48" Ottawa, elm backed maple (not for bom)

[half eye]

Made three rough out bows for a friend in Maine. One of them is this little Ottawa. It is 48# @ 26....hard maple backed with red elm. the bow is 1-3/8" wide and 7/16" thick. It shoots really fast and hard. The arrow in the "full draw" shot is only 26" so the draw is an inch short of what it's tillered to. It has 1/2" set and picks up about 1/4" of temp string follow. While not too authentic, this wood combination seems to make a real lively bow. The bow only weighs 8 ounces, with the string.

It has no finish at all, and needs to be final sanded. Just thought it was interesting wood combination and maybe give ya some ideas.
rich

[wildman]

Wow very nice you are a one man bow factory

[John K]

Love it rich, would be a great little ambush bow !

[beetlebailey1977]

There ya go again.....neat little bow.

[gstoneberg]

That's nice.  I love that bend.

George

[Keenan]

Those are sure some neat little bows Rich. I'm very impressed with the variation of bows that you kick out. Most of us settle into a certain style and don't venture away from that very often. Your range of bows is inspiring

[hammertime]

Yeah Keenans right very cool bows,from the simple backed bows to all that fancy carvings -awesome stuff-Hammertime

[okiecountryboy]

Dang Rich
When was the last time you slept. I just get home from work, post on your last bow(the museum piece) and there you go again.
Fine,Fine weapons as usual!
Can we trade lives

You da Man
Ron

[half eye]

Thank you fellas,

John, The Ottawa (Odawa) used 'em exactly like that. They also had the shortest bows in the area. I allways thought it was because of thier use in canoes....turns out it was but also because the Ottawa were some of the shortest and had slighter builds than most all of the other tribes.

Keenan, thanks for the compliment, but mostly my interest in native american bows is from the great lakes region and most of theirs were carved....not all, but alot. I also got real interested in the possible connection between the Mollegabet layout and the close similarities with the Eastern bows....but basically thats it.

Hammertime, Thank you sir.

Gonsten....& BB....thank you for the kind words

Wildman, ya aint seen nothin yet, partner.

Okie, Dont think so, this not havin to work no more is goin down real good....

[toomanyknots]

"I'm very impressed with the variation of bows that you kick out. Most of us settle into a certain style and don't venture away from that very often. Your range of bows is inspiring"

I second that. The ottawa bow is insanely nice. So, do you carve out the notches/basic bow shape, and then tiller on the belly?

[half eye]

Toomany,
     A good way to look at the scalloped bows is to ignore the "humps" and look at the limb in the bottom of the scoops (scallops) The bow is actually thinner than it appears to be. By cutting the small "v" 's in you are then removing the "stiff" parts that the points would usually make in the draw profile. So you basically have a straight tapered limb and the bow is nearly tillered like that.....you finish the tiller by sanding down the limb tips to the draw weight and length you want. Because the limb is tapered as you sand with even pressure you produce a very slight taper in thinkness....it's really hard to measure usually but thats how you "tweek" the bend profile.
    If you notice in the "full-draw" you can see that the tips are still somewhat stiff....so if I wanted the little bow to draw another inch or two, I'd just reduce the thickness in the outer 1/3 just a tad and could get more draw length. But I got the 26" I needed with the profile that's shown so left it as is to get a little more speed. Hope I said that right?
rich

[Pat B]

More cool bows Rich. I love the complicated simplicity of them.   

[Parnell]

Very nice, Rich.  Looks like a good hiking bow, a manageable length with good power, I'd bet.  Very cool.

[ken75]

awesome bow Rich , your most defintely a bow factory . keep inspiring us to get better !!

[dragonman]

Yep, very nice Rich, more fine bows, you are back in production, you're expert with those short bows, Plenty of snow over there....