Author Topic: Heat-treating in the old way?  (Read 14536 times)

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Offline Marc St Louis

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Heat-treating in the old way?
« on: September 01, 2019, 07:35:14 am »
Reading what Shannon said about his ancestors heat-treating their bows just doesn't sit quite right with me.  I thought a bit about it and honestly the idea that natives would spend that much time "improving" a bow when a properly made untreated bow will easily get the job done especially when their hunting skill were such that they could get quite close to the prey just doesn't make sense to me. 

Like many people, I had read about natives liking fire killed wood for making bows before I started my initial experiments on heat-treating in early 2000 but you know, a fire killed tree will not have heat-treated wood, except maybe on the back, since the belly of the bow would have been well protected from the fire.  The only bit of information that suggested to me that dry heat was actually used on bows to set them or induce a different shape was an account about the English using dry heat to rejuvenate Yew bows, still not a positive historical account since they may not have actually heat-treated the wood.  I had heard/read about early people exposing a bow to fire during it's construction but  got the impression, at the time, that it was only to speed dry the wood.  I talked to an old Algonquin, dead now, a number of years ago who had made bows when he was younger, much of his work is in a local museum, and he more or less confirmed that notion.  In addition, there is never a free meal.  A heat-treated bow is under more stress and therefore more likely to be subject to failure especially if the wood being used is not properly selected and/or exposed to certain conditions.  I've had failures, explosive, with a number of different species after being tempered including Osage, not too much fun after spending a fair bit of time working on the bow.  I've also had failures with bows that I was using for hunting that were subjected to repeated cold, as in freezing, for several days, intense cold will dry out wood.  To think that natives, who had only stone tools to make their bows, would take that risk after the intensive work required to make a bow with those stone tools also does not make sense to me.  I do believe they had better things to do.

To clarify one thing.  When I started making heat-treated bows it was not to revive a supposed lost art but because I like fast bows :BB

If anyone has better ideas then please include them here.
Home of heat-treating, Corbeil, On.  Canada

Marc@Ironwoodbowyer.com

Offline sleek

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Re: Heat-treating in the old way?
« Reply #1 on: September 01, 2019, 08:28:25 am »
 I do wonder, if its is a possibility that the use of fire was location specific.  Marc, being in Canada as you are, the need for heat on a bow is probably less than the need for it in the humid areas of the east coast about from Virginia and south to Florida. Everywhere else as you say, you get more likely to break a bow than benefit from it. I'd say its probably related more to specific woods as well than related to all... say Hickory and not elm so much. That's again assuming it done at all.

That being said  I have cooked a fresh cut stave, reduced to floor tiller, over a fire while camping. The next day that bow ( persimmon) was a very dried out fast shooter. It wasn't heated to the point of heat treat, just over the heat to the point you held you hand over the fire and it wouldn't burn but hurt real bad after a few seconds.

My dad told me stories of Indians using fire to make bows stronger. That was in the 90s, before the quick spread of information. One must wonder where everyone got the idea that natives did this. Honestly, I dont see natives stock pilling bow wood like we do. Chances are good, they cut a stave, fire cured it, then made the bow. We have never found a stockpile of roughed out bows set aside to cure much less a stave stash. Then of course, if the actually did store staves in ponds to keep bugs off, fire would probably be used to dry out the bow blank over a period of days....

Running the scenarios through my mind from all possible directions, it keeps going to the same spot, fire cured, not fire hardened for the sake of less work in cutting and storing staves, with the possibility of select locations heat treating select woods for humidity protection. But then again... tallow goes a long ways to prevent that problem as well.
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Offline bassman

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Re: Heat-treating in the old way?
« Reply #2 on: September 01, 2019, 08:39:18 am »
Some tribes had a working bow ,and always one in the works. Their labor free way of heat treat was to hang the bow over the fire, and let the heat, and smoke take care of it.Makes sense to me.

Offline bassman

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Re: Heat-treating in the old way?
« Reply #3 on: September 01, 2019, 08:59:29 am »
Some tribes carried 2 bows with them. That makes sense also, since their lives depended on those weapons for food ,and war. Mark, Sleek, if you 2 were natives back  then the way you both have passion for bow making you would have had staves hanging above the fire stuffed under the Buffalo hides, and any were else you could put them.

Offline DC

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Re: Heat-treating in the old way?
« Reply #4 on: September 01, 2019, 09:12:56 am »
I think that would depend on their lifestyle. If they were nomads like the plains people I don't think they would want a lot of extra "stuff". People that built permanent settlements would quite likely store a few staves, especially if they had a dedicated bowyer.

