever. I just bought a can of spar varnish and it's a little easier, or at least quicker. Both work great for me.
Thank you! Was thinking truoil but was worried about the sheen. I think have some spare varnish I could use
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That’s a great looking osage bow. I finish my bows with 6-8 coats of Tru-oil followed with a final coat of spar-urethane to knock the sheen off the bow. Good luck with it this fall!
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I've used tru-oil for ever. I just bought a can of spar varnish and it's a little easier, or at least quicker. Both work great for me.
Thank you! Was thinking truoil but was worried about the sheen. I think have some spare varnish I could use
To get get of the sheen buff it with a mix of olive oil and pumice powder. Creates a beautiful finish with low sheen.
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Got the handle and tips shaped. Will share some draw pics shortly!
I suppose it’s about time to start thinking about arrows. Here’s a run down of where I’m at. I cut a few crepe Myrtle shafts out of the front yard about a month ago. I also picked up a handful of tomato stakes. I did notice one of the crepe Myrtle shafts was quite brittle as I was straightening it and I kept breaking it shorter and shorter. That particular shaft also has trouble staying straight for very long. My biggest concern is testing the spine. I don’t have a spine tester. Is there a good method for tuning arrows without one? Another consideration that makes this even more difficult is my arrow heads all weigh slightly different. Would love to get opinions on next steps.
Thank you for all the continued help in this journey!
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Boy your first bow looks better than my 50th :P :) (SH) :-D
I can't wait to see it finished :)
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Got the handle and tips shaped. Will share some draw pics shortly!
I suppose it’s about time to start thinking about arrows. Here’s a run down of where I’m at. I cut a few crepe Myrtle shafts out of the front yard about a month ago. I also picked up a handful of tomato stakes. I did notice one of the crepe Myrtle shafts was quite brittle as I was straightening it and I kept breaking it shorter and shorter. That particular shaft also has trouble staying straight for very long. My biggest concern is testing the spine. I don’t have a spine tester. Is there a good method for tuning arrows without one? Another consideration that makes this even more difficult is my arrow heads all weigh slightly different. Would love to get opinions on next steps.
Thank you for all the continued help in this journey!
Buy some proper matched shafts to get you in the ballpark first. Once you have a known arrow that shoots well there are ways to match it.
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Buy some proper matched shafts to get you in the ballpark first. Once you have a known arrow that shoots well there are ways to match it.
Was thinking about this. I have a few carbon arrows in a similar spine i can test with. Good suggestion.
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Boy your first bow looks better than my 50th :P :) (SH) :-D
I can't wait to see it finished :)
Thanks for the kind words. It ain’ta bow though until it flings an arrow, so keep your fingers crossed for me!
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Boy your first bow looks better than my 50th :P :) (SH) :-D
I can't wait to see it finished :)
Thanks for the kind words. It ain’ta bow though until it flings an arrow, so keep your fingers crossed for me!
Fingers crossed :)
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Here is a draw pic
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Bingo!!! :OK
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Full draw looks great, especially with the stave you started with. Hopefully it will hold together for a long time to make you a durable hunting bow.
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Getting that good of a tiller on that wonky lower limb shows you do really good work.
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Thank y’all for the kind words!
When I was splitting this log over 10 years ago, I had the back of my axe head explode on me with a hammer strike sending two pieces of metal about the size of a .22 bullet into my right leg. An emergency room visit, and a talk with an orthopedic surgeon led to emergency surgery to remove both pieces due to risk of nerve damage to my ankle and lower leg. I took this build slow for several reasons, but one big reason was I that I felt this wood OWED me a bow, lol.
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Thank y’all for the kind words!
When I was splitting this log over 10 years ago, I had the back of my axe head explode on me with a hammer strike sending two pieces of metal about the size of a .22 bullet into my right leg. An emergency room visit, and a talk with an orthopedic surgeon led to emergency surgery to remove both pieces due to risk of nerve damage to my ankle and lower leg. I took this build slow for several reasons, but one big reason was I that I felt this wood OWED me a bow, lol.
My goodness what a story! Seems like the wood produced you a bow
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Thank y’all for the kind words!
When I was splitting this log over 10 years ago, I had the back of my axe head explode on me with a hammer strike sending two pieces of metal about the size of a .22 bullet into my right leg. An emergency room visit, and a talk with an orthopedic surgeon led to emergency surgery to remove both pieces due to risk of nerve damage to my ankle and lower leg. I took this build slow for several reasons, but one big reason was I that I felt this wood OWED me a bow, lol.
dang! that wood definitely payed you back in full! its a great looking bow