Show off your NON-heat treated selfbows!

[Deerhunter21]

I'm certainly not trying to say that heat treating doesn't make good bows awesome. It just seems that it's become such a common trend that some people may not be learning to make those good bows first to take full advantage of the technique. The investment in time to heat treat is not insignificant. I think to get people into this hobby, making bows should be as easy as possible and this includes dispelling myths such as needing backings on boards or that heat treating is needed to prevent set.

Keeping the ball rolling, here's an infamous poplar bow. 66" ntn and about 50#@28". 10" handle and fades and 2.5" wide at the fades with a convex taper to 1/2" tips. Tip overlays are poplar as well. Took just over an inch of set and shoots pretty good.

Poplar!? blasphemy!    how did you get that to work? ive always been told poplar is a bad bow wood!
 also... i feel like i know that place... is that the Marshalls rendezvouses place?! been a while! going there was one of the highlights of life! seriously lol!

[Marc St Louis]

Heat-straightening is not the same as heat-treating and I don't believe you need to do one if you do the other.  There are certain times that I do both at the same time but not always

[Selfbowman]

Yes Marc but I have had Osage seem to not want to tiller the same after  maybe straighten one spot in a limb. Could have been a bad tiller day. I think we all have one sometimes. I go to the bench  or caul 4-6 Times nearly on all my bows. So the hopefully last time I do the whole bow. Then is when I do what I call heat treat. Also 350 -400 degrees. Hand on hand off within 2-3 count. Tried the lazier thermometer. To much going on for the simple guy I am.

[willie]

wasn't there a guy that posted a few years back in the warbow section. he duplicated bows from dimensions taken from the mary rose finds, and tillered by hitting the more bendy spots with a heat gun?

[JW_Halverson]

In my opinion, heat treating/toasting bow bellys is an advanced technique best left until after you have mastered the basics. But heat treating has become the new "sinew backing", another advanced technique.

It seems we all came to bow making with the desire to make a great bow, not realizing we could make A LOT OF BOWS on the way to making that great bow, and we all seemed to want that first one to be as good as it could possibly be.  I am dealing with a potential student that I believe has that innate "something", but I cannot get her to commit to starting the bow, just keeps recalculating what the penultimate most bestest is supposed to be. Three years and she has not touched a tool or a stave.

Perfect is the enemy of good. Robert Watson-Watt, who developed early warning radar in Britain to counter the Luftwaffe, argued for a "cult of the imperfect", which he stated as "Give them the third best to go on with; the second best comes too late, the best never comes."

[Marc St Louis]

Yes Marc but I have had Osage seem to not want to tiller the same after  maybe straighten one spot in a limb. Could have been a bad tiller day. I think we all have one sometimes. I go to the bench  or caul 4-6 Times nearly on all my bows. So the hopefully last time I do the whole bow. Then is when I do what I call heat treat. Also 350 -400 degrees. Hand on hand off within 2-3 count. Tried the lazier thermometer. To much going on for the simple guy I am.

Yes that's true, that will happen after applying heat.  Did you leave it hydrate long enough after?  Applying heat in one spot will drive any moisture from that area further down the limb making that spot dry and the surrounding area with more moisture.  That will definitely affect how the wood bends

[PatM]

In my opinion, heat treating/toasting bow bellys is an advanced technique best left until after you have mastered the basics. But heat treating has become the new "sinew backing", another advanced technique.

It seems we all came to bow making with the desire to make a great bow, not realizing we could make A LOT OF BOWS on the way to making that great bow, and we all seemed to want that first one to be as good as it could possibly be.  I am dealing with a potential student that I believe has that innate "something", but I cannot get her to commit to starting the bow, just keeps recalculating what the penultimate most bestest is supposed to be. Three years and she has not touched a tool or a stave.

Perfect is the enemy of good. Robert Watson-Watt, who developed early warning radar in Britain to counter the Luftwaffe, argued for a "cult of the imperfect", which he stated as "Give them the third best to go on with; the second best comes too late, the best never comes."

 Yes, there is too much info readily available now.

 Paralysis by analysis is  a killer for bowmaking now.

[RyanY]

You guys nailed it. Now post some bows! 

[Allyn T]

I agree wanting to make a "perfect" bow can hang people up. I spent almost a year from tree cut to realizing my bow wouldn't work but since then my second bow is already almost as far as my first and it's only been 3 weeks. I hope mojam happens this year it would be so helpful to have experts in person and see it happen in real time.

[Selfbowman]

Ryan I would but I don’t have any. 😀😀😀sorry to high Jack the thread. Arvin