Offline PatM

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Re: Heat-treating in the old way?
« Reply #5 on: September 01, 2019, 09:32:47 am »
Perhaps but a roughed out plains style bow stave is not much bulkier than a couple of arrow shafts.

Offline bassman

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Re: Heat-treating in the old way?
« Reply #6 on: September 01, 2019, 09:38:24 am »
Half dozen 40 inch staves even  if they were plains natives  would have been much less  weight than one of the their tipi poles. Can't help but to think some carried an extra stave or 2 with them. They could have carried them in their quiver or strapped them on their horse. Sorry for getting off subject. They new fire hardening, and used it.

Online bjrogg

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Re: Heat-treating in the old way?
« Reply #7 on: September 01, 2019, 09:39:04 am »
Some tribes carried 2 bows with them. That makes sense also, since their lives depended on those weapons for food ,and war. Mark, Sleek, if you 2 were natives back  then the way you both have passion for bow making you would have had staves hanging above the fire stuffed under the Buffalo hides, and any were else you could put them.

I know the second I broke my first selfbow, I was heartbroken. I knew right Then and there that as soon as possible I was never going to be without a bow again. Almost immediately I started making two more. Almost like my life depended on it. Theirs did.
Bjrogg
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Online bjrogg

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Re: Heat-treating in the old way?
« Reply #8 on: September 01, 2019, 10:02:28 am »
I think that would depend on their lifestyle. If they were nomads like the plains people I don't think they would want a lot of extra "stuff". People that built permanent settlements would quite likely store a few staves, especially if they had a dedicated bowyer.

I'm thinking the same DC.

I'm also thinking that they spent a lot of their time around a fire and just kinda using it's magic to influence on many  things. I'm thinking they constantly were working on tools, hides, weapons and foodstuffs all around their fires. They didn't waste their time watching TV. I think their fires were their wookshops and their schools. Their social center and their place for scientific experimentation. Their spiritual connection. It's pretty natural to experiment with fire. We just naturally want to put things in it. From wood to meat and even stones. I'm sure they would have constantly been drying their possessions around and over the fire. I'm also thinking it would have been used at least for drying their slow water soaked bows. Quite possibly and probably even by accident one to close or left on to long was heat treated. If they felt it was enough of an improvement they may have tried to duplicate it. They may also have thought the spirit and power of the fire was even introduced into their bows.

Bjrogg

Just kinda thinking out loud
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Offline DC

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Re: Heat-treating in the old way?
« Reply #9 on: September 01, 2019, 10:28:50 am »
It's hard to imagine isn't it. No TV, no books, not a single luxury ;). You'd think they were bored spitless but I guess they always had little chores to do. Fix this, improve that. Make up stories.

Online bjrogg

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Re: Heat-treating in the old way?
« Reply #10 on: September 01, 2019, 10:34:47 am »
It's kinda funny DC. One thing us kids learned really young was to never tell our dad we were boarded. He could always find something for us to do.
Bjrogg
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Offline sleek

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Re: Heat-treating in the old way?
« Reply #11 on: September 01, 2019, 10:40:48 am »
It's kinda funny DC. One thing us kids learned really young was to never tell our dad we were boarded. He could always find something for us to do.
Bjrogg

It usually involved hard labor...
Tread softly and carry a bent stick.

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Offline DC

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Re: Heat-treating in the old way?
« Reply #12 on: September 01, 2019, 10:44:30 am »
I've noticed from years of camping that you have to go through a period of boredom before you can really relax.

Online bjrogg

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Re: Heat-treating in the old way?
« Reply #13 on: September 01, 2019, 10:56:28 am »
It's kinda funny DC. One thing us kids learned really young was to never tell our dad we were boarded. He could always find something for us to do.
Bjrogg

It usually involved hard labor...

It ALWAYS  involved hard labor.

Well stated DC. Nothing more relaxing for this old fart than boardum
Bjrogg
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Offline Marc St Louis

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Re: Heat-treating in the old way?
« Reply #14 on: September 01, 2019, 11:06:57 am »
Some tribes had a working bow ,and always one in the works. Their labor free way of heat treat was to hang the bow over the fire, and let the heat, and smoke take care of it.Makes sense to me.

There is a big difference between heat-curing and heat-tempering, a big difference in the amount of heat needed. The accounts I read is that they would hang a stave, or half finished bow, in their shelter, tipi, longhouse, whatever, but not directly over the fire
Home of heat-treating, Corbeil, On.  Canada

Marc@Ironwoodbowyer.com