Not thrilled with osage

[jimmy]

Bows, for the most part, are personal preference.  Having said that, I've seen a lot of osage bows, particularly at OJAM, that are just over built.  Long equals heavy.  Wide equals heavy.  Get the weight off, way off.  A light weight osage bow is a rocket launcer.  70", in my opinion, is insane.  Most of mine are 60-62".  The same goes with the width.  Take off the excess weight.  I have never understood why in thw world people use such over built osage bows.  There is just no way they can compare to a lighter weight bow, and with osage, you can and should use design that allows for this.

[E. Jensen]

I love longer bows.  Just something about length does it for me.  The mulberry I finished is 71" and its the best bow I've shot.  But it's also much lighter than osage.  The literature says 10-15" light but I think its more so.  I guess I just weighed them both and for roughly equal volumes, 16oz vs 20oz, which is right around 15%.  But even though I like long bows, I also like fast arrows.  So since this osage is already at my upper limit of weight, I'm going to wait.  When I'm ready for more power, I'll pike it. 

[RyanY]

Length doesn't necessarily equal heavy if the tiller is good for the design. I have a reputation for being anti-osage and to be honest it's one of my favorite woods. Works amazing, chasing rings is a dream, takes almost no wood to make a bow, and it's an absolutely beautiful wood. I've loved every osage bow I've made. If you design and build a good bow it'll be a good bow no matter what wood it's made of.

[Parnell]

Osage is to bow wood as the Yankees are to baseball.

[Dances with squirrels]

What's baseball?

[JW_Halverson]

Not all Osage is gold. Soy made a scrap bow for me that is 56" tip to tip, inch and an eighth wide at the grip, and used to pull 55#at 26" draw. It has since cured further and pulls 58 lbs now. I wanted to make a bendy Iroquois influenced in similar dimensions and it came in at 52" tip to tip, inch and an eight wide, and both bows are almost exactly the same thickness, but mine came in at 33 lbs of draw.

Two bows almost exactly the same dimensions, but the shorter one is drastically lighter in draw. Go figure. Heck, I.recurved the tips and heat treated them and they no longer work, effectively putting drastically more bend in the working limbs...so there it is!

Maybe that stick you got was just low grade stuff. It is certainly plenty overbuilt in the length department and piking MIGHT help. I suggest you try another stick of osage. Best of luck, keep scraping wood!

[Aaron H]

Osage is to bow wood as the Yankees are to baseball.

I love Osage, but I despise the Yankees

[Parnell]

Osage is to bow wood as the Yankees are to baseball.

I love Osage, but I despise the Yankees

I am with you.

[paulsemp]

if you ain't thrilled with it you're doing something wrong

[E. Jensen]

Yes, I am.  I am used to being good at everything right away  curse you osage for humbling me!!! On my next one I'm focusing on thinner tips as well.  I've come to consider 1/2" thick even for non-osage.

[huisme]

Everyone's saying osage is good for extreme designs like other woods aren't

I've pulled locust and vine maple alike tree inches past their drawx2 limit at one inch wide with good results. One of my strangest looking bows was a high-wrist one inch wide "skinnybow" (like my short bendies but with the grip) with about fifty inches of working limb pulling to twenty six inches. All it takes is some tip adjustment for desirable string angle. Also locust is stiffer, less is required for the same resistance.

If locust can do something like that with its tendency to fret then I wonder how many other woods are treated as less than they are.

[DC]

When you say locust are you meaning black locust? We have BL as an introduce species here. I have also heard of honey locust but it's not as good is it?

[Stringman]

Correct, DC.

Huisme - I would acknowledge that many people like different woods and have high success rates with them. However, I believe osage is at the top of the chart because it is so user friendly and forgiving as well as capable of handling all designs and climates extremely well. No other wood, except possibly yew, even comes close. Your distrust of osage is more likely founded in a lack of exposure to it, but don't let me convince ya.  Different strokes for differnet folks.

[Carson (CMB)]

My current shooter is an overbuilt Osage bow. 70" from nock to nock with 3 inches reflex, very wide out of the fades but pyramid taper limbs to 3/8" nocks. 68# at 28" It isn't a speed demon but it thumps a heavy arrow out there. I will probably rework it into a slightly shorter bow with similar stats.
If you arent happy with your osage bow, and you would like to be happy with it, then it needs to be reworked. I wouldn't approach shortening or "piking" it as simply cutting off 4-5" on each end and carving some nocks in. You will gain a lot from that piece of wood by finding the shorter bow within it. Like others have said, osage is extremely elastic and dense. Bow making is a balance between straining the wood and not overstraining it. A bow design that doesn't strain the wood isn't going to have much cast. Also, get those tips skinnied up! And quite playing with your juvenile wood for now! 

[bow101]

When I work B. Locust it sort of looks like Osage even has a yellow tinge to it .  I do not really do self bows mostly laminate but I sure love Sugar Maple its very forgiving the grain is generally consistent and its not expensive out west.  There is a reason they used maple for core wood besides price and availability.  It bends like a dream with dry heat.