Hickory backed osage or ipe warbow>?

[Chris grimbowyer]

If I were to make a english warbow of about 72-80 inches in length what wood would be superior being backed with hickory? Ipe or Osage? How wide should the limbs be from start to finish of taper and should the belly be rounded or flat and should this bow bend in the handle? (This will be my first bow of over 66 inches)

[Ian.]

It depends on what weight you want, both Ipe and osage are good osage in most peoples opinion is better, rounded-ish on the belly, and it should definitely bend in the handle if its a warbow, try to get the last 12" of the bow tapering to 1/2" the middle totally depends on how much draw weight you want.

[Chris grimbowyer]

I dont know if I should go for a heavy poundage considering that it is a warbow or just make it the poundage I usually shoot 40-60 pounds

[Ian.]

Its fun making heavy bows, if you are going for 50-60 then the warbow shape probably isn't best. Why not about 100lb most people can pull that weight after some training and that way you get the feel of a real warbow, and you will get good performance out of both woods at that weight. Or you could try for 150+ and make a real beast 

[Easternarcher]

Not to hijack the thread, but this may be helpful info...
I also have a stick of osage that I was hoping to turn into an ELB or tri-lam warbow.
The warbow idea may not work as this belly slat is only 7/16ths thick at the grip to start with and tapers down to 3/8ths at the tips.  Pretty hard to do a rounded belly with such thin belly wood correct?
I tried it on my ELB and ended up with very thin belly wood because of the mid-core being too thick and not tapered enough toward the ends.

[fishfinder401]

chris, i might be biased towards heavier bows, but i would say go for ipe and a 100+ bow and see what you can do, if its to heavy, shave it down, and once the poundage is right, put the finish on it, you may need horn or antler tips on it though, you might be pleasantly surprised what weight you can pull, just dont hurt yourself , if your joits are sore, let the reast for a few days, and try again and repeat this, it helped get my body used t heavy bows
noel

[sailordad]

chris, i might be biased towards heavier bows, but i would say go for ipe and a 100+ bow and see what you can do, if its to heavy, shave it down, and once the poundage is right, put the finish on it
noel

i have to disagree with that statement
you should know what weight you want befoe you tiller the bow
during the tillering process you NEVER WANT TO EXCEED YOUR INTENDED DRAW WEIGHT
if you pull the stave past your draw weight during tillering this can cause a slow bow as the wood cells have been stressed past the finished weight
this causes excessive set,poor cast etc etc
in my opinion this is just as bad as changing the bow profile during tilliering
always have a plan before you start and stick wth it
if you want a 130# bow,start to make it and finish it,if yo want a 6t0# bow start it and finish,but never jump ship mid stream
jmho 

[Bevan R.]

Sound advice from Salordad.
If you start out one and try to end another, you mess up both ways.

Bevan R

[Chris grimbowyer]

Thanx for all your help guys! I think im gonna start with a 72 inch hickory backed ipe at 100 pounds with a perry reflex.

[Chris grimbowyer]

Ooops I ment to say just 70 inches. I hope that is long enough, My core isnt quite 72.

[Ian.]

The shorter a bow the harder it will be to draw and also the string angle wont be comfortable, I think go as long as you can within reason 76" is about right

[fishfinder401]

chris, i might be biased towards heavier bows, but i would say go for ipe and a 100+ bow and see what you can do, if its to heavy, shave it down, and once the poundage is right, put the finish on it
noel

i have to disagree with that statement
you should know what weight you want befoe you tiller the bow
during the tillering process you NEVER WANT TO EXCEED YOUR INTENDED DRAW WEIGHT
if you pull the stave past your draw weight during tillering this can cause a slow bow as the wood cells have been stressed past the finished weight
this causes excessive set,poor cast etc etc
in my opinion this is just as bad as changing the bow profile during tilliering
always have a plan before you start and stick wth it
if you want a 130# bow,start to make it and finish it,if yo want a 6t0# bow start it and finish,but never jump ship mid stream
jmho 

i do agree with you to a point, i didn't mean a change of more than like 10lbs, just more to fine tune it, if he wasn't comfortable with the strength, but you do have a very valid point
noel

[NTD]

The shorter a bow the harder it will be to draw and also the string angle wont be comfortable, I think go as long as you can within reason 76" is about right

76" seems pretty long for Ipe....but then again I've never built a bow over 60lbs...

[adb]

I wouldn't go shorter than 76" for any bow at or above 100#.

[NTD]

I've seen your bows so I believe ya   Thanks Adam.