Will Hickory make a good heavy bow

[Ian.]

 Looking at making a heavy hickory bow 140Lb ish, first off will it make the weight and second if it will what dimensions would you suggest to start on.

Thanks

[adb]

Why hickory?

[Jaro]

Ian, I have seen some nice all hickory longbows in 60# made for serious clout shooting, but I wouldnt use hickory for heavy longbow.
I would cut that plank into 6 backings  Then contact closest hardwood flooring dealer and get few planks of Ipe.
Hickory is so much stronger in tension than in compression that it will tend to crush its own belly on longbow profile. Also it will come out as I suspect with very bad mass to stiffness ratio, when made as selfbow. It cannot be much improved by heat treating like soe other, more fat woods. The stiffnes and belly load could be improved by laminating hickory on hickory, but then again, once you start to glue, there are much better choices for belly wood.

[adb]

Thanks, Jaro... my thoughts exactly.

[coyote pup]

Personally I like hickory and I'd use hickory for anything. I'd go 70", start out at about 1.5 wide in the center, narrow to about 5/8" at the tips. Not sure exactly how thick, maybe about 3/4" to start and go from there. Slightly rounded belly. JMO

[Ian.]

thanks for the feedback   I do have belly woods but nothing that can take that weight sapele is the best ive got.

[adb]

You will NOT get a 140# selfbow from hickory at 70"!!!! Not if you're drawing it past 24" or so. What draw length do you hope to achieve? When I think warbow, tillering full compass to 32" comes to mind. This requires special wood, and hickory self bows do not come to mind. 70" would be too short for almost any wood. Hickory would make an excellent backing wood, in combination with osage, ipe, jatoba, yew, and a few others. It would need to be at least 78" NTN for that kind of draw weight.
Hickory is tough stuff, but it does not excel in compression. Making a 70" bow, 1.5" at center, would result in unbelievable amounts of set, if you could get the wood to hold up in the first place! Hickory excels (in a selfbow format) with wide, flat limbs.

[adb]

I mean no offense, but who will be shooting this bow? I believe there are only a limited handful of people in the world, who regularily shoot full draw bows in the 140# class. For that matter, there are also only a smaller handful of people making them.

[Ian.]

I mean no offense, but who will be shooting this bow? I believe there are only a limited handful of people in the world, who regularily shoot full draw bows in the 140# class. For that matter, there are also only a smaller handful of people making them.

I'll be shooting it, I have asked about heavy bow before the main thing that holds me back for pulling high draw weights is making bows heavy enough i don't know how the likes of bickerstaffe can make a heavy laminate I currently have a 130Lb bow that I bought, ill have a crack at a 1/2" backing of hickory on a sapele belly, but any suggestions who be greatly appreciated

[Marc St Louis]

Jaroslav
Hickory is a better bow wood than White Ash and it seems to me that you have made some pretty heavy weight bows out of that.  The only problem with Hickory is that it works better at a low MC.

For a 140# bow I would go with 1 1/2" wide and perhaps 74" long, that should be good for a 31" draw.  You didn't specify if you wanted to make a traditional English warbow therefore I would suggest a shallow D section.

[adb]

I would dearly love to see a 74", 140# @ 31" hickory self warbow.

[Jaro]

Marc I did, but that was very special ash, and perhaps one in thousand ash planks does for bows that heavy as I made. It should be noted that those very also very shallow in profile.
What I suspect with hickory bow in this weight and construction is that it will be pretty much unbreakable, but also sluggish and shocky, with ammount of set, we dont usually consider normal.
But maybe not if you make it, since you tiler better than most people on archery boards anyway.

Ian, I havent tried the sapelle, but I have seen sapele bow of 70# and it looked like the belly was going to be inevitably crushed.
If you only have hickory, then cut a backing strip and cut thickness taper on belly and reglue together on some simple former to get like 1 1/2" of reflex in outer limbs. That might help you offset negatives I mentioned. If you cannot get Ipe, try at least bulletwood (massarundaba), even though it is not that good, it is still better than sapelle.

Having no yew (almost) me and lads around here have made some seriously heavy bows out of hornbeam - that is european hornbeam and I suspect that it is closest to hickory we have, though not so hard. Dogwood bows of 100# shoot pretty well, the only trouble is pin fretting should the pin cross the belly from side.

What I m trying to tell you that once you venture into the 140# your wood choices are going to be more and more limited.

Jaroslav

[skerm]

Having no yew (almost) me and lads around here have made some seriously heavy bows out of hornbeam - that is european hornbeam and I suspect that it is closest to hickory we have, though not so hard.

Without backing?

[Jaro]

Without backing, because made of split staves with unbroken back ring.

[Ian.]

Ill have a go with hickory to make the weight results good or bad will be posted