Trying to live with a big mistake I made

[jrmeza]

Hey there Primitive Archer community, again, I'm still knew, and I'm working on my first osage orange selfbow (longbow).

I made a big mistake with the drawknife while putting my bow to final dimensions today and I cannot believe I did it.
The bow I am making was looking to be a mighty fine 68" snakey bow, all was going well, I have managed to follow the grain pretty true despite some complications with the way the stave warped around a knot on its sister stave.

I was narrowing down the stave, I had planned to make the bow wide in the horizontal dimension (left to right when holding the bow upright) and really thin in the anterior/posterior dimensions because thats just how the stave ended up looking after carving out some deep cracks that occurred after not sealing the back.  AND THEN IT HAPPENED.
I started carving out a piece of grain on the edge of the bow that had a crack in it that could not be left on the bow, and I curse myself because my draw knife bit way too deep, and that single fiber ran deeper, and deeper, and deeper....

Now Im left with a decent and nearly complete bow, except there is now a portion 12 inches from the center that is only 7/8" wide, and 3/4" deep.

So what would you make of that? Don't say scrap it immediately, I want to give it a fighting chance. Is my only option to continue to tillering and even things out as much as possible, and end up with a reaaaaallly light poundage bow? Will heat treating or maybe adding a recurve to it possibly up the poundage?  Remember, there isn't exactly anything "wrong" with the stave, its just really thin in that one spot, but everything follows the grain really well and true, no cracks or check or anything like that.

Help me out! Thanks a lot selfbowyers!

[Will H]

First let me say, NEVER FALL IN LOVE WITH A PIECE OF WOOD! Not until it becomes a bow at least. Everything else before it flings arrows and becomes a bow is just a stave IMO.

Second, it's really hard to say without pics. Pics really help when discussing this sort of thing. Over all it sounds like you should still have enough to work with. It don't take much Osage to make a bow.

Post some pics. Let's see how bad it is.

Don't sweat the small stuff. Just deal and move on

[BOWMAN53]

doesnt sounds so bad but pictures could tell a different story.

[jrmeza]

How do I post pictures if the website only allows for 200KB size per picture?? The pics I took are all over 1 Mb

[DarkSoul]

Upload onto www.tinypic.com
Copy the [IMG]-code for message boards.
Paste link here in your reply text box.

[jrmeza]

Hope this helps! thanks guys!

[Pat B]

Make it!  Don't worry about the back profile just tiller the bow as it is.

[jrmeza]

Great! I'm glad to hear that it is doable! Does anyone think that heat treating it and/or adding recurve (or is it reflex?) would do this stick justice?

[Stringman]

I just finished a bow much like what you have there. Will is right, a little Osage goes a long way! Taper your tips to 3/8" and make er bend smooth. You got this.

[George Tsoukalas]

Should be ok. Forge ahead! Jawge

[4dog]

skinny bows are the shnizzz...you will be surprised at how skinny an osage beauty can be!!

[NeolithicMan]

Dont feel to bad, recently I was cutting out the profile for a replica bow and I got about 12" down before I realized I wasnt on the outside profile line but the center line!!! now I have a very nice stave with a long cut in the middle! oh well now it will make a kids bow or two

[Pat B]

When you get about 1/4" from the profile outline put down the draw knife down and get a good rasp. A farriers rasp works well for this with its wide, flat cutting surfaces. Work the rasp from back to belly.

[jrmeza]

Wow thanks a lot for all the feed back guys! I feel revitalized and pumped to keep on trucking along! I will post my finished project when it is complete!!! Thanks PA community!

[DuBois]

Get it man! There's still a bow in there (I think)