Author Topic: Hjarno-ish ash bow finished  (Read 6065 times)

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Offline CaptainBeaky

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Hjarno-ish ash bow finished
« on: April 07, 2013, 06:19:14 pm »
OK, it is now more or less finished, bar some decoration (which I am pondering) and a few coats of Danish Oil and beeswax.

Ash from a tree I took down last December, 68" n-t-n, 3" at fades, tapering to 3/8" at the nocks.

Nocks are ebony offcuts from the Box of Useful Items.

About 55lb at 30", shoots quite sweetly.





Can I convince anyone that the belly is a jpeg artifact?



3" wide at fades



Closeup of nock - now glued on and re-profiled.



Non-primitive riser - sort of patterned after a Border Griffon.



I'll update when I've finished the decoration.


Thanks for looking  :D
The law hangs the man and flogs the woman
That steals the goose from off the common
But lets the greater villain loose
That steals the common from under the goose.

Offline CaptainBeaky

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Re: Hjarno-ish ash bow finished
« Reply #1 on: April 14, 2013, 06:18:28 pm »
Measured draw weight again yesterday, now dropped to 48lb @ 30", after a little bit of shooting in my garden, and now showing about 3" of set.  :-[
More patience needed in tillering, methinks...

Decorated, oiled and waxed:





That's all, folks.
The law hangs the man and flogs the woman
That steals the goose from off the common
But lets the greater villain loose
That steals the common from under the goose.

Offline lesken2011

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Re: Hjarno-ish ash bow finished
« Reply #2 on: April 14, 2013, 06:56:14 pm »
Nice job, Captain!
For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast.

Ephesians 2:8-9

Kenny from Mississippi, USA

Offline H Rhodes

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Re: Hjarno-ish ash bow finished
« Reply #3 on: April 14, 2013, 07:39:55 pm »
Cool bow. Love the finished art work. 
Howard
Gautier, Mississippi

Offline dwardo

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Re: Hjarno-ish ash bow finished
« Reply #4 on: April 15, 2013, 07:03:35 am »
Nice work  8) Where is it taking most of the set?

Offline Parnell

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Re: Hjarno-ish ash bow finished
« Reply #5 on: April 15, 2013, 10:24:42 am »
Nice one!
1’—>1’

Offline Hrothgar

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Re: Hjarno-ish ash bow finished
« Reply #6 on: April 15, 2013, 10:44:01 am »
Good looking bow, tiller seems right on too.
" To be, or not to be"...decisions, decisions, decisions.

Offline hatcha

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Re: Hjarno-ish ash bow finished
« Reply #7 on: April 15, 2013, 02:12:29 pm »
That's a serious bow!  Nicely finished.  You mentioned Danish oil - what exactly is that?

Offline CaptainBeaky

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Re: Hjarno-ish ash bow finished
« Reply #8 on: April 16, 2013, 06:26:40 am »
Thank you, kind Sirs  ;D

Nice work  8) Where is it taking most of the set?

Fairly evenly along the working part of the limbs, IIRC - I'll check when I get home.

...You mentioned Danish oil - what exactly is that?

Do you know, I have no real idea?  ??? Hang on....

[exercises Google-fu]

Tung oil, with synthetic resins dissolved in it, together with solvents to improve the application and driers to speed up the drying/curing process.

You wipe it onto the surface and rub it in/allow it to soak in then it sets into the surface, forming a tough, impervious coating in the outer layer of the wood.
I use it on the handles of almost all of the knives I make.

(technically, a varnish is resins dissolved in a carrier solvent, allowing application to a surface, where the solvent will evaporate, allowing the resins to polymerise forming a solid coating)
(if we are going to get pedantic, the solvent does not actually have to evaporate, as there are 100% solids varnishes, where the carrier solvent also polymerises, typically in UV-cured finishes - Danish Oil could therefore best be described as a high-solids room-temperature-curing varnish)

(this may be more information than required...   ::) )
(OK, I have to admit working in the surface coatings industry many summers ago, but I'm cured now  :P)
The law hangs the man and flogs the woman
That steals the goose from off the common
But lets the greater villain loose
That steals the common from under the goose.

