Designs.

[Jah-army-glows-bright]

I have been learning and experimenting for about a year since my last post here. But I can't seem to find very much information about which selfbow design to use with different woods. More than that I don't know any designs aside from pyramid bows and Elb's. Between my land and my fathers land I have found a lot of types of wood to use. But I love trees and don't want to cut hundreds of trees to keep experimenting. I've found maples, black cherry, mulberry, crabapple, every oak imaginable, holly, and a number a trees that seem to have potential but I haven't read about ("soapberry"/Sapindus being the most interesting). Does anyone have a list or diagram of designs vs wood species? Or even just a general rule of thumb to remember?

[OTDEAN]

With white woods, just make 2inch wide flatbows out to about 3/4 length of limb and then taper to nock, Paul Comstock style. 

[PEARL DRUMS]

Osage, yew and black locust - draw length x 2 plus 10" - 1.5" wide to mid limb, even taper from there.

Everything else - draw length x 2 plus 10" - 2" wide to mid limb, even taper from there.

Maybe a bit of sugar/hard maple and mulberry is all Id use from what you mentioned. The numbers I gave can be and will be split 10 ways by somebody, but those are good numbers to start with and finish with to build a durable bow. You'll reduce here and there as you learn.

[Jah-army-glows-bright]

I have no Osage, yew, or black locust available. Why only maple or mulberry? Personal preference or just better woods to learn with? I haven't had any success but I enjoyed working with the other woods

[bubbles]

Oftentimes guys will post the dimensions and designs of the bows they make when they post them, and definitely the type of wood it is. That's a great way to tell what are some good designs for the wood you have. If they don't have dimensions, just pm or ask in the thread what they are.

[TimBo]

If you can get hold of The Bowyer's Bible series, volumes 1 and 4 have lots about design and wood types. 

[bubby]

Sugar maple and mulberry because they are good bow woods, make both 1-3/4" wide at the fades pearls desigbn is for a standard american flat bow, a pyramid is a great design too, go the width above and taper straight to 1/2" tips with a even thickness taper

[JackCrafty]

I'm sure with that much land you'll have lots of trimmings and throw-away branches.  Take some of those, peel the bark, and dry them out.  Then bend and break as many as you can.  The hardest ones to break are the best wood(s) for bows.  It is different for every piece of land and every tree, so even if we gave you 100 pages of bow plans, the plans might not work for you.

Remember:  You need to test your wood dry (air dry at least 6 months).  And you can make bows out of limbs too.  You don't need trunks necessarily.

[huisme]

I agree completely with pearlie, that's pretty much what I'd call safe guidelines. Shorter is possible, I even prefer to build shorter (just draw x 2), but better to lean finishing lots of bows with security than breaking every other stick you touch

[RyanY]

All woods will make all designs or styles of bow. But to achieve that each wood's individual properties need to be accounted for in the dimensions and what you want out of the bow. Sometimes what you want to achieve might not be practical for a particular style of bow. For example, a very short, stout, native american style bow made of poplar may be too wide to be practical to shoot. Or a black cherry bow may not hold up to a rounded/trapped back. With a few exceptions I believe just about anything is possible. As for designs there's really no list of designs. For example, an american longbow has a huge number of possibilities when adjusting length, fade length, handle length, and taper shape. Look on here to see what bows you like and go from there. Doesn't matter what the bow is called as long as it gets the job done.