Primitive Archer
Main Discussion Area => Bows => Topic started by: Del the cat on April 27, 2013, 05:59:20 am
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A guy at our club buys in cheapo Hickory ELBs from the USA to sell as beginers bows. They are prob' not propperly seasoned or too high MC (ok as a cheap 'first bow')
Anyhow he asked me this.
"one is really odd. It is already curved about 4 inches, but the back is very dark with a white belly. It almost look like yew. Does hickory grow like that?. It is such a strange looking bow I might keep it."
Now this sounds a bit bonkers to me as the ones I'd seen were edge grain rather than ring followed so I don't see how back and belly could be different :o.
Any thoughts comments?
Del
BTW I took one these bows that had a bout 3" of set, heat treated it, slimed the tips, re-tillered it and gained about 20fps at the same draw weight.
This post has a pic of the bow.. next post shows the results.
http://bowyersdiary.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/big-bow-detail-and-hickory-challenge.html (http://bowyersdiary.blogspot.co.uk/2013/03/big-bow-detail-and-hickory-challenge.html)
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Del
Hickory sometimes will hardly have very little heartwood in it and others will just have a little white sapwood and a-lot of heartwood in it. I have been working up some Hickory and one log is darn near all white sap wood and the other one has about a 1-1/2" of white sap and the rest is heartwood. If I get time I will take some pics of it and show you. To get a heartwood back and I white sap wood belly you just about had to follow a ring to get that. Dean
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Cheers, does the heart and sap behave about the same?
Del
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Cheers, does the heart and sap behave about the same?
Del
Yup,
I followed ring on a 50 inch kids bow one time and it functions the same as sap wood only a different color.
Greg
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Del, I'm still working on my first cup of coffee, so I may not be following what you asked. Hickory, like most white woods, still has a dark center, and as Dean mentioned the heart wood can vary some in both degree of darkness and size. Depending how this bow/stave was cut at the saw mill it might very well have a percentage of the board heartwood. Although hickory sapwood is recognized as slightly better than the sapwood I believe that wood bows made from staves that the heartwood is still the belly of the bow and the sapwood side is the back (at least this is how I have always worked it). What I find intriguing is that the bow you looked at is concaved 4 inches toward the darker side (?). As you know a stave while often warp slighty toward the bark side (the lighter color) when drying--maybe it was cut from a warped trunk?
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Wow I learned something here. I was always told that the heartwood in Hickory isn't much count. Burned a bunch of it. But will keep it from now on. Heartwood Hickory is beautiful wood when finished. Here is a pic of a couple of different ends on a couple different Hickory logs. One has a-lot of sap and the other one has more heartwood. Dean
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I think hickory heartwood is more brittle than the sapwood. It should work well for belly wood.
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Thanks for the replies, and those nice pics.
I haven't actually seen the bow in question. I was just asked by a guy at the club and as I didn't know I thought I'd ask you guys from where the stuff actually grows:)
Del
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I think hickory heartwood is more brittle than the sapwood. It should work well for belly wood.
I have heard that before but I tillered out a 50 inch kids bow with a 6 inch stiff handle to 22 inches and it shot great. I did back it with rawhide after tillering and shooting some cause ya know what kids do to their bows :o The bow took little set and shot great. BTW it was my first bow. Maybe I was just lucky ;)
Greg
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I'm kinda curious about this too. Is the heartwood weaker in tension? It seems a bit more brittle?