Marc St. Louis bow question (with progress pics)

[Nasr]

Marc i've worked with white oak and it bends really well using dry heat and also benefits with heat treating. I have not attempted a reflex deflex though so i don't know how it would work in that regards but i am confident i can get the curves i want with it. I am glad to hear i dont need to add a strip to the back it makes my first attempt at this much easier.

White Ash heat-bends well also but it can't take the compression, it chrysals badly

So Marc would hacberry be a good choice

Marc I am not worried about it chrysaling but that's only because I've always been under the assumption that a  deflex reflex bow is less strained then a recurve bow given everything else is the same or am i missing something. If my assumption is correct than i shouldn't have anything to worry about cause i have not had a problem with white oak chrysaling although it does love to take set but i like to trap the back on my white oak bows as well which seems to help. 

below are some of the bows I've made with white oak

[Marc St Louis]

[quote author=upstatenybowyer link=topic=63509.msg892478#msg892478 date=1527033235

Marc, can it be done with just one long backing strip? If so, do you just flatten/round out the back over the splice as best you can and then proceed with the glue up?
[/quote]

Absolutely.  I use a power lam over the splice that extends to at least 1" past the fades and it is flattened with my belt sander over the splice.  Whichever way you do it the bend at the handle is going to be a bit of a problem simply because of the slight deformation of the strip caused by bending it around the curve.  When using one strip I pre-bend the curve around the handle using dry-heat then use my belt sander to flatten the inside of the strip.  I also use my belt sander to flatten the inside of the strip at the crown of the handle on a 2 strip backing since I do pre-bend the first strip around the handle as well.  Whichever way you use there is a lot of prepping to do. 

As an aside, I find it is better, in some ways, to use 2 strip because it's much easier to get 2 pristine strips than 1 full length strip

Marc i've worked with white oak and it bends really well using dry heat and also benefits with heat treating. I have not attempted a reflex deflex though so i don't know how it would work in that regards but i am confident i can get the curves i want with it. I am glad to hear i dont need to add a strip to the back it makes my first attempt at this much easier.

White Ash heat-bends well also but it can't take the compression, it chrysals badly

So Marc would hacberry be a good choice

Marc I am not worried about it chrysaling but that's only because I've always been under the assumption that a  deflex reflex bow is less strained then a recurve bow given everything else is the same or am i missing something. If my assumption is correct than i shouldn't have anything to worry about cause i have not had a problem with white oak chrysaling although it does love to take set but i like to trap the back on my white oak bows as well which seems to help. 

below are some of the bows I've made with white oak

As I said, I don't know much about White Oak since I don't have easy access to it.  I wouldn't make a recurve of any style with White Ash.  It's good sinew backed or as a flatbow or as a native style bow but it doesn't like being strained too much

[Bayou Ben]

Nasr, I think you're right about it being less stress with a mild deflex/reflex as opposed to a recurve all else being equal.  But Marc's designs are anything but mild.  5" is A LOT of reflex and then you will be adding recurves.  I've had wood chrysal with 3" of reflex that otherwise would be fine without it.  I would think the deflex is there to allow that large amount stress without breaking or chrysaling the wood badly even when using premium woods like osage/yew/HHB/elm. 

Good luck on your build.  I will be following this thread closely.

[Nasr]

 Marc thank you so much for your time and explaining things i will give it a try if it works or fails we will all atleast learn something about white oak.

Nasr, I think you're right about it being less stress with a mild deflex/reflex as opposed to a recurve all else being equal.  But Marc's designs are anything but mild.  5" is A LOT of reflex and then you will be adding recurves.  I've had wood chrysal with 3" of reflex that otherwise would be fine without it.  I would think the deflex is there to allow that large amount stress without breaking or chrysaling the wood badly even when using premium woods like osage/yew/HHB/elm. 

Good luck on your build.  I will be following this thread closely.

if i am being completely honest with myself i doubt that i would be able to do what Marc does that is why i will be overbuilding it. That is why i wanted his thoughts on this cause i view everyone here like teachers and i am just a student. But maybe in 20 years i can do what these guys do 

i will post pics here for everyone to see i don't know how many people would want to see my efforts i was just gonna let everyone know at the end if it worked or not.

[upstatenybowyer]

Marc, this is really great information to have. Thanks so much for taking the time to share your knowledge.

[Marc St Louis]

The bow Marc made me is unbacked and heat bent into reflex. He does do a billet splice to get deflex in the grip area too.

This might be the bow Bob was talking about, I made it for him about 15 years ago.  It's a single stave bow of HHB and consistently clocked over 190 FPS on a 27" draw

[Nasr]

just cut the splice and they were ok but there was a small gap there so i boiled the splice since i still have to build a form to reflex the limbs.

while the splices were boiling i did a search on primitive archer about boiling splices and red the you really only need to use dry heat and oil ................rip.

when can i glue these splices? how long until they are dry enough.

[Nasr]

Marc i've seen that beauty before. i hope one day to be able to make a bow like that, such beautiful curves.

[DC]

Are those glue on recurves, Marc?

[PatM]

just cut the splice and they were ok but there was a small gap there so i boiled the splice since i still have to build a form to reflex the limbs.

while the splices were boiling i did a search on primitive archer about boiling splices and red the you really only need to use dry heat and oil ................rip.

when can i glue these splices? how long until they are dry enough.

 Dry heat and oil in a splice to be?

[Badger]

     Mark, I will see if Bob still has that bow , maybe we can get him to shoot it in the broadhead event at Mojam.

[Nasr]

just cut the splice and they were ok but there was a small gap there so i boiled the splice since i still have to build a form to reflex the limbs.

while the splices were boiling i did a search on primitive archer about boiling splices and red the you really only need to use dry heat and oil ................rip.

when can i glue these splices? how long until they are dry enough.

 Dry heat and oil in a splice to be?

yeah so Marc has said in previous posts about splices that he uses dry heat wihtout oil to fix splices and others have said that same with oil and they would use acetone to remove the oil afterwards

[Marc St Louis]

There was nothing glued on with this bow except the overlays and the bridges.  The bow was made from the best HHB I have ever cut.  It was a dandy of a tree fully 12'" in diameter.  I got a lot of staves out of that tree, I also got very sore shoulders carrying it out of the  bush

[Lip]

I used to have a build along Marc did for his bow but it's gone now. Would love to see that one again.

[bubby]

Yes I have built several statics with hackberry, bends like butta and smells like popcorn