Hjarno-ish ash bow finished

[dwardo]

I have played with our local ash quite a bit and found it all comes down to early to late ratio.
Some of the stuff I cut that was struggling under a big canopy had loads of real spongy airy early growth and little late which made sense I suppose.
When tillering it seemed to just keep taking set. When working down through the growth rings the early had the consistency of Cheshire cheese. Had two like this recently and gave up as soon as they started to chrystal, very early in tiller too.
The couple i made from the faster grown stuff with large late growth rings was far better.
I was watching a tv program recently about a guy who is trying to make a woodland business work as a coppice and they had a world class furniture maker in who was after ash timber. He dismissed the slow grown stuff with thin rings immediately and went for the opposite. The furniture maker did some very extreme steam bends in his work and knew what he was doing.
In regards to trapping pretty much all of the bows I have made from ash came from small diameter stuff so the shape was there already Heat never harms white woods

[CaptainBeaky]

Useful information here! 

Mike - I'm intrigued, to say the least, and also rather more than somewhat confused 

1. Trapping the back I followed, as you state that ash is weaker in compression than in tension, you then leave more of the wood where it is weaker. But:

2. Is it worth making anything wider than 2"?

3. If the limbs are a pyramid design, and I take 1/2" off each side of the back, when I get down to 1" width, there will be no back left at all...

4. What about using the same 3" down to 1" silhouette for the working limb, and trapping by a constant proportion of the width? e.g. taking 25% of the back width down, so 3/4" each side at the handle fades, reducing to 1/4" each side at the tip fades.  Worth a try?

5. I think I've been awake too long... I will  until I'm a little more compos mentis tomorrow...

[CaptainBeaky]

Further thoughts this morning after some sleep...

This particular ash was in a small clearing on it's own, so wasn't struggling for light/water. Texture was good, not "Cheshire-Cheese'y" at all, and no crysalling even at the later stages.

I've noticed that this one has ended up thinner near the riser fades than at the tip fades, which would imply that I have made it too wide, or possibly tapering too much 

I have the next stave from this batch partly reduced down to size - 68¹/₂" ttt, this one has a slight reflex at both ends and a good straight section between.

Based on the above, I will try a similar design, but a bit wider at the outer fades, say 3" tapering to 1¹/₂", trapped 25% of width on each side all the way the tip fades. Thick tips necked down to 1" narrowing to ³/₈" at the nock.


Heat treated on the belly prior to tillering.

What do you think?

[hatcha]

Interesting thoughts on ash - I think I shall definitely be trapping the stave I've got on the go in the shed.

Also - I got my hands on a can of Danish Oil and I LIKE it!!