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11
Arrows / Fancy Eastern Woodlands style blunt with Buzzard
« Last post by jameswoodmot on Today at 12:12:23 pm »
After making my short bows, it only seemed right to make an arrow or two to go with them.
Hickory isn’t really available here and any Elm I’m going to keep for making bows. I decided to try making these from shoots instead of split wood, just to see how it worked really. The area whay I was in only offered Rowan or Hazel in the required size and I know Hazel can be too brittle for arrows so I thought I’d give the rowan a go.

Cut shoots about an inch in diameter and 6ft long so I could get two arrows from each. I roughed down the shaft with a small axe and knife to about 5/8 octagonal so I could force dry and straighten them by the fire.
Once dry and straight I decided to finish one to see how the rowan is, it’s quite light and doesn’t feel super tough. It’s relatively stiff for its weight.
It started quite huge and I slowly made it smaller and smaller to get down to around 500 grains.

Some of the originals were unfletched so I tried shooting it with a 35lb Tatar and with the finest release I could get it would just about fly ok but any plucking and it would kick off. Realistically it’s probably just too stiff for the bow.

I found a road kill Buzzard (similar to a red tailed hawk but all brown and white) which you can pick up in the U.K.. unfortunately he had his head and body run over but his wings and tail are ok.
I used two of his tail feathers and some neck feathers for the fletching.

The guy I gave the bow to brought me some Roe deer back strap with sinew still attached so I was able to use that for the fletching. I’ve never had access to back strap sinew before so that was fun.

Stained the shaft (and my hands, sofa, carpet clothes and face) with Fiebings leather dye.

Damn things too clean and pretty to shoot now!
12
Bows / Re: Short staves- draw length and draw weight trade off
« Last post by jameswoodmot on Today at 11:57:58 am »
Pics
13
Bows / Re: bamboo self bow build
« Last post by WhistlingBadger on Today at 11:57:09 am »
Really nice.  Those hollow-belly bamboo limbs look so cool.  I bet it's going to be faster than fast.
14
Bows / Re: Short staves- draw length and draw weight trade off
« Last post by jameswoodmot on Today at 11:56:02 am »
I took almost no photos of making the second one but I took a few videos of pulling it in-hand along the way so I could keep an eye on the asymmetric tiller. This is the only full draw pic I can get.

The other photos I took in the woods after half hour of shooting with the guy I gave it to. It looks like it’s got string follow off to one side of the centre but it’s actually the knot that’s there making it look off, the string follow is dead centre.
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Bows / Re: Short staves- draw length and draw weight trade off
« Last post by jameswoodmot on Today at 11:44:45 am »
This is the only other photo I have of it, just after painting. Once it’s dry I’ll get proper photos and full draw pics
16
Bows / Re: Short staves- draw length and draw weight trade off
« Last post by jameswoodmot on Today at 11:40:25 am »
Here is the first bow that ended up as a laminate.

The photo outside is right after shooting and the one inside is 20 or so mins after. Flat through the middle.
You can see the odd side bend too, it’s got a bit of a twist when strung but you kinda have to look for it
17
Bows / Re: Short staves- draw length and draw weight trade off
« Last post by jameswoodmot on Today at 11:34:39 am »
The second bow was a great success, im dead pleased with it.

That wonky stave i posted earlier strightened up great with dry heat and loads of clamps and wedges. I have it a hot air gun heat treatment/ reflex bend with the slats clamped to the side like Del does. Getting it bending nicely before stringing I cut through a lot of the heat treatment so i gave it a second going over.

Again, even though i cut this one thicker, i still didnt have enough wood in the middle. Both these bows too set in the centre quarter so I need to remember to keep them really thick in the middle.

I couldnt get on top of my tiller on this one soon enough to take any reading of arrow speed at shorter draw lenghts. It was a bit seat of the pants and I got it to behave just as i was reaching 25". i was planning for 45 ish at 24" but it ended up 40 at 25" which is completely fine. It took a bit more set than the last one but its a couple of inches shorter and pulling quite a bit more so again, no biggie. After hald hours shooting it comes back with its tips inline and half- 3/4" reovered in half hour or so. I really liked shooting this bow but i gave it away already!

