Osage bow build- along

[youngbowyer]

Hi guys. its been a long time since i posted a bow on here. I think the last one was in february. Once spring came around i spent most of my days fishing for trout. I'm absolutely crazy once it comes to trout fishing. But some depressing things happend in my life and i needed something to take my mind of things. So i started working on bows again. Anyway getting back on topic again here's the back of an osage stave i'm working on. I finished chasing a ring(this is my first time chasing a ring) and i was wondering if this was the right way to handle knots on the back of a bow. I'll keep you guys updated on this bow.

[gstoneberg]

Looks good Tom.  The right side is done a little nicer than the left.  What you want to do is follow the ring around the knot without cutting it.  That knot may loosen up and come out as you start bending the limb.  You have good limb width there.  Should work out nicely.

George

[JW_Halverson]

Just be sure to scrape or sand out ALL of the toolmarks around that knot before you get it bending much at all.  Knots are wonderful character and always draw a looker's eye to them.  On the other hand, they also draw all kinds of extra stress to themselves too and any toolmarks, scratches, or cracks will help focus the stresses and lead to further failure.  Can't wait to see more pics of the bow, keep posting.

Good luck!

[Pat B]

In the pic it looks like you left a portion of the previous ring around the knot. I would remove that and clean up the other tool marks like JW suggested. If you work from the top of the knot down, around the knot with a scraper it should come off easily.   I would saturate the center of the knot with super glue also. Keep plenty of wood around the knots and you should be fine.

[George Tsoukalas]

Good advice. Let the grain lines swirl around the knot. Leave it wider and when you tiller the bow the knot should appear a little flat than the rest of the limb. Jawge

[youngbowyer]

Thanks for the feedback guys. Got the bow roughed out somewhat today. I'll work on it tomorrow and I'll post more pictures.

[JW_Halverson]

My first bow had a huge ol' knot right below the handle.  I thought I should make it bend more in that area so that there was less resistance and less likelyhood of breaking....or so I thought.  Good thing I had that idea beaten outa my head before I blew it!!! 

[youngbowyer]

lost my last 2 arrows today so i'll be working on it tomorrow. the bow has got one huge knot in the upper limb; the knot is somewhat dead so i'm not sure if it will crack once i start bending it. Maybe wrap it with sinew?

[George Tsoukalas]

Knotted areas should not bend as much as the rest of the limb. They should appear flat. Jawge

[soy]

Kinda fun chasing rings your first time is it not?takes all the bad out of your mind whilst u r busy knifeing the crunch. Everybody is lending good advice about the knot, thick and wide...good luck young bowyer

[youngbowyer]

I got the stave roughly tapered now and i didnt want to continue untill i got some advice on what to do with this knot.
I can either leave it as it is and take the risk of it cracking whilst tillering(the knot is dead) or i could just remove the entire knot without losing any limb width. Advice?

[youngbowyer]

here she is so far. i know the tiller is a little off but i didnt want to remove too much wood because of all the knots to improve the tiller. She is a little over 45# at 28. im planning on heat treating and i still need to thin the tips. what do i do about the tiller though(tillers is not that out of wack in real life, picture makes it look real bad)

[gstoneberg]

Tom, considering all those knots, I think you did a fine job.  It's osage, it should shoot like crazy.

George

[blackhawk]

Bottom limb looks good. Top limb doesn't quite match. You can get a lil more bend near the fade and out in the outer mid limb on. You wont lose much weight to fine tune that,especially if you heat treat it and put a tad bit of reflex at the same time.