Do I have time?

[Pat B]

Mid August for the static, Ed. It is out of sight... 

[blackhawk]

I have no problems letting my sinewed staves sit to season...heck...I still got an osage that was sinewed over two years ago now still waiting to cure out to be tillered       

I'm in the ole school camp of letting your sinew "season "....so it sounds like a perfect scenario of sinewing now,then tiller it no sooner than Xmas break...or even next summer 

[osage outlaw]

I like to sinew in winter and tiller in summer.

[ionicmuffin]

Ok, so to answer your question Beadman: The bow is 60 inches ntn, it has 1.5" of SET! its about 1.75" wide and about .5 inches thick, its limbs narrow 9 inches from the tips. down to about .5" as far as the "why sinew this bow" question. It has a ton of violation on the back of it right now, I decrowned it with the intention of sinewing it anyway. Its held up to tilering on the tree but has yet to be shot so I cant say I'm out of the danger zone yet, so I would like to sinew it for safety and also so I can add my snake skins to it. Like you guys said, it's a great opportunity for the get it out of sight and out of mind because literally I will be out in wyoming so I wont even be around to see it at all let alone have time to think about it.

I can post pics this evening if you all would like to see it but until then this is what I've got for you all to go on.

[Newindian]

I'm no expert but this is what I do with a bow like that first of all cut it down to 52" (if it bends through the handle) then, string it backwards do one layer wait about two days do the next layer , wait again, then do your final layer, wrap with tape (sticky side out) for a couple hours, come back to it in winter. you should easily get rid of your set if not reflex it a fair bit, as far as weight goes last time I did a bow in that ranger with three courses I couldn't string it after it cured, with that one though I didn't string it backwards before sinew so with the extra reflex you could gain more.

[Pat B]

Why decrown the bow for sinewing?   I've never decrowned any bow in over 25 years of wood bow building. 

[Thesquirrelslinger]

Are you happy with it? if so, don't mess with it

[ionicmuffin]

I decrowned it because it was a high crown and I wanted a flatter profile, especially one that was wider and flatter than some of the others I've made. I didn't really know exactly what i was doing but i figured if i was going to put sinew on and all that i would decrown it where i wanted to. I also did this so that the wood that is purple would show up on the bow rather than all sapwood.

[mikekeswick]

There is rarely any need to de-crown. Maybe on tension weak woods that you want to be a self bow but otherwise an untouched back is the safest way.
With sinew you really want it to be as crowned as possible.
Put one thin layer over the whole back and let it dry a couple of days.
Next layer should cover only half the width and let dry for a few more days.
Then the last layer should be just down the center.

Really it's best to stop tillering a stave before it takes any set and then sinew becuae your bow has 1 1/2 inch of set then it will never regain that 'spring' from undamaged belly wood no matter what you back it with.
Also remember sinew is heavy compared to wood. It's sg is around 1.3 so you have to make it work. Sinew can stretch upto 8% of it's length wood only 1%. So if you think about it you are adding a heavy material onto a piece of wood that limits how hard it can work to way below it's maximum......all these points add upto - use sinew on short wood bows 
It's very very easy to make a sinew backed wood bow slower than if it was unbacked and designed properly.

[blackhawk]

Whatever you wanna call it(decrowning or not)...I find it best to remove most if not all sapwood with woods like junipers and yew if I'm going to sinew them,and leave a bit of a crown still....and the op did exactly that...just cause he used the word "decrown" means that he actually did what folks are interpreting as "decrowning"...it seems like so many folks bash and despise that word so much that whenever someone says it folks go off like bottle rockets...lol .....and IMO "real" decrowning is no harder than chasing a ring and actually easier IMHO...yet we chase a ring and don't "bash" that and emphatically advise to do so....I think y'all just misinterpreted the usage of the ops word "decrown"...because I know y'all who's so anti decrowning would've done the same thing as the op did as far as removing sapwood to have a sinewed heartwood belly

Also making a flatter back might have been needed to allow the proper width for the design at hand...you can only go so wide with a small diameter stave..and creating a flatter back allows for more width if needed ;)maybe the op needed to do it because of this as well...and although he bent it to far presinew,he still had the intentions of sinew backing it..so who cares if its violated n such

[ionicmuffin]

Like I said, I really wanted it to be a heartwood sapwood combo because otherwise it would have been entirely sapwood. Plus the natives used to make sinew backed bows that were very flat on the backing as well, not super flat but flattish, I realize that those bows were shorter but they also had a shorter draw. My intention was to get another inch or so out of the draw so as to be drawing to 29" or so, that would allow for maximum usage of the wood right? so if it were sinewed as well then it would allow for more efficient sinew usage. I'm just thinking out loud here, I don't mind having the minimum sinew on this bow since that was my intention all along I am more than willing to put on a very thin coating of sinew, so basically the finest sinew strands possible for maybe 2 or 3 layers so as to still have the sinew but will still be relatively light. I also desire to have the experience of sinewing a bow.

Whatever you wanna call it(decrowning or not)...I find it best to remove most if not all sapwood with woods like junipers and yew if I'm going to sinew them,and leave a bit of a crown still....and the op did exactly that...just cause he used the word "decrown" means that he actually did what folks are interpreting as "decrowning"...it seems like so many folks bash and despise that word so much that whenever someone says it folks go off like bottle rockets...lol .....and IMO "real" decrowning is no harder than chasing a ring and actually easier IMHO...yet we chase a ring and don't "bash" that and emphatically advise to do so....I think y'all just misinterpreted the usage of the ops word "decrown"...because I know y'all who's so anti decrowning would've done the same thing as the op did as far as removing sapwood to have a sinewed heartwood belly

Good catch on my wording being loose, I think that what i meant to say is that i basically didn't follow a ring but i didn't make it flat. I put as much heart wood in the bow as possible because it was a small stave there anyway, but for what its worth it should have an almost entirely heartwood belly with some nice creamy sides and handle.

[BowEd]

I see.Sounds good.Oughta make you a very nice and safe bow,and you have time.