Hickory Tempering ?

[Stick Bender]

Hi Fellas  I was just re reading Marc's chapter on heat tempering in TBB & he was saying limbs could be made up to 30% narrower , so I have this Pig nut hickory stave that I ruffed  out last spring is was a little narrow so I ruffed out a 1 1/2 wide  67 in. Handle bow out of it thinking maybe latter to make a shorter 60 in. Hunting/sinew bow but sense I have a 1 1/2 wide I was considering making a 67 in. Heat tempered self bow out of it , most hickory designs call for 1 3/4 wide so my question is do you think a 1 1/2 tempered hickory self bow could be made with out taking a lot of set I was planning on tempering in 2 in. Of reflex strait limbed ?

[willie]

1.5' wide is 17% less than 1.75", Seems like you could make some of that up that with tempering. I would be interested what others have to say about expecting a 30% gain.

[upstatenybowyer]

I live in an area with a very humid climate and this makes it hard to avoid set with hickory. So, I tend to go wide and put a thorough heat treatment as well. Hickory loves a nice toasting.

[DC]

I think, like always the key words are "up to". That said I did a couple of crab apple bows that I had tillered out to 40#@28". I gave them a good heat treat and then they were 40#@20(approx). That's pretty close to 30%. So far crab apple has responded the best for me. Don't know from hickory.

[Danzn Bar]

Keep it as dry as you can get it.......store it in a room around the fireplace, stove, furnace........or better yet, get an aluminum dryer vent hose and hang it from the rafters add a 60 watt blub in the bottom and hang the bow/stave in it when your not working on it.
And hickory likes it's belly toasted.........
DBar

[BowEd]

Those are very nice staves like you have there.At an 1.5" wide and 67" heat tempered good it'll make you a fine bow into the 50's in poundage.Even more.Done it many times even with 64" bows with 8" handles and 8 to 9 inches of slightly flipped stiff tips too holding at least half the heat treatment in the working limbs.
Like DB said to keep it inside in between while tillering all the way to finishing.