Maple Board Bow

[ajooter]

I started working on this bow quite awhile ago.  It had a nasty grain swirl that chunked out on me when I ran my rasp the wrong way.  The area affected was near one of the tips and since I had already shaped the handle out I had to removed about 4" from each tip.  The bow is ~60" ttt and pulling 35#@21".  I'm gonna try and keep the dw below 40# and get it back to about 24-25".  It hasn't taken that much set as of yet.  The handle and tips accents are red oak and purpleheart.  I thought it would make a nice bow for a woman or child.

Don't be hatin on the pjs....im going for a trip on the polar express train with my gfs 4 year old! 

[bow101]

Looks pretty good, I never use a rasp or blade on boards, use belt sander much quicker and remove less material.  Ya got a ways to go yet to hit below 40# and get it back to about 24-25".

[Stick Bender]

Nice looking bow like the accents , I have fount working with furniture as well as bows Rock Maple can have a lot of tear out if you go against the grain ,I'm working on a maple stave bow now waiting for the sinew to cure & have one spot in the handle that's giving me a little trouble but will take it there instead of the limbs keep us posted curious to see how it works out

[ajooter]

A belt sander?!?!  I couldn't do it!  To each his own...I like a hatchet...rasp...and scraper...three tools and I'm pretty much there.  Once the handle and tip overlays are glued on I can have a bow to floor tiller in about 2 hours.

[ajooter]

The limbs are still an inch and a half wide.  I also wanted to try and keep that width since im told wider thinner limbs take less set.  I made a maple board bow awhile ago that I heated a bunch of reflex into and heat treated the limbs at the same time.  That bow was also 60" and came in between 70-75# at 28".  I burned around 300 arrows thru it before it blew.  This was intended to be a longer bow and since the last one I heat treated responded well to the heat I would probably try the same again on a different bow. So far maple is my favorite wood in board form.

[bow101]

A belt sander?!?!  I couldn't do it!  To each his own...I like a hatchet...rasp...and scraper...three tools and I'm pretty much there.  Once the handle and tip overlays are glued on I can have a bow to floor tiller in about 2 hours.

Slow and steady as they say, I check the thickness with the calipers as I go and exercise the bow about 30 pulls everytime.  Never had a hinge yet using the sander. 

[rps3]

Sharp looking bow. I like how you added recurves using overlays.

[George Tsoukalas]

Very nicely done. Jawge

[ajooter]

Thank you guys...I'll post finished pictures when I'm done