Update on 120# yew warbow - I don't like to complain, but...

[Del the cat]

Presumably the right limb in the top pic is the one with the reflex?
If so I would't weaken it any more, as both tips are coming back a similar distance. And if it started with reflex then it's actually pulling back further than the other thus it is actually weaker!
I'd say you are safe to pull it a bit further, it's gotta come back to 120# some time. I'd say now is prob as good a time as any, or if you are nervy take it to 100-110# it will show what's happening a bit better*.
Slow and steady, I think you are 80% if not 90% there now.
Del
*(Make sure no one is standing behind you with a paper bag  )

[WillS]

Cheers Del.  It's been to 120# and beyond quite a few times now, as I had to get it up to almost 140# to get the string on it at one point! 

To be honest the tiller looks pretty similar all the way down to 140# and I'm just not happy with the way it looks.  It doesn't look even and circular at all to my eyes.  I know there should be signs of the raw stave in the final curve but at the moment it just looks damn ugly!

[Del the cat]

Looks reasonable to me ... the 'stiffer' looking limb just has a hint of reflex at the tip. Maybe you need to start tapeing the outer thirds more, to get that spitfire wing profile and get 'em coming round a bit more.
I think you are only looking at subtleties of tiller now. don't go mad. When in doubt leave it be, play with MS paint etc...
Play with moving it slightly on the tiller etc.
Del

[WillS]

Thanks mate.  That's helpful.  I tried overlaying circles but it just made it look worse.  I'll get the tips moving as you're both suggesting and we'll see where we are!

[Del the cat]

Thanks mate.  That's helpful.  I tried overlaying circles but it just made it look worse.  I'll get the tips moving as you're both suggesting and we'll see where we are!

Just a bit more off all over will get it moving more. If you take a couple of mm off the thickness all along the belly that is automatically thinning the tips more, as it's a greatr proportion of the thickness at the tips. Just keep taking it off evenly and re-checking the tiller.
Having said that, pics taken at full weitght will show more bend.
Del

[Marc St Louis]

Actually to my eyes it's the left limb, top pic, that needs work just outside of center.

[WillS]

Well that's just awkward...!

Right, so I'll get the tips moving a bit more, take some off the non-reflexed limb just outside of center (around the two dark spots that are actually knots I'm assuming Marc?) and bring it a bit further.  I'll post some pics of that progress!

Cheers guys, appreciate the help!

[toomanyknots]

When in doubt leave it be

The best tillering advice anyone has ever given anyone... ever.  I can use this advice maybe 7 or 8 times every time I tiller a bow,    .

[WillS]

Ok so it's done, pretty much.  It's been right up to 30" with full brace height and just needs some tweaking.  Still over weight at around 135#.  Trouble is, I'm super disappointed at the amount of set it took in the last stages.  It was looking really straight and had almost no set until about 25" draw length and suddenly took on around 2" of string follow, all in the last part of the non-reflexed limb.  It hasn't even been shot in yet!

I wonder if starting out with one limb heavily reflexed put undue stress on the straight limb? The reflexed limb would have been resisting movement while the straight limb was doing most of the work?

It also has the ugliest brace shape I've ever seen on a bow which doesn't make me feel much better! Bit of a failure all round in my opinion, but then we are our harshest critics...

I'll post some pics if I can bring myself to look at it again later...!

[toomanyknots]

You could probably at least fix the braced profile look of it. The bow might be unbalanced, or it might be balanced, but just not look it due to one limb being reflexed and one limb not being reflexed. You might need to weaken the reflexed limb a bit still, I would guess if the deflexed limb is taking more set or bending more. Like I said, in a situation like this I will tiller the bow to look and bend like we think a bow should look and bend, and then if it doesn't draw balanced from the typical arrow pass location (I do 1/2" above center), I just adjust the arrow pass location until it draws smooth and balanced in the hand. I'm not saying it's the right thing to do, but it's just how I have come to deal with this. I think the fact that you repaired this bow and have it pulling 135# is a dam feat and that alone I think should make this a major success!

EDIT: And with one of my personal bows (not one I am going to give away) if a bow has 2" set and still shoots good, I am still happy. You might be able to heat treat it out too, but I have no experience there to give any advice.

[WillS]

Here's a quick pic of the unbraced shape (the top nock exploded on me AGAIN so I have to order more horn and have a third attempt - crazy!) so I can't brace it, but you can see where the string follow is starting to show on the left (upper) limb.

If I brace the bow, and then immediately unbrace it, the left limb takes about 2 full inches of set before settling back to this, which is just under 1 inch.  It's pretty frustrating, I have to admit.  I could live with a bow that takes around 2" of set after being fully shot in at 32" because that's about normal for a heavy bow but to take that much just literally from bracing?  Horrible.

The right limb is now a full 5mm thinner than the left and is still so stiff that the brace shape is completely off.  If I take any more off the right limb it's going to look really daft.

