Will hickory benefit from sinew?

[Mo_coon-catcher]

I'm thinking about starting on a mid/late winter, dry weather bow for myself. Hickory gets the nod for the wood for obvious reasons to anyone who has worked with hickory. This bow will mainly get pulled out when the humidity drops enough to make me nervous shooting the other bows. So it's main uses would be late season deer and goose hunting. i won't be able to use this bow until next season either way since the hickey I have was cut the middle of this summer. So the wait time for the ainew to dry isn't a big concern since it'll take a good month after shaping before I'd be comfortable tillering it out anyway. Do you think there would be any benefit to hickory being sinew backed for this purpose or is it going to be a negligible use of sinew and time? I feel like it would be pretty negligible unless I feel like making it a short compact hickory bow.

Thanks,
Kyle

[wizardgoat]

Some original bows were sinew backed hickory.
If you design it right it would be worth it I'd think

[upstatenybowyer]

I think if you're going for a short high-stressed design it would work well. The sinew would help prevent it from taking set. Hickory loves a good belly toasting, so if it were me I think I would tiller it out to near completion, heat treat the belly, then apply sinew and tweak the final tiller once the sinew had cured. I'm no sinew expert, so take that with a grain of salt.

[Pat B]

I made a copy of Jay Massey's Medicine Bow, 60"t/t, 58#@26". A month later in the humid  summer it dropped to 45#@26". I sent it to Kenneth(Little John) in Colorado to use on horseback and in a month it drew 65#@26". It shot well at all weights(best at the heaviest/driest).
 IMO, hickory works well with sinew backing but like hickory alone it performs best at low R/H levels.

[bradsmith2010]

yes Hickory can bennefit from the sinew,, Jay Massey liked it,, thats enough for me,,

[Mo_coon-catcher]

Well, sounds like it's worth using the sinew then. I think I'll do a short bendy handle with flipped tips or full recurve if I pick a stave straight enough for easy alignment. Probably make it 52-54" ntn, 1 5/8" wide, and put about 3-4" of reflex before tillering out. probably aim for 45# at 27" and see where it ends up come next winter after some good drying time. That should make for a good compact hunting bow.

Kyle

[Stick Bender]

This bow is 1 of my hunting bows for this year heat tempered sinew backed hickory with 7 coats of true oil & 7 coats of poly & 4 coats of furniture wax used this bow in rain high humidity didnt notice any percievable loss of weight at least didnt have any change in arrow trajectory & I rewax every hunt , Brad mentioned that Jay M really liked that combo I think its a solid choice with being meticulous sealed The only regreat was I didnt add more reflex this one shoots a 530 grain arrow @ 156 fps 47 lb @29 with B-50 not a rocket launcher but ok for a 62 in hunting bow

[bradsmith2010]

i think that is really nice cast with the 530 grain arrow,, nice hunting set up,