Firewood

[junseld84]

Hi all,

These are likely the final posts i'll do on this thread. I want to thank everyone for the advice, guidance and encouragement through this process. It's been a blast and this definitely won't be my last selfbow attempt. But first I have a great straight grained white oak board that's begging to be used in several different projects.

I've attached final pics of the tips and handle section. I tried to heat treat the bow to raise the draw weight once I was happy with the tiller. I think the only thing I really accomplished was to take the recurve out that I had previously added. So, I tried to add that back in but then this happened to the belly!

[junseld84]

The crack is on the belly side right under the recurved part of the limb. I tried to fill it with CA glue but since the limb bends backwards there, you can see the glue was pushed out. Since it's a nasty looking crack and it's an obvious weak point, i'll just add it to the list of reasons why this bow should have broken already. That being said, I took it out and shot it today over the chrono. It was averaging between 139-143 fps with an 13.4 gpp arrow. I'm not sure how good that is but I feel like that's fairly respectable given that this is my first attempt and the number of cracks and flaws this thing has. It's pulling right at 40 lbs at 28" still so I'm assuming it's making it to 42 lbs at my full draw of 30". I know the tiller isn't perfect but I think future efforts would be best afforded to a new project.

[upstatenybowyer]

Way to go! I really hope it lasts, and if not, you can blame it on the wood. The bend looks really nice to me. Looking forward to seeing more from ya. 

[JW_Halverson]

Definitely keep working on 'em.  Keep posting, keep scraping wood!