Looking for dimensions for a 75 pound red oak pyramid style self bow

[KenH]

What about gluing a handle to the belly side of the D bow?  Will that prevent it from popping off?

Or adding a tied on hand-filler of folded leather to the belly side?

[Orkraider]

Hmmm, I can see where the whole popping off thing might be an issue.

At this point, I'm in a quandry; I want to do 2 things that might not be compatible.

I want to make a pyramid bow with a reasonable chance of success, and I want to make a 75# bow.

I'm going to the store today to buy some wood, maybe I'll buy enough for 2 bows. Then I can start on the 75#, and if it doesn't work out, I can jump right in to a lower weight that's more likely to work.

The more I read, the more likely it seems that for the higher weight bows I want to make, I'll need to go beyond stiff handled red oak selfbows.

after I take a stab at todays project, I reckon next will be a bend through the handle longbow. I've seen Jawge suggest that a bajillion times, so it's got to be a good idea.

After that, I might have to start messing with some of that fancy "laminating" you all talk about.

Doing that stuff might be hard without a table saw, tho. =)

Once I get to building this pyramid bow, I'll be posting pics as I go.

Thanks again to everyone, this place is the best.

[Jude]

I agree that you should probably get away from hardware store 3/4" lumber, if you want heavier bows.  Do you have a band saw at least, or are you chopping out the front profile?  Either way works. Check online and in the phone book for hardwood suppliers.  There should be some in your locality.  I was hard up for good wood in Alaska, but the local hardwood supplier had nice clear 5/4 rough sawn Hickory and White Oak boards, for a reasonable price.  The advantage of buying rough sawn lumber, over planed, is you get the full advertised dimension, ie: a 1" board is 1" thick, not 3/4" and a 5/4" board is 1 1/4" thick, not 1 1/8".

On a different note, where have you been stationed?  I've been at Ft. Drum, Ft. Wainwright, Ft. Irwin, and now back at Drum.  I've worked in Armament Maintenance the whole time, since '98, so my preocupation with bows stems from a broader mental disorder, mainly my preocupation with anything that fires a projectile of some sort   Now i'm just waiting for my latest sunny Middle Eastern vacation to end, so I can get back to my family and make som new bows for my 3 boys.  (Can't seem to convince Mommy that she needs one too)

Good Luck,
Jude (AKA Chief Benoit)

[Orkraider]

Hey, Jude. (couldn't resist)

I don't have a bandsaw, or a table saw. So far, I've been laying out the dimensions in pen or pencil, then taking wood of with my trusty stanley surform.

I do actually have a wicked cool table saw, a solid metal behemoth, but I need to scrounge up a motor for it; that's another work in progress.

I was originally planning on hitting menards today to see what they had, but it was a nice day, so I said screw it, and hit the range by the lake instead. It was awesome.

I bumped into a guy and his 3 sons shooting their compounds, and they were all oohing and ahing over my board bow and ghetto arrows. What a boost to my ego, lol.

I did bump into my landlord on the way out, and he gave me an address for a wood supplier he deals with. He says they have everything, in any dimension, and will cut to order, and that it's dirt cheap. I'm pretty excited, that's gonna be my destination on my next day off.

As far as where I was stationed, I was a "civilian soldier" or "weekend warrior"; never did any active duty, just the reserves. Bootcamp at Fort Benning, Georgia, where I learned the fine art of the 11 Bravo, then after 3 years of that I switched to 13 foxtrot, forward observer with a Fist team. Spent time just up the river from my house at Fort Snelling, also Fort Mccoy, and Camp Ripley.

I never had to go anywhere sandy, for which I'm greatful; thanks for serving, and I hope you make it back.

[Orkraider]

Okay, I'm finally starting this bow after a long delay. The weather here has gotten really decent, and any time I've had after work and home has been spent heading out to the archery range rather than making a new bow.

   I just got back from Menards (local warehouse style hardware store), and I picked up a 1" by 3" by 6' piece of red oak. It's solid, no knots, and the grain looks like it runs right along the length of the board without running off.

   I'm shooting for the dimensions Badger gave me, i.e. 66" long, 2 1/2 inch wide at the fades, tapering smoothly down to 1/2" wide at the tips.

   I have a few questions before I start this bad boy; the biggest one is this:

    How do you tiller a pyramid bow? The bits and pieces I've gleaned from the build alongs I've looked at make it sound like it's all side tillering, i.e. wood is removed from the sides of the limbs rather than the belly. This fascinates me, it sounds like it would help make sure you remove any excess mass of wood from the bow; I'm just not sure I have a clear understanding of how this works.

   My next question: earlier, I was told that the handle popping off might be an issue. Is there any way I can do some creative joinery to make sure this doesn't happen? Or, perhaps, might my handle wrap help the handle stay on? Perhaps I should make a built up handle out of layers of glued on leather?

  Last, what would the downsides be of leaving it at the full length of the board, i.e. 72" instead of 66"? It just seems a shame to have this nice long board and not use the whole thing.


