Tiller Check - 57" maple pyramid (also have questions to fix)

[JW_Halverson]

Learning to gently "floor tiller" helps.  That is when one tip is on the bround, the other tip is in your hand, and the remaining hand pushes on the handle section.  You are just barely trying to get a hint of bend in the limbs.  From there, long string tillering.  the string goes from nock to nock but does not require the bow to be bent to get the loops into the nocks.  Now you can use a tillering tree or a tillering stick to pull the bow just a few inches.  And when I say few, I mean starting with two inches, three at the most.  Scrape a little wood off the flat portions of the limb and again test the tiller. 

Ideally, you should have the bow coming to a beautiful and appropriate for design arc when your long string tillering is pulling the bow about 10 inches or so.  Then you can put on a shorter string.  As you tiller a few inches at a time you should hit full draw around the same time as you hit the intended weight of the draw.  Maybe even sooner!

[Pappy]

Looks to me like you have a little thin spot right at the hinge area, either way Sorry to say but I would
cut it up and cook Brats with it. I always stay mostly off the fads area until the last few inches, they all want to bend there when you first start bending them, just natural, it wants to bend in the center.
 Pappy

[DuBois]

MMM...Brats

[DuBois]

It would be interesting to see a front profile just for the heck of it.

I agree it is a good lesson, but knowing myself, I would probably shorten it a few inches, scrape it way down to a kids bow with a shorter handle and spend way to much time fixing it instead of moving on 

Good luck any way you go.

[Jim Davis]

Guess this is the first time I've disagreed with you in a big way Pappy. Brats have way too much fat and cholesterol. 

Jim Davis

[Pappy]

  Mine are Venison Jim with little fat.
 Pappy

[George Tsoukalas]

So let's talk how to avoid hinges, which is what I see just off the handle on the upper limb.

This is for a bow with parallel limbs. Not pyramid of which I am not a fan for beginners. Getting the tiller right for that limb shape is difficult.

First and foremost, rarely confine wood removal to one area, count your strokes and check tiller often.

Second, a handy way to make sure you get a decent taper is to measure off the limb in 6 in. increments.  Get an outside caliper. Just off the fades, I start at 3/4" or a little less. Probably too this but you can't put wood back.

Give the dial a turn, slide it to the next 6 in. mark and remove wood until it fits. Continue.

Then you can begin to look tiller.

Perhaps, stick with straight limbed bows until you get some experience. Also, go to the Bow of the Month club and look at the tillers of bows.

Check my site.

http://traditionalarchery101.com

Jawge

[loon]

I like pyramid bows best. But if you do leave them the same thickness all the way to the tip, the limbs will always bend more on the fade end that at the tip. It's because we can't actually taper the width to a point. So, we have to thin the limbs from about the middle to the tip, tillering as with parallel limbs.

"Eiffel tower" limb tips are probably best

[BowEd]

Doing what George says for parallel limbs will get your bow to brace from floor tiller every time in good shape not stressing the limbs any.
Doing what ash arrow says for pyramids will put your pyramid bow where it should be for tiller too.
Doing what loon says about the tips can be learned later but work great too.
Doing what Springbuck says is on the money too.
Doing JW's method works great too.
Doing what Pappy says can get you some fulfillment from it yet anyway at the moment.
Dong what DuBois says might be worth your while too if so inclined.
Sorry if I left some fellas out.
Some smart fellas on here.I'd take their advice.

[Springbuck]

Asharrow has a good point. I approach the pyramid thickness differently, but it's true that an exact consistent thickness will make the pyramid bend more toward the handle, less toward the tips.

When you mark out the dimensions of a pyramid bow, since, as Ash said, you can't ACTUALLY, taper to a point, most guys just mark the sides, tapering to a 3/8"-1/2" wide tips.  In this case you will need a slight front/back taper to make the limb bend evenly.

I usually DO mark the sides taper to a point.  Then, I add some width to those last few inches with parallel sides.  So, the side taper ends, say 5-6"  from the tip, and the sides become parallel.  This let's me not have to specifically try to taper the thicknesz, but as I tiller, I end up doing it anyway, working the bow toward tiller.

BTW, the best way to hit draw weight is to pull the bow only about that hard as you tiller.  If you want a 50 lb bow, only pull the bow on the tillering tree with 50 lbs of force.  Lots of guys use a spring scale to do this.  I have a pulley system to watch limbs bend, but I also have a bar and weights from an old barbell set I hang on the string and step back.  Early on this will only bend the limbs a bit, but that's ok. Correct what you can see, and check again.   The weight will pull it 3", then 5", then 8", etc.  By the time it's pulling a real string 20" or so, I'm usually happy with the bend, and just have to bring it in.

Lastly, "trapping", is the practice of reducing the limbs to a trapezoid cross section, the back being narrower than the belly, and the sides angled.  Most woods are stronger in tension than compression, so you help the belly a little doing this.  It also reduces physical limb weight while maintaining stiffness.  You lose weight faster than you lose stiffness, if that makes sense.

On a pyramid bow, this might be used to take the weak inner limb/stiff outer limb problem.  If you narrowed the back by 1/4" by angling the sides, you'd be removing PROPORTIONALLY more width at the tips, since the inner limbs are wider and the tips narrower.  Handled properly, this might let you get away with less front/back taper.

[Springbuck]

Oh, and what flipping the tip did is to GEOMETRICALLY stiffen that bit, which is already stiffer, so, beat up inner limbs.

Man, this is a long, boring surgery I'm sitting in on.

[George Tsoukalas]

Pyramid limbs are wider at the fades and narrower at the tips so why would the fades bend more?
Jawge