2016 Primitive Archer Bow Trade Sign up and Information

[mwosborn]

Thumbs up Rich!    You and all the others in the group make me happy I jumped in!

David - If you get a chance, a pic of the unbraced bow along side of the pic where you are pulling on the tree makes it easier to determine whats going on with the bow.  You probably have one posted here somewhere - but we are up to 80 pages!!    Depending on the unbraced profile that "hinge" may not be as obvious as you think.

Didn't get any work done tonight on the bows - meeting at school. 

Mitch

[Drewster]

Gutshot, I saved your image to my hard drive, used one of my photo software programs to rotate it and then reposted.  Just took a couple of minutes.

[---GUTSHOT--->]

Did a little tillering tonight...tiller isn't quite even and I still need to tweek my alignment some more.  I may have cut the rest a little deep so straightening at the handle may be a little dicy but there always plan b

It's at about a 4" brace and pulling 30#@14".

Ajooter bow is looking good. And what's up with the Hoyt shirt on a PA website. Just agrivating ya! I have a Mathews shirt on here at work.

It's at about a 4" brace and pulling 30#@14".

[Dakota Kid]

David I was going to mention that the interlocking grain of HHB often can lead to tear outs if your draw knife starts splitting rather than cutting. That's about the only drawback with that wood I've noticed so far.  Watch the blade angle and keep it sharp. Looks like there's still plenty of wood left though. I usually switch from the draw knife to a surform pocket plane after the rough out is finished. I like to modify the blade a little so it takes off more wood. If you take a small flat pointed file and do 2-3 pushes from the inside in each little hole, you'd be surprised by the improvement. It looks like it would take far longer than it actually does, maybe 10 minutes but well worth it. 

[half eye]

Well I made up for the splinter, kinda-sorta. Decided that with a bunch of weight I'm going from a Penobscott to one of the Iroquois types of single bows, got that cutout and just passed floor tiller.

Dont know about the rest of you fellas but we are in the middle of a series of winter storms at 3 days and a couple more to go, and averaging 10-12 inches a day But I did manage to get this much done after diggin out the shed for the umpteenth time
rich
PS I agree Dakota, I have to cut mine out with a saw but from then on it's hand tools, meaning rasps and files then sanding blocks.....yup, Ironwood will let you know the minuet your tools get dull....but it makes a hell of a bow.

[burchett.donald]

  Rich, Those pictures make me glad I'm living in S.Crolina   By the way that looks like some kinda heavy beast your pulling
                                                                                                                                        Don

[half eye]

Mr. Burchett,  We have had a easy winter compared to the usual, but this is getting old right here
Ya that thing is definitely in the "stand on the string" range for sure.
rich

[PlanB]

Rich, you've funneled off all our normal winter snow before it gets here. Plowed once this winter, and that wasn't even worth it - 3". But I wanted to start the old tractor because it's been sitting for months.

Looking forward to your bow build!

Dakota, that's a neat tip, sharpening a sureform -- I'm going to have to try it!

Gutshot, the bow looks real good now. I sure hope the handle works out.

[jandersson]

God morning,
The work on the lilac has been going slow. I've been taking a lot  of belly wood off the last few days but it's still very stiff. I found some posts by "sumpitan" and I guess he makes bows that pull 45# out off thumb wide 48" lilac sticks. After reading that I realized I'm gonna have to reduce my stave a whole lot. Mine is now 1 7/8 wide across the belly, 1/2"-5/8" thick, 60" long and about 44" working limb. I've decided to sinew the back for extra security. My question is if I should try to keep the width and work mostly on thickness? Right now I got 50# at 3".

[half eye]

Mr. Andersson,
      You have yourself a balancing act here.....the sinew is going to add enough performance that you have to consider BOTH factors that you mentioned. If you leave the limbs wide and sinew you run the risk of having to tiller wood away on the belly to the point of making them too thin.....BUT....if you narrow the limbs width first you need to be carefull that you leave enough to guarantee enough surface area so that the sinew doesn't "pop" off.
    I have never built a sinew bow, but have worked on some, so my advise would be to study up on width vs thickness......then reduce width, then sinew, have enough wood to finish the belly tillering process.
    That is not a whole lot of help, and maybe some of the guys who know about the process can give a more direct answer.
rich

[PlanB]

jandersson, that's pretty interesting about the thumb wide 48"  45# lilac bows. But I'm wondering what is their draw length?

I guess  a lot depends on what you need for your trade guy's draw. I see you have 44" working limbs total because of the stiff tips. And the reflex right out of the handle is going to make bringing to brace hard to start with.

Just to give you a thickness data point, black birch, which has a similar very high stiffness, runs about 3/8" thick mid limb, on a 2" wide non-lever 64" 40# bow. No backing.  I don't know the quality of the 44" working section of yours, so don't know why the backing. Not making any recommendations one way or the other at all in this, just giving you info to add to your cogitations when considering draw length, width and thickness.

[Dakota Kid]

I think when you "sharpen" the surform blades, most of the improvement comes from bending as apposed to sharpening.  The file pushes those little blades out a smidgen and changes the blade angle. This allows it to scoop and lift more wood with each pass.

[PlanB]

Oh, okay Dakota, I get it -- I was wondering about whether a file could sharpen, because I figured the sureform blade was hardened. Makes sense. Thanks!

[half eye]

Fellas, thought I'd catch you up on the latest bow....there are pics of the front and side profiles and a couple of "floor tiller" pics I'm nearly ready to brace it up and check tiller and weight.
rich
2 sets of pics and also a shot of my files and rasps

[half eye]

second pics

The first "draw" pic you can see the left limb is stiff and the second ya can see it coming around