Differences between Bows

[AndrewS]

What is the difference between a longbow and a recurve?
Is it the length?
- I know deflex reflex longbows with a length of 54 or 56 inches and I know recurves with 10 inch more
Or is the difference something complete different?

Thanks for your comments

[blackhawk]

Basically IN GENERAL ones a little longer and the string doesn contact the tips at brace,and a recurve will be a bit shorter and the string will contact the tips at brace. Pretty simple...one has tips bent up n the others are straight. There is some grey area in between that im sure some devils advocate is gonna  wanna play with.

[LittleBen]

In general

Recurve - string touches belly of limb

Longbow - string doesn't touch belly of limb

Although I guess, especially with wood bows it seems, that a bow with very reflexed tips might be called a recurve even if the string doesn't quite lay against the belly.

[PatM]

If the string doesn't lie on the belly the tips can't be that "reflexed".

 The lines between the two get blurred when you make a burgundian style longbow which has small hooks on a fairly typical longbow body.

[AndrewS]

Thanks for your response.

So the difference is mainly if the string touch the belly or not.
In some cases there is a grey zone:
- like PatM demonstrate us
- the difference  between an extreme reflex and a soft recurve isn't clearly defined
-...

[Lehtis]

The two major archery associations have a bit different definitions for longbow. World Archery (WA) rules say that longbow should have traditional look and string not touching belly outside nock grooves, i.e. some slight recurve allowed. Length of the bow should be 160 cm or more (for male archers). International Field Archery Association (IFAA) rules say there must not be any reflex outside handle area when bow is stringed, i.e. limb line should form D.