Its interesting how quickly i went from turning my nose up at these bows becasue i thought they were inelegant and didnt like the design because of the wide tips and straight lines, to them being two of my favourite bows ive made! Books by coveres, eh?
18
Bows / Re: Short staves- draw length and draw weight trade off
« Last post by jameswoodmot on Today at 11:21:44 am »
Yao could have saved you some trouble going down the rabbit hole of gas burners.  Too bad.  They didn’t work well for me either.  The only things that ended up working for me was a good heat gun which take a lot of time even if you build a holder, and a hot coal bed.  The coal bed is the best in my opinion to get a thorough cook.  You will benefit from protecting your back with a heat resistant material like insulation or insulating foil perhaps.  I used a roll of pink insulation layer out on sticky foil tape that worked.  I’ve since moved to roxul the green stuff held in a strip with foil tape and then weight that down as is cooks.  I find it doesn’t send glass fiber floaties around in the air like the pink stuff does.  Anyway some thing to consider for next time.  I also don’t heat treat woods like western or eastern cedars or junipers or yew really.  At least not the same as we would with white woods.  If doing corrections in twist or alignment fixes use steam. It will make the corrections more safe and drastically reduce your splinter lifts or breaks if done right.  Overheating can cause wood to become too brittle and snap.  White woods generally take more heat better the other woods even Osage.  So long as you take measures to avoid too much wrap around heat effect on the stave white woods can tolerate a lot.  I’ve got many hhb, hickory, elm and others in white wood category that have taken darker then normal heat cook over coals and been great shooters.  Even bamboo is a great candidate for heat treatment.  I know a lot of guys don’t do this but for me I’ve found some noticeable benefit from doing it.  If using bamboo for backing only heat treatment on the non rind side.  Especially for backing.  If using a bamboo backed and bellied bow then there is benefit to doing a treatment on the compression belly side boo only.  Some of my fastest bow have been these ones.  Anyway lots of info here on the forum.  Do some searches I’m sure you’ll see some good examples to give you a good reference.  Message me directly too if you like. superdav95@gmail.com

fantastic, Thanks for all tha info! I had no doubt i was not the only one to try gas burners but i couldnt find any info anywhere, its good to know you had the same issues as myself.
I have also found coals to be vastly superior as a heat source but I am limited on outdoor space and can only do one limb at a time so it becomes a bit of a pain. The next bows i do ill go back to coals.
great tip on the insulation board, i use a lot of small diameter staves as so there is always a big gap where the heat can get around, i'll try some insulation next time!

Im planning on keeping the burner and seeing if i can get an isualted box built to contain the heat and use it as a kiln for heat treating belly lams. I've roasted wood in the oven for appearences and its quite eaxy to get a consitant through colour. would be great to do a 40" piece that could be used for belly billets.


So the orginal bow turn out to be a wild sucess, after laminating with the black locust i got a great little bow. It was pulling 35lbs at 25" and shooting 316 grain arrows at about 161fps average which i was well happy with.

i tillered it almost symmetrical, not realising how much the tiller would change in the hand. I videoed myself shooting it and realised that i needed to weaken the top limb, it ended up being 32 ish lbs at 26" which is great as thats a full draw bow for me.

It had a bit of a twist after glue up and somehow the whole thing ended up bent but not twisted after tillering. No idea what happened there but it dictated to me which side to shoot off.

I barely took the bandsaw marks out of the centre, i didnt realise how much thickness was needed in the middle. The thickness taper caught me out a bit too, ive never made a bow with such wide tips, in hindsite its obvious but i ended up thinning the backing a lot on the outer thirds.

got it painted up with oil paints now so ill have to wait a month or so to shoot it again.
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Bows / Re: Yew specific gravity, performance and MoE
« Last post by Del the cat on Today at 08:16:35 am »
IMO the only generalisation you can make about Yew is that you can't make generalisations!
I used to use simulation programs and computer stuff when I designed electronics, and its all well and good.
But for making bows, is it "primitive"?
I was going to post my latest flight bow (boo backed yew) but the plywood riser is held together with screws, so I decided it was not primitive enough.
If we use the mass principal (and I don't so maybe I've got the wrong end of the stick) doesn't that pretty much account for density ring count etc?
Anyhow, the properties of a stave can vary along its length (even across its width!), and surely that's the challenge of working with wood?
It all seems a bit of overthink to me... after all, you can only use the wood you have! it's no good pining ::) for some perfect piece that is half way round the world with extortionate shipping.
Maybe I'm just a jaded old git?
I'm not "anti" using the software, just beware its limitations, and its not for me.
Del
20
Bows / Re: bamboo self bow build
« Last post by superdav95 on Today at 02:00:14 am »
A update on the bamboo self bow and a few more progress pics.  I got the handle sanded up and put a coat of tung oil on it to seal it a bit.  Ill add more later. the handle is made up of bloodwood, black walnut and black palm.   i also added thin horn plates for string groove nocks at the tips.  Ive had the string bite in and come close to splitting the bamboo on previous builds.  thanks for following along. 










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