Ironwood Bow Designs

[wooddamon1]

Setting up to steam the deflex out of the one limb. My first go at tillering white wood, I'd like the limbs as even as possible before I start.

[wooddamon1]

Tips are actually 1" for now. Leaving myself a little wiggle room.

[PaSteve]

Coming along very nicely. From seeing some of your Osage bows I'm thinking this'll be a nice one. Good luck on the tiller.

[superdav95]

Looks good and fairly straight actually. I’d be happy with a piece of hhb like that. 

[wooddamon1]

Thanks guys. Steamed a limb to get the bend out, hopefully it works out like I want.

[wooddamon1]

Still safe to heat-treat after a few days out of the form? If ya look in the background of that last pic, that's the only bow I've broken so far 😔

That was a steam job that I was too impatient with that I ended up bending too soon after some dry heat corrections. Lesson learned on that one.

[superdav95]

I think after a few days you are pretty safe.  Ya even with steam it can actually dry out the bow with rapid moisture loss with the steam or boiling.  It sounds counter intuitive but waiting a few days for your corrections to rehydrate a bit is all ways a good idea.  How’s your humidity there

[wooddamon1]

I'm in Michigan, so it varies. Right now it's around 70% I believe. I'll give it a few days and get back to it.

[wooddamon1]

Got the belly heat-treated with a heat gun. Hopefully I did it long enough. About 30 minutes on each limb, we'll see. I'll leave it be for a few days at least while I work on some other bows I need to finish up. Let me know if it looks ok or if I need to hit it more.

[superdav95]

Woodamon.  I usually do more heat treatment then this.  It looks charred on the surface but I suspect it may not be deep enough to yield the results you are hoping for.   When I use a heat gun I mount it in a holder of sorts to face the belly at about 3-4” away.  I move it along an inch or two every 4-5mins depending on the temp of your heat gun and the temp in your shop.  Moving it along slowly and maintaining a consistent distance from the belly will give you a seemless looking cook.  You’ll want to see a Color change browning through about half way the thickness of the limbs.  This will ensure a good hardening of the belly that will give good results. I’d hit it again and try the mount set up and time your moving the heat gun along your bow belly.   Hope this helps.  I’ll see if I can dig up a pic of my set up and include it here. 

[wooddamon1]

Thanks, Dave! Very slick, I'll try to come up with something similar.

[superdav95]

Ya no problem.  I stole this idea from Marc at Luis here.  He does a similar set up.  He also uses a pine pitch wax mix when hot as he moves heat gun along too.  Check his site out he has got good stuff there on this.  I’m sure a quick search on pa here you’ll find it.  Best of luck.