Some other things that have happened during my journey to become an archer, bowyer, and fletcher;  I've shot my current bow enough now that my arms are in much better condition. Less shaking and pain has resulted in a Huge increase in accuracy.  Also, since I started taking a much deeper hook on my string, my fingers don't hurt when I shoot; I'm getting a small amount of callousing, but all in all, I think I'm going to be able to go without an archers tab, which makes me happy. 

One of the biggest things I've noticed is how much fun I'm having. Part of it is the reaction I get from other people. At the ranges I go to, I'm usually the only guy shooting a bow like mine; I get a lot of attention, and it's a great conversation starter with the other shooters.  I also get a lot of looks and questions as I travel to and from on the bus. That 6 foot piece of wood does tend to stick out a bit.  I've never done anything else that has had so many people say to me "wow, you made that? that is so cool!". That's a power feeling, and I'm getting hooked on it, lol.

Last, but not least, I finally  stumbled across the ideal materials for less ghetto looking cases for my tackle (I read that archery gear is properly called 'tackle'). I bought a 10 foot section of 3" corrugated black plastic tubing, it's used for drainage applications. I also got 4 end caps. Total cost: 6 bucks. This will let me have a 6 foot case for my bow, and a 3 foot case for my arrows.

Bah, I do ramble when posting at 1 am. Pictures to come as stuff comes together. peace!

[Jude]

Hi again,

If you haven't read the Traditional Bowyer's Bible, Vols 1-4, I would highly recommend it, as they get heavily into design principals.  As far as the length, there seems to be optimal lengths for bows, in regards to performance and durability, depending on the draw weight and draw length of the design.  The optimal length for a 50# straight-limbed, unbacked  bow, at 28" draw, whether its a bend through the handle or a stiff handled design, seems to be about 66" nock to nock.  Making it longer just robs performance, due to higher limb mass.  Making it shorter can lead to stacking, due to bad string angle, and generally will require design adaptations, like recurves and possibly backings, to maintain performance and durability.  Warbows are typically longer, 72+", due to their draw length being much longer, and draw weight much higher.  If you are going for a heavier bow, as you spoke of earlier, you may want to go longer to take some strain off the neccessarily thicker limbs.  Otherwise, you would have to go much wider at the fades, to achieve a bow that takes little set at 80# @ 28"DL /66"N-N.  Bear in mind, that bow that's  80# @ 28"DL /70"N-N may not perform any better than a 60# bow that's 66" N-N, because of the added limb mass.  I believe that warbows are longer more to compensate for the 32" draw than for the heavy weight.  Good luck, and I hope this helps.

Jude

[The Gopher]

If you leave the glued on riser section on a little plateau of wood (ie, non-bending) you won't have to worry about it popping off.

As far as tillering a pyramid, here are my thoughts: in theory the profile of a pyramid bow dictates that thickness should be even throughout, thus the idea that you tiller it from the sides. In practice though we know that wood is not isotropic it is orthotropic (experiences different properties in the three mutually perpendicular axes), add to that the fact pin knots, big knots, undulations in graind, etc, etc and the theory starts to fall apart just a little bit. The bottom line is this, and i can only speak from my own experience, i have yet to build a pyramid bow where the thickness is identical throughout the limbs, and i have always done some belly tillering on pyramid bows.

Also, if you leave the first few inches wood just past the fades a bit thicker you will cut down on set in that area. a little bit of set close to the handle looks like a lot of set once you get to the tips.

By the way, i'm in Maple Grove.

[Hillbilly Deluxe]

Hey-

   I don't know if this style of bow appeals to you but here is a bow that I just finished for my nephew. It has a seperate riser and limbs that are glued and screwed on. He is only six so obviously t does not pull 75# but i think that this riser would be stiff enough for it. A couple of things that I would have done different are get a longer board for the limbs and cut it in half (all but eliminating the need to tiller).

   With this bow I used 1/4" x 2.5" red oak for the limbs (got it at Lowe's, I was living out of a hotel at work and needed something to do). To get a higher draw I think that you could potentially laminate two or three layers of this and then put a backing on that.

   The riser is made of red oak and poplar (again Lowe's), the entire bow is glued with Gorilla Glue. The nice thing, I thought, was that you might be able to keep the length down. I originally made a 3/4" board bow as you are talking about, it was four feet long and after I shot about two dozen 24" arrows through it broke straight across the limb. That is when I went to the next design This one easily accomodates the 24" arrows I am actually going to recurve it soon with some fast flex bamboo from Rudder Bows. It is also 48" long.

   One thing that I think helped is that the limbs being angled back already they are not as stressed when initially braced. I was thinking about doing this myself but am just getting started an a yumi for a friend's wedding. Try it if you like, I have been looking for an excuse to post a pic of this bow as it is only my second ever, and this seemed as good as any.

   I will send the pics next thay are on my wife's desk top. (She also did all of the wood burning!)