White oak static with antler tips and buffalo leather. 45#@28”

[rps3]

Beautifully bending bow.

[Santanasaur]

Looks great, Dan! Love everything about it. what kind of leather do you use for your handles?

Thanks Weylin. I buy big pieces of veg-tan leather in a few thicknesses.  Recently I’ve been using a lot of buffalo because I got a good deal on an entire hide that was damaged. This piece is about 5-6 oz thick. For heavily tooled handles I like something a little thicker but if there is minimal tooling you can go thinner too.

[bjrogg]

Very nicely done sir. Nice bend and beautiful bow.
Bjrogg

[Bob Barnes]

just gotta love it...how did you put the curves in?

[backtowood B2W]

Very nice bow! Especially the grain and handle catches my attention. Tiller also

[Santanasaur]

just gotta love it...how did you put the curves in?

Bob I steamed the limbs about 45 mins then bent on a 2” radius caul. I use a wallpaper steamer with heat resistant kitchen bags (made for for vacuum sealing food)  to hold in the steam. I usually keep a metal strip on there to hold splinters and chase a g ring on the belly side where the bend will be. Finally I lock the bend with a heat gun.

Here’s a static recurve buildalong of another bow where I used the same recurve caul. Bending starts around 5 minutes in  https://youtu.be/ye4GqWDGRak