[meanewood]

OK now this is a dilemma I have encounted with an Elm bow recently and I'm not sure what the answer is!
The Elm stave had 3 undulations over its length. I start off like most people  by roughing out both limbs to the same thickness.
Now when the stave is bent it is constanly checked to see if it is bending evenly and small amounts are taken off where it is stiff in order to ensure the wood is stressed evenly. That's easy when it's a straight piece to begin with, but how can you determine what may be a stiff area when the arc is uneven because of the undulations!
 If you find one limb is becoming a lot thinner in an area compared to the corresponding area of the other limb, then the stresses are becoming uneven, even though the tiller 'looks' better.
Would it be fair to say, if the stave has undulations, the undulations should still be present even at full draw and be very wary of trying to tiller them out?

[toomanyknots]

Well if you assess the the situation, I haven't seen the tillered profile of this bow, but given that you say the right limb is making the braced profile off from being stiffer than the left, I would guess it is stronger still (despite whatever the stave looked like to begin with) and I would guess that the tiller is off as well when being drawn. You wanna go easy on the bow for the most part when you don't got everything doing what it is supposed to. It's not the stiff limbs fault it is making the profile (or tiller) off, you need to weaken it to even out the tiller if it's too strong, and don't go drawing the bow out real far until you got a tiller you are happy with. I'm sorry the nocks broke again, this bow is really making you work for it! I mean this is just my guess at what is going on, I don't know what the tiller looks like, but it sounds to me like you need to weaker a stronger limb. if you get too frustrated with it, sometimes it is better to just let it be for a while, I usually am more prone to making mistakes when I am frustrated or in a hurry.

[toomanyknots]

OK now this is a dilemma I have encounted with an Elm bow recently and I'm not sure what the answer is!
The Elm stave had 3 undulations over its length. I start off like most people  by roughing out both limbs to the same thickness.
Now when the stave is bent it is constanly checked to see if it is bending evenly and small amounts are taken off where it is stiff in order to ensure the wood is stressed evenly. That's easy when it's a straight piece to begin with, but how can you determine what may be a stiff area when the arc is uneven because of the undulations!
 If you find one limb is becoming a lot thinner in an area compared to the corresponding area of the other limb, then the stresses are becoming uneven, even though the tiller 'looks' better.
Would it be fair to say, if the stave has undulations, the undulations should still be present even at full draw and be very wary of trying to tiller them out?

Now to me, none of this pans out. It is all fine to say / assume / theorize that the wood cells are stressing more than others if the tiller looks good, and character bows need to be tillered according to their every bend and hump, but in reality if you take a stave with a bunch of deflexes and reflexes in the stave, and get the stave working evenly to where all the reflexes and deflexes bend the same amount, the bow is gonna take lots of set in the deflexed areas no matter what you do. You have to leave the deflexed areas stiff. And if any of the deflexed areas are near the outer limb, you are gonna have a stacking unpleasant to shoot bow. The deflexed areas are like built in set, they are already bent persay, they don't need too much more bending usually in the tiller.

I start off like most people  by roughing out both limbs to the same thickness.

When you rough out a stave with reflexes and deflexes before floor tiller, it is smart to leave the deflexed areas thicker, as they will be the weakest link in the tiller, and most likely and damaging to hinge, darn near impossible to fix if hinged, if the deflex is real pronounced like on snakey staves.

[WillS]

Well if you assess the the situation, I haven't seen the tillered profile of this bow, but given that you say the right limb is making the braced profile off from being stiffer than the left, I would guess it is stronger still (despite whatever the stave looked like to begin with) and I would guess that the tiller is off as well when being drawn. You wanna go easy on the bow for the most part when you don't got everything doing what it is supposed to. It's not the stiff limbs fault it is making the profile (or tiller) off, you need to weaken it to even out the tiller if it's too strong, and don't go drawing the bow out real far until you got a tiller you are happy with. I'm sorry the nocks broke again, this bow is really making you work for it! I mean this is just my guess at what is going on, I don't know what the tiller looks like, but it sounds to me like you need to weaker a stronger limb. if you get too frustrated with it, sometimes it is better to just let it be for a while, I usually am more prone to making mistakes when I am frustrated or in a hurry.

The trouble is, while common sense (and even the most basic bow making experience) says "stiff limb must become thinner to even out" how far do you let it go? 

When I look at this bow now, unbraced, there is a real obvious difference in thickness from upper limb to lower limb.  It's nasty to look at, and almost looks like two different bows butted together in the handle the difference is so obvious.  It's really going against all logic and common sense now.  I guess what must be happening is I'm missing something fundamental and assuming that all the problems are in the stiffer limb so I'm constantly thinning that limb, and the problem isn't being sorted.  I'm ending up with one limb a nice even taper and a good thickness for the draw weight, and another limb that looks like it belongs on a 50lb target bow wedged up against it!  When it's braced, it looks like one limb (the one that started with reflex) is still too stiff, but simple common sense tells me that it can't be that anymore. 

Somebody with a whole lot more experience than I have in making warbows has kindly offered to help out, and I'm not gonna touch this horrible thing until I know what I'm doing.  It's super annoying though, because this was the first stave I paid a lot of money for as a "premium" warbow stave (yeah, I know...!) and there is literally nothing wrong with it - no dips, no knots, no cracks nothing and would clearly have been able to make a really top quality warbow.  And yet with my inexperience and rushing I've almost certainly wasted a really nice piece of yew which is a travesty!  I'll be lucky to get something over 100# once the tiller has been sorted out and that's a real shame.  Hopefully I'll learn from this...