Exercising bow during tillering?

[NewBowyer]

Waiting for Weylin to weigh in on this question- I think I remember from either a previous post here, or maybe YouTube, that he had a different opinion on this question. As DanaM said, “Fascinating how people do things so differently.”

[Selfbowman]

I floor tillered and strung my 50# record bow. Adjusted the tiller at brace and worked on it till I liked the  bend at about 20-24” . Not necessarily exercising that much. This was before I started using a tillering tree. Bow #225. In December I started using the tiller tree. I am at about 20 bows using the tree. I am liking the tree but it’s not a must. At 275 bows I like both ways. Still learning from using the tree. I noticed if you center the bow on the tree and center the pulling point with the scale pulling straight down . The scale hanging point will follow the stiff limb spots moving away from a straight line from center of bow drawn straight down. Not a good explanation of the bows response but best I can do. Does not show up so much on a 67” bow but wow how it magnifies a 42” crossbow . Here is a pic of my tree. Maybe you can figure out what I am trying to explain.  Arvin

[willie]

The scale hanging point will follow the stiff limb spots moving away from a straight line from center of bow drawn straight down. Not a good explanation of the bows response but best I can do. Does not show up so much on a 67” bow but wow how it magnifies a 42” crossbow . Here is a pic of my tree. Maybe you can figure out what I am trying to explain.  Arvin

Arvin,
I think I follow what you are saying.
if you have to slide the scale to one side or the other to keep the bow level when you draw, it will move towards the stiff limb?

275 

[George Tsoukalas]

Yes, your tillering string will slide towards the strong limb. Jawge

[Del the cat]

In a lot of cases you won't notice any change in bend after removing wood. By exercising the wood between wood removals the wood will usually register the wood that was removed.
   This is probably what happened to your bow. You took enough wood to make the hinge but it didn't register until after you shot the bow 100 times. I believe it also helps reduce set and it eliminates most of the weight loss during the normal "break-in" period because you have taught the wood how to bend and how much bend is expected of it under normal use.  Pat

+1... nicely explained.
That's why it's easy to overshoot and take off too much wood... because the effect doesn't show up immediately.
Del

[Eric Krewson]

I mentioned in an earlier post that I shoot the bow at a short draw, less than 20" as I get to that point on my tillering tree. Before I started doing this I would take what a nicely tillered bow out for it's first shots and something would drastically change, usually one limb would go weak.

Just my unproven conclusion but I believe the snap of an arrow leaving the bow registers a change must better than simply pulling the bow on a tillering tree. By seeing a slight change early on you can head it off at the pass before it can become a major problem down the road.

I still see slight tillering changes during the initial shoot-in, sometimes almost none, sometimes troublesome, it all depends on the quality of the bow wood you use.

[mmattockx]

I mentioned in an earlier post that I shoot the bow at a short draw, less than 20" as I get to that point on my tillering tree. Before I started doing this I would take what a nicely tillered bow out for it's first shots and something would drastically change, usually one limb would go weak.

How many shots do you think are necessary for this to give full effect?


Mark

[Eric Krewson]

I shoot a dozen or so but not with every scraping, I pull the bow on a tree 20 or so times between normal scrapings and gizmo checks. When my gizmo lines are getting really short or after 4 or 5 scraping sessions I  shoot a dozen or so arrows and recheck with my gizmo to see if anything changed.

As I get closer to finished tiller I shoot more and more arrows and exercise the bow on the tree less, still at short draw.

I don't have a set pattern for any bow exercising, just what comes to mind at the moment.

[bradsmith2010]

I didnt read everything,,
I start shooting the bow at 20 inches,, and pull on the tiller tree to look at the bend
and I leave it braced for several hours a day as I tiller
that seems to work ok for me,,
I went back and read some,, Steve to you its simple,,,

[NonBacked]

How about it, Simson? What's your thinking on this subject?

[willie]

I went back and read some,, Steve to you its simple,,,

Brad,
I have tried Steves no-set/benchmark method a couple of different ways. For me, holding a particular draw length at the same time as letting a bouncing scale settle was not the easiest. I think my biggest problem was making sure I was exactly on the desired drawlength mark.

I now keep an actual weight on a bench at the foot of the tillertree. when I want to check a benchmark, I can hang the weight on the string and measure to the 1/8" to see drawlength increases easier.

Needless to say. I use Badgers no set principle on every bow I have made since I first tried it.