Buckthorn Flatbow

[Jonas]

Hello,
this is the first time I used buckthorn as a bowwood and I must say, its pretty good stuff.
I often hear that buckthorn is inclinded to break at the back, but this one luckily doesnt have this issues. I ll build more to see if this was just a lucky shot. Nevertheless, it s not a bow wood for beginners, you ll need a lot of sandpaper to make it shine, it s veeery soft and no fun to work with the drawknife.
However- here it is. It s 33lbs@26", weights about 400g and is 170cm long.

[Jonas]

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[Jonas]

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[Jonas]

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[TacticalFate]

Whohoo that is gorgeous! I've only broken one buckthorn bow, and that had tons of knots on the back. I don't think buckthorn has a tendancy to break, but it really needs to be processed immediately after cutting-debarked and split at least. The staves I've cut and not debarked immediately developed gray colored decay underneath the bark from the residual moisture- the cambium is very wet.

[legend]

Hey Jonas ,
Love the character and colour contrast to that bow

[sieddy]

Great job man- you must be proud of that. Love the cambium camo on the back! 😎

[BowEd]

Beautiful color contrast to that wood.Cool muscled up back also.Excellent tip work too.Your more then lucky.Your a bit skilled there too.Congrats!!!Full draw tiller looks very good too.Eliptical.Should shoot pretty sweet for ya.Probably was a bit narrow though.Reason for the set I imagine.Still a very nice bow.Did you heat treat it any?It might jeopardize the back though doing that and then make you unlucky....lol.It all depends on how elastic that buckthorn is.

[Steve Milbocker]

That's a pretty bow Jonas!

[selfbow joe]

Nice looking bow

[upstatenybowyer]

Love the simplicity. Nice work 

[Hawkdancer]

Real nice!  That bow has character!
Hawkdancer

[Limbit]

Could have told me that was Yew and I would probably have believed you.

[simson]

Let me first say I admire what you have done here, very good executed. Good job on finish, tips, and so on.
But, I think this wood is not worth the effort. I'm pretty sure this is glossy buckthorn (rhamnus frangula) not the common buckthorn (rhamnus cathartiga) we see from time to time here and which makes good bows.
At least the glossy buckthorn I have heere in Germany is not good bowwood. I have tested some bows and after some time I made firewood aout of them. The wood is brittle, extreme low sg, and breaks after some shooting unexpected and with a great bang.
No offense here, but I would suggest put your nice work into better wood and be prepared about a sudden bang!

[Jonas]

Thank you all for the kind words!
@ TacticalFate: Thanks for sharing your experience. I also have a stave with the bark left on because I didnt know which way to dry buckthorn best - I ll see if it makes a difference.
@Beadman: Honestly said, I was thinking the opposite, that the area after the fades (was that what you meant by narrow? the language... ) might bend a little more. Anyway - since its shooting pretty good, I ll leave it the way it is 
@Simson: Interesting, I didnt know about the different kinds of buckthorn. I looked them up and now I am pretty sure it is the common buckthorn. When I first cut the wood, I thought it was dogwood because of the leaves, which are very similar to buckthorn. The leaves of the glossy buckthorn look different.