First Bow

[louisianaman]

Alright, I have a osage orange 72" bow stave (about 2 3/4" thick in the middle) and I have no idea were to even start. I do know that you need to get it down to one growth ring. I also read it is best to start out with a d- style bow (with no dimensions mentioned anywhere I can find.) I do have a draw knife and a wood vice. I'm scared to just start stripping wood, because of the small width of the bow. I'm open to any suggestions and will probably need a lot of help.

[ionicmuffin]

for starters, most osage bows that are about 66 inches or less can be made about 1.25" wide and the thickness will come as you get it to floor tiller. If you can post pics that might help out. You need to draw out the center line following the grain, once you have done that you can start marking out the maximum width following the grain. Any more questions? i hope some others can explain this process better, i know i could do it if i had the stave in hand, just hard to explain.

[Weylin]

Find a copy of the Traditional Bowyer's Bible Vol. 1. I'm sure you can get it through your library system if you dont want to buy it. There is an chapter called "Osage Flatbow" or something similar. I think reading that would be a good place to start. Not saying that you shouldn't get advice here as well but at least that would give you a good frame of reference to start with. Do you know your draw length and your desired draw weight? That info would help us give you a place to start, dimension-wise. Have fun and good luck. You definitely want a solid design plan before you remove any wood.

[steve b.]

Yes I'd say you need to read up, or get help.  Other than that, you could ask questions and post pics at each  step along the way but I think that would be much more tedious than finding the book that Weylin mentioned and reading through it......