Game. On. First board bow...

[bubby]

That's a long riser you have going. How narrow is the grip, the narrower you go the thicker the wood needs to be in that area.
If it is roughed out 1" wide by the time you are finished it will be considerably narrower and in the case i would glue a extra piece on the handle area, another variable is if you are cutting in a shelf you need thicker material at that point as well. A couple 1/4" thick strips will work fine

[Ippus]

Well, I was trying to mimic the cherry "ringer" in Boards from Bows (ch 2, TBB II, p29-30), which is described as having a 6" handle and wider than normal limbs (3" at the grip) tapering to 1/4" nocks. I'm not quite ambitious enough to go all the way to 1/4" my first time out...
The handle on that bow doesn't appear to be any thicker than 3/4" based on the pictures.

The handle on my bow here is 6" from fade to fade, 3/4" thick, slightly generous 1 1/4" wide in the middle (1 5/16?), tapering to 1 1/8" on either side before widening out to the limbs at just under 2.5". Is that too narrow? I was basically going to smooth the edges and then wrap it with something.

I'm hearing what you're saying about stiffening it up, though... do you think at the width I have there, it's not going to be stable enough without some added thickness?

Edit: Forgot about the arrow shelf. No, I wasn't planning on cutting in a shelf.

[Ippus]

Okay, got the handle piece glued on. It's a 1/2" thick piece of alder that had similar color and grain, 7" long. Total handle thickness is now ~1-1/4"

Questions for the group:
1) Looks like even though I clamped it, there's a little bit of a gap between the bow and the riser on one side there. Do I rasp it down so there's a smooth transition? Try to glue a shim or fill the gap with sawdust/glue mixture before I sand it down? Other suggestions?

2) I've read through the chapter on strings, and tbh a lot of it isn't sinking in. Can anyone recommend a good string-building video/pictorial?

[FilipT]

Surfaces weren't completely flat. Try to correct this connection with rasping sides.

[Ippus]

Handle smoothed out. I took Stalker's advice and rasp/filed down the curve to where there's no longer a gap.

[FilipT]

Looking good! You did well. Same thing happened on my first attempt of board bow (it was also supposed to be my first bow). Unfortunately it broke during tillering.

[Ippus]

Unfortunately it broke during tillering.

Oh, don't say that! You'll jinx it, lol!

[loon]

There's backyardbowyer's videos on string building...
I think it may be easiest to really wax, then twist a bundle of strands and then tie knots. Would you be using fast-flight or dacron type material?

This knot seemed to work with D-10 (dyneema, basically just like D97) for me... can always apply some superglue, I guess. Or do overhand or a fig. 8 on a bight, which'd be more permanent. Or a zeppelin bend loop O_o .. I'd probably go with this knot first:



A timber hitch type knot is like a noose, so that could be the end that's permanently on the bow. This variation of the timber hitch is less prone to slipping, and seemed to work with D-10 for me:



from: https://echoarchery.blogspot.com/2014/12/fast-flight-strings-and-bowyers-knot.html

I think if you burn the tag/loose end after tying the knots, after they've settled with some shooting or something, the burning will expand the strands and make it so they can't slip through the knot?

[Ippus]

B50 dacron is what I was planning on. I bought a spool of it a ways back when I made my first stickbow attempt (picked a bad stick for it, and it didn't survive, anyway...).

[Knoll]

Ya may find this useful for making bowstring.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ukoRMI4pbiM
Also, 2 colors of string makes things easier for me to see what am doing.

[loon]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RzZCfoopOKk

i think flemish would be too stretchy for dacron... could try to leave the non-loop portion untwisted I guess

[bubby]

Flemish works just fine with flemish twist

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RzZCfoopOKk

i think flemish would be too stretchy for dacron... could try to leave the non-loop portion untwisted I guess

[Stick Bender]

I'm liking the long riser look on that bow !

[SLIMBOB]

Something to consider....narrow and thin is no bueno, especially in the fades.  At the point where your limb "begins" to narrow at the fade, it should also begin to thicken correspondingly.  It appears as though your thickness taper (glued in piece) begins well past that point leaving a narrow and thin section.

[Stick Bender]

The first board bow I tried to make with my only knowledge base was a 1996 copy of PA I did the same thing and the bow cracked right in the Fade area there is a lot of stress in that area , that was my first lesson of hard knocks in bow making  had many more lol