Questions about Prunus padus - bird cherry

[freke]

Hi,
We have at my family farm a lot of Prunus padus, and read the wood should work although not very strong so I decide to test it and now working on one bow, although it is still not dry enough to tiler.

My questions is if any here have any experience? should it/ or not be heat treated, dimensions etc?

thanks
Jonas

[turtle]

I have no experience with it, but most cherry is weaker in tension than it is in compression so heat treating wouldnt be a good idea. And some sort of backing would probably be a good idea. Hopefully someone with more experience than me will chime in.

[Joec123able]

I have a cherry bow I've started, it will be the first of the wood I've tryed. From the roughing out I've done, it seems the wood loves to check badly and is very soft wood. I imagine the wood is pretty brittle for a bow too. I intend to go 68" long, 1 3/4 wide near the handle staying about that wide for 2/3 of the limb and then tapering in to narrow tips. That's the dimensions I intend to use myself, maybe give ya an idea.

[freke]

The only info I found are from English warbow society, under lesser known bowwood, and it is listed, weak tensin, acceptable compression and low hysteris and low density. Sounds promissing except it may snap easily:/

So far has my piece not check luckily, difficult using cutting tools as i want to splint in odd direction if not watched carfully and the rasp seems the safest way to go - in general it seems too easy to work and I am worry it may be too weak before final tiller.
I have add a minor deflex in handle and reflex in tip, mostly from green forming but later I even the re-flexed shape some with steam and it left marks on the bow back = very soft wood, luckily in the static part although I think its not very strong and may need backing.
The layout I target is a 66-68", 2" wide to 2/3 and then slim tips.

[BowEd]

Only experience I've got is with black cherry in the states here.I've found out it can't take a very extreme type design[lots of reflex] and adding a thin layer of sinew or rawhide should make it safe and last a very long time.Dry heat treating I would stay away from doing on it.Enjoyable shooting type bowwood though.
That length and width should make you a 50# bow.Provided the thickness is there.Good luck with it.

[JNystrom]

Hello from Finland, my first post to your excellent bow forum!

I know a this guy (known as sumpitan in pa) from here (Finland), who uses and has used a lot of prunus padus, bird cherry, and really thinks its good bow wood. I think he has been building bird cherry flatbows for about 20 years now. Well not only bird cherry bows, but you may understand that its not bad wood if you have been making bows from it that long...
Bird cherry is soft, but what i have heard, its really tension strong. So toasting the belly will help the bow greatly (i assume). It will make good flatbows, if you have right dimensions - aka enough wideness. The bows from bird cherry what i have seen, have been about 40-50# tops, but also shorts. So not that high poundage, but if you go longer and wider, higher is possible.
I just cut my own staves recently, and i am also trying some longbows from it.

I can give you couple of links to our finnish primitive bow forum, where you can see some pictures of bird cherry bows. Ill translate some dimensions here, cause the forum is in finnish.

http://perinnejousi.yuku.com/topic/128/Btuomi-ja-tasankonuolet
130cm/52" ttt, 32mm wide, natural B-profile, 37#@21".
Cut from just a little thicker tree than the bow.
bow by sumpitan

http://perinnejousi.yuku.com/topic/100/Tuomilyhri
140cm/55" ttt, 40#@24", handle 30mm wide, at widest 35mm, 12mm nocks

Hope this helps!

[freke]

Beadman/ thx for your curaging input and I have a complete deer hid waiting to be used for backing:)

JNystrom, I live next door, routsi:). Sadly I don't understand Finish as it looks really intresting page you sent.

[FilipT]

I saw Tuuka on the paleo planet forum a while ago, very experienced bowyer, experiments with woods most will stay away. But Finland's geographical location also contributes to the quality of wood, so most of the trees he works with, may not actually work in middle or southern Europe. That is truth.

For example in Norway, you can find common ash (Fraxinus excelsior) with SG of 0.85! That is above rang of many many other types of trees which are know to be excellent bow woods.
Hazel, same story. Even wych elm is super hard there. All because of mountainous terrain.