Hickory Board Bow #7

[bjrogg]

Your bend doesn’t have to be perfect before you pull to you intended weight. I usually get floor tillered and unless something looks really bad I pull about 30 times and work up to my draw weight and take note of what my draw length is.

If your pulling 50 @ 20 and your tiller is a little wonky yet. The wood you compress will still end up being removed with more tillering. Unless it’s a bad hinge.

The set usually doesn’t start creeping in till about 25” of draw. And then it might be hard to remove as removing wood from set area is going to exacerbate the problem. You want your tiller pretty close by this point.

The easiest way for me to hit my intended draw weight is to start pulling to it as soon as I can. Somebody else might have a better way, but that’s what works for me.

Bjrogg

[bentstick54]

Working with Osage I usually get the tips moving 4” to 6” on the long string and then go to my short string with about a 3” brace if I can. Then will start working on evening up the limbs from there. There is always lots of wood removal to work with at that point. Once I get limbs bending how I like them, I start drawing just shy of my desired finish weight. I raise my brace height to about 6” once I can draw it back to about 24”-25”. I usually like to end up 50# @ 28”, so I will pull to 47-48#, exercise the limbs 30 times, then scrape some more, put back on tillering tree and repeat. I see about a 2-1/2# gain per inch of draw so about 25” I start pulling to my 50# to bring in the final tiller. Others may do it differently but this has worked well for me.

[chasonhayes]

Great advice. When exercising the limbs after scraping do I pull to full draw weight each time? Or do I pull it to something less and just check the draw length at full weight 1 time after exercising?

[bjrogg]

I usually flex things a few times first at less than draw weight and if it looks close I work up to draw weight. If it looks good there I usually pull it there several times and if it’s still pretty good hold it there a few seconds and look it over good. I usually snap a picture there to if I’m having to figure out where to remove wood.
 Then I pull it again after I look at the pictures and see if they make sense. Then I mark spots I want to remove wood

Bjrogg

[Badger]

   Apply a little bit of logic to the process instead of just methods. You can't hurt your bow by pulling to full draw weight unless it is already too weak in an area that is bending too much. The area that is bending too much limits the entire bow to the maximum you can pull before that one spot on your limb starts bending too much. Another thing to remember is that you can get a fairy accurate reading of your draw weight without bracing it. If your bow is pulling 50# on a long string hanging loose 6" at say 20". It read just about the same as if you braced it. Most people say that you should brace a bow when it is about 10 or 15# heavy. That would mean when you hit target weight at about 23 or 24" on the long string it is time to brace it. Once you get some experience and a feel for things you have a lot more freedom to change the way you work. But without experience that are logical methods you can follow that will bring you right into weight as long as you don't screw up the tiller.

[bentstick54]

I’m currently working on a wonky osage stave that I have set aside since 2013 because I had little hope of it surviving my tillering expertise. I finally decided it would either make a bow or go to the burn pile. I’m finding Badgers insights pretty close. I got it pulling to about 50# at 23” on the long string before switching to a 3” brace. I pull it about 30 times to the 50# at 23”, then scrape until I get 50# at 24” then pull 30 times. Then repeat to 25” then to 26” and so on. Once I get it to maybe 25” I start creeping the brace up until I can get it to 6” from the belly of the handle. Most of my bows seem to like a finished brace of about 6-1/4” from the belly of the handle. YMMV.

[chasonhayes]

This is all great stuff. thanks. It is hard to get a feel for it just reading books and watching videos. I think I'm going to just finish this bow up as is and use it for target practice and get started on my next one with what I have learned.

[Morgan]

This is all great stuff. thanks. It is hard to get a feel for it just reading books and watching videos. I think I'm going to just finish this bow up as is and use it for target practice and get started on my next one with what I have learned.

That’s a great plan! I would bet that most everyone that has given you advice on here has had many outright failures and as many bows not come out the way we wanted them to. Taking what you’ve learned and learning from others advice will make the next one a little closer to what you want, and the one after that closer still. Eventually you will get to where the failures you have are a result of an accident such as getting too deep with the rasp or drawknife, experimenting on a new type of bow like pushing the limits on a bow wood, or an unseen flaw in the wood. This is very much so a trial and error learned craft lol.

[TimBo]

I very much admire your persistence!  And each effort is getting a lot better from what I can tell.

[chasonhayes]

So here is the finished product! My first working bow that didn't break. I had so much fun today in the backyard shooting a couple homemade arrows at a box filled with Styrofoam. I hit it over 50% of the time at 15 yards. It is finished with 2 layers of tung oil and 2 layers of polyacryilic. the string is 14 strands of double twisted B55, the nock protectors are deer femur. and the handle padding is homemade buckskin. It took me about 8 times re-brading the string to get the right length for a 6" brace.

Thanks for all the help. Hickory board bow #8 to be started next weekend. I also just came in to a log of white oak and 3 logs of ERC. Enough to keep me busy for a while. Having lots of free wood takes the fear out of trying.
'

[chasonhayes]

2 more pics

[bjrogg]

Makes me smile just reading about it.
Bjrogg

[bentstick54]

Great to see you stick with it and get it shooting. It’s a great feeling when you get there. It sounds like you’re learning with every one you make. Hopefully every one you make gets better and better. Congrats.

[Don W]

Nice job.