Offline gpw

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Re: Hjarno-ish ash bow finished
« Reply #9 on: April 16, 2013, 09:15:34 am »
 Capn’ , just an idea .... a simple tensioned cable backing would help with the weight and set ...  A “primitive” solution ...

Offline hatcha

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Re: Hjarno-ish ash bow finished
« Reply #10 on: April 16, 2013, 06:00:19 pm »
Thanks Cap.  And there's no such thing as "...more information than required..." ;)


Offline adb

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Re: Hjarno-ish ash bow finished
« Reply #11 on: April 16, 2013, 06:29:52 pm »
With your pyramid design (3" at the fades) I'm surprised it took 3" of set. Was the wood still a bit green? Do you actually have a 30" draw? If not, why did you choose to tiller it to 30"?

If that bow had been mine, I would have gone for a more circular tiller with the pyramid design. Getting the tips a little lighter and coming around a bit more might have reduced the set a bit. Still a nice bow, however. Well done!

Offline CaptainBeaky

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Re: Hjarno-ish ash bow finished
« Reply #12 on: April 16, 2013, 08:27:16 pm »
Thanks, adb - The stave started out with a lot of deflex, which I attempted to heat-bend out - I don't think I managed it. It may also have still be a bit green when I started tillering, although it had stopped losing weight and been stable for 4 days.
Yes, I draw 30" - those shafts in the bow further up the thread are 30" and I draw them to the head...

It started out as a normal pyramid design, but having seen the Hjarno artifact I fancied having a go at a leverbow, hence the outer 1/3rd of the limb is almost non-bending.
It does shoot nicely, so I'll play with it for a bit while I make the Mk2  ;D

My son has also now got his eye on this one - a bit of a jump from his 30lb@28" flatbow, but he manages to draw it all the way back to his normal anchor, so he may end up with it. (If I'm not careful  :o )
The law hangs the man and flogs the woman
That steals the goose from off the common
But lets the greater villain loose
That steals the common from under the goose.

Offline rossfactor

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Re: Hjarno-ish ash bow finished
« Reply #13 on: April 16, 2013, 08:30:18 pm »
Nice bow.  I like the limb profile.

Ash is a good bow wood, but I've noticed it can be pretty set prone.  Of course someone will come and tell us that design would solve that problem, but... I'm of a mind that some woods take set more easily than others.
Still I'm a fan of Ash.

Gabe
Humboldt County CA.

mikekeswick

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Re: Hjarno-ish ash bow finished
« Reply #14 on: April 17, 2013, 02:51:18 am »
Nice bow.  I like the limb profile.

Ash is a good bow wood, but I've noticed it can be pretty set prone.  Of course someone will come and tell us that design would solve that problem, but... I'm of a mind that some woods take set more easily than others.
Still I'm a fan of Ash.

Gabe

What you've got to ask yourself is WHY it took the set. Sure you can say that some woods are just set prone , well SOME maybe are but ash ISN'T one! The simple answer is that ash is extremely tension strong but not so great in compression when compared to it's tension strength.
A lot of people think that for less dense woods the simple answer to it taking set is 'make it wider'....well thats ok if it is the compression strength that is at fault. Ash however has this large difference between tension/compression strengths so the first thing to do it fix this problem. To make high performance ash bows you must must must trap the back heavily. If your limb is 2 inches wide the back should only be 1 inch. 1/2 off each back corner.
Just going wider actually makes the problem worse  ;)
Ash was the most easily available wood to me when I started to make bows. All of mine took plenty of set before I strated heavy trapping and heat treating. Bingo - less than 1 inch on them all. One of my very best flight bows is made of ash - it has less than 1/2 inch set and it's highly stressed. It shoots just shy of 300yds.