Tiller help

[Christian Soldier]

This bow is 62" long and has a semi-loose (about 1/4" brace) 550 cord tillering string. Still drawing havier than I want so I can take off some more wood. This is the best looking bow I've made and I really don't want it to break. Here are some pics of the tiller, if you could tell me what's wrong and what I should do with it, it would be very appreciated.   



Thanks!

[MWirwicki]

Okay, Christian.   At first glance, it it is bending mostly near the handle.  You'll need to get more of the limb to take the bending load.  If you were to divide your limbs into thirds, it appears that the 1st thirds from the handle are doing most of the work.  From the one picture, any corrective measures would be wood removal in the nextt 2/3 of the limbs towards the tips, stopping short about 3-4 inches from the tips. 

With as far as you are pulling it back, you should be able to shorten your string to a normal brace height of "about" 7-inches measured from the back of the handle. 

Do you have a bow scale set up on a tillering tree or wall?  You need to know how many pounds you have to "mess with."  If you do and can hang the bow up, at normal brace height, draw the bow without exceeding your intended draw weight.  Record how far (in inches) you were able to draw.  If for example you were looking for 50# at 27-inches and your bow so far pulled 50# at 20-inches, you know that you have 7 inches remaining to reach your draw length.  Remove wood where the limbs aren't bending.  If/when the arc is good, remove wood evenly along the entire length. 

The closer to the handle that you remove wood, the quicker you'll lose pounds.  You seem to be bending sufficiently just outside of the handle areas, so make corrections in the 2nd two-thirds of the limbs.

[Joec123able]

Both limbs are bending to much at the fades . Your bottom limb is definetly stiffer. You need to take wood from mid limb out towards the tips on both limbs but take a little more off the bottom

[Christian Soldier]

Thanks guys! That's kinda what I was thinking too. I'll rasp the mid and outer limbs pluss a little extra on the bottom limb.

 I'll work on it some tomorrow and post new pics after church. 

[ssgtchad]

Instead of a rasp try a cabinet scraper you'll have better control. I made one usingnthe back of a sawall blade. Its really helped my tillering ......for what its worth. Looking foward to seeing the finished bow !

[Christian Soldier]

That would be my tool of choice if I had one. 

I use my 4in1 for most of the tillering work, then I use my knife (mora) as scraper, then check the tiller. Rinse. Repeat. 

It usually works out okay. 

I'll defintely post pics of the finished product.

[Slackbunny]

If you got a few extra bucks I highly recommend the cabinet scrapers from 3riversarchery. Mine just arrived in the mail this week and I already don't know how I survived without them. They are really great. You can remove a surprising amount of material in a short time without gouging or tearing. It makes for a much better finished product.

[Christian Soldier]

Allright, I did one scraping session with the upper limb and 2 with the lower and the lower is stil pretty stiff most of the length but I think the upper is looking allright but just a bit stiff mid limb.

Here are some pics, lower limb is at the right.  Input is appreciated.   

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Thanks!

[TacticalFate]

The top limb in the pictures still should be bending quite a bit more.....You can see in the pics that the string is canted towards the stiff top limb

Leave the bottom limb alone for now, and get that string parallel to your handle by working on the stiff limb. Be very careful though, and check tiller frequently, I once screwed up a bow because I took too much off a stiff limb without checking tiller often enough.

[Newindian]

Looks like the entire top limb is to stiff, but the outer third is the stiffest. So remove a little on the outer third then evenly remove wood from the entire limb until it matches the lower limb

[Joec123able]

Yea the pics are confusing but it's easy to tell which limb is stiff but if the bottom limb is on the right the yes you need to take wood from the bottom limb.. the limb on the left looks to be bending pretty good so don't touch it until you get the stiff limb even with it

[Christian Soldier]

Yeah, probably should have oriented the pics the other way,  the bottom limb is actually on top here but the advice still is applicable.

I'll scrape some predominantly from the lower third of the bottom limb (which is on top in the pictures  ), then even it out with the other limb and post a couple more pics. 

[DarkSoul]

Check the tiller often. You're now at the phase where most screw ups occur, or where you'll come in underweight. Remove little wood, and keep checking the tiller. Try to check the tiller yourself, instead of only relying on the Primitive Archer internet community. It is very obvious from the last pictures that the upper limb is way stiffer than the lower limb - you should have seen that yourself as well, I hope. Do not pull it any further; brace height is sufficient to see the tiller corrections that need to be made, so you must not pull it at all. That lower limb looks good, so try to match the upper

[Christian Soldier]

I did see it myself, I think I'm good now, the lower limb is still a bit stiff but its much closer to matching the upper limb (which is on the bottom of the pictures    )

The bow should be finished within the next couple weeks and I'll post some pics then. Thanks for your help guys.