Temperature and bows

[Joec123able]

Quick question I'm wondering about- does the temperature outside effect the performance of your bow when your shooting ?  I heard something about wood bows perform better in colder weather not sure if that's true or not

[Pappy]

Never noticed much difference,seems much heaver in really cold weather but I think that is just me, never weighted one to see,they will,depending on the wood feel a little sluggish in really humid weather. 
   Pappy

[WillS]

S'common sense ain't it?  We use heat to soften wood so we can manipulate the shape of a bow. 

In very warm weather, the bows will be softer, lacking in punch a bit.  Perhaps not enough to be a real issue, but depending on the wood you can feel it.  Yew bows for instance take a performance hit in hot weather, and feel harder and tighter when it's cold.

[PEARL DRUMS]

I think Keenan brought this up a few months back. Not one person could prove any performance difference in normal temp fluctuations. I believe his premise was trying to disprove yew bows are heavier or brittle in cold weather. They aren't from what I learned from his thread.

I left a few osage bows baking in the direct sun this weekend for 5-6 hours. It was about 90 degrees and about 90% humidity as well. The bows were very hot to the touch, but shot as if they where 72 degree's. As far as using heat to manipulate wood, we sure do. But that heat is incredibly hot and direct as compared to the sun or its ambient heat.

[WillS]

Interesting stuff! From my own experience, a yew longbow is easier to draw in hot weather.  My 80# bow felt far easier to draw last Saturday during a really hot weekend here in the UK.  In fact it got to the point where I had to be really careful not to overdraw as some of my rougher bodkins were starting to snag on the bow which never usually happens.

When I returned home, I tried drawing the same bow having left it in an air conditioned room for a few hours and I was really struggling to get the arrows to the head.  This may well be an illusion, perhaps I was more settled or comfortable or something during the shoot, but it seemed a heck of a coincidence!

May be worth mentioning I didnt notice a performance drop per se, the bow didn't feel slower.  But it felt easier to draw.

[PEARL DRUMS]

Could be your warm muscles feel the weight less than cooler, stiffer muscles will. I cant argue the wood changes in some ways with heat fluctuation. Whether or not we can feel it is something Im not sure of.

[SLIMBOB]

I do a lot of shooting in August to tune up for the opening of bow season Oct 1.  Lots of days over 100 here in Central Texas,  105-110 mid afternoon.  I sense a difference early morning to late afternoon.  I say sense, because it's only that.  The bows seem to lose a little umph as the day heats up.  Could be that Pearl is right and it's the shooter not the bow, don't know for sure, but I feel a difference and won't shoot one for too long in that kind of heat.  No lasting effect as far as I can tell.

[WillS]

Could be your warm muscles feel the weight less than cooler, stiffer muscles will.

Didn't think of that, that's a really interesting point.  I remember hearing from a few people that you should always rub a yew bow before shooting.  Apparently it softens the wood fibres so they're not in danger of breaking.  I think it's almost impossible to generate enough friction heat by hand to avoid breaking a bow, but it probably warms up the archer's muscles to the point where drawing the bow feels more comfortable than jumping in cold.

[Bryce]

Could be your warm muscles feel the weight less than cooler, stiffer muscles will. I cant argue the wood changes in some ways with heat fluctuation. Whether or not we can feel it is something Im not sure of.

Yes.

My sinew backed yew pulls and between 55-58# depending on temperature. But selfbows, I weighed my osage it 19deg and 90deg... No change in weight.

[Joec123able]

Wow thanks everyone

[BOWMAN53]

Take the speed of the arrow on a hot day and compare to how fast it is on a cold day.

[Carson (CMB)]

Certainly there is a difference, how negligible is the question.    Maybe some woods are more sensitive than others.  How is that for an enigmatic answer?!

Thinking of yew, it seems that tensile strength/elastciity would increase in warmer weather and compression strength would decrease resulting in a softer bow. 

I wont string a bow fresh out of a hotbox at 105 degrees F.

[mikekeswick]

Take the speed of the arrow on a hot day and compare to how fast it is on a cold day.

Exactly right.
If you are just relying on feel then the results would be far too subjective to mean anything you need a measuring device that doesn't have feelings!

[Pappy]

That would be me Mike  I told a guy the other day that made a slid remark,
that would have hurt my feeling ,If I had any. Good discussion guys, their is probably some change,but for hunting which is mainly what I do, it's not enough to matter. I have been hunting in singal digit weather and I swear the bow was 100lbs and hard to draw over 20 inches. Head to the cabin and after a 10-15 minute walk all of the sudden it went back to 50 lbs like it was to start with. 
     Pappy

[crooketarrow]

  It really matters when you get to tillering or any beening of a limb. Then hummitly can make a VERY BIG difference on set and string follow. Here in WV HUMMITY ON SUCKS white woods exspecially HICKORY. As soon as I get to bending limbs I start out by buting my bow in a hot box for 1/2 hour. This gets rid of the realitive hummity it dose help with the set and string follow.