Got the bug...bow #2 is underway

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Yew Selfbow

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Now that I've had my first "fix" of making my own long bow, I'm hooked, and bow #2 is underway. This time I'm it's all home made.
Last year, I was thinning out and laying the Hawthorn hedges around some of my fields when for some reason I saved a hawthorn stave to use as a hedgestake. Well, it's straight, dry , with no cracks so it's going to become my first home made self bow. The grain is beautiful and dense , so I'm looking at at a bow of around 60lbs.
I rough cut the stave last night and followed a growth ring to form the back and I have to say it's looking good.
I'll post pictures if anyones interested..
 

tel

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Would Pip have overseen the last project if he'd known you were going into competition? ;)
 

Tom

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Yew Selfbow said:
I'll post pictures if anyones interested..
I'm sure most folk on here would love to see the pictures. It sounds like a very interesting project.
 

Yew Selfbow

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tel said:
Would Pip have overseen the last project if he'd known you were going into competition? ;)
I'm no competition Tel I can assure you. We did discuss it in the pub... he thought I was bonkers...
 

Yew Selfbow

Active member
Not alot to see at the moment. The stave is still a little wet. I did a moisture test last night. It's coming out at around 20% I need to get it down to around 8 - 10% before I can start some serious shaping.
 

Yew Selfbow

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Radar_UK said:
YS - from start to finish how long would a project like this take ?
Not as long as you might think Radar. because this second bow is a self bow (i.e. made from a single length of wood with no glue or laminations) The initial cutting out is done on a bandsaw and takes only an hour or so. The initial shaping of the limbs takes a little longer because you have to follow the grain and the growth rings of the original wood. Scraping what will become the back of the bow with a cabinet scraper is one of the most pains taking tasks.You have to start by identifying the single growth ring you want to follow and scrape away all surplus material that is not part of that growth ring. In Hawthorn the growth rings are very tight so you only have 1mm or so to play with.
Tillering is the tricky part. Because the stave has all the lumps and bumps of the original wood , these form hard and soft spots that have to be tillered in such a way that that the limbs"come round" to form a smooth arc at full draw.
All in all I'd have to say theres about 20 hours work in making a self bow..
 

Yew Selfbow

Active member
Disaster ..Crisis... Catastrophy

At the first tiller, my first attempt at building a self bow went BANG. Splinters of wood all over the workshop....
Oh well..... back to the drawing board....:eek:uch:
 

tel

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oops...sorry to hear that YS - can you pinpoint the problem?
 

laminatekid

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Yew Selfbow said:
At the first tiller, my first attempt at building a self bow went BANG. Splinters of wood all over the workshop....
Oh well..... back to the drawing board....:eek:uch:
oh the joys of self bows....you never know whats going on inside the stave!!
 

Yew Selfbow

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laminatekid said:
oh the joys of self bows....you never know whats going on inside the stave!!
Your absolutly right there L.K..
Tel..after close examination of the fragments it seems the failure occured at a kink in the stave that was also the site of a small pin knot. This made that area much stiffer than the rest of the limb. I had seen this little trouble spot and thought I'd left sufficent material leading up to and away from it, but alas, I didn't get it right. The location of the pin knot was, I think another factor. It was 2/3rds down the limb so there was alot of stress in that area.

Oh well... I've learned alot from the experience and I think I'll be a little better prepared next time....
 

cliveanne

New member
Ironman
Yew Selfbow said:
I'm no competition Tel I can assure you. We did discuss it in the pub... he thought I was bonkers...

He thinks you are bonkers...I know you are bonkers, but that is another story :D :D
Best of luck with the project.

OOPs sorry to see what happened, I posted before I read all of the thread
Regards to Pastures :)
 

Yew Selfbow

Active member
Well.. I've been laying hedges today and I couldn't resist taking out a 10 foot pleach of Holly. It's about 12 inches in diameter at the base and around 8 inches at the top and straight as a die.
So..... leave it for a few months and start work on new self bow....
Aahh the joys of archery....
 

morphymick

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I'll be lopping down an apple tree this weekend, I've already earmarked one trunk for a few staves, may even have a look at the hawthorns. (Not the WBA variety)

Mick
 

Yew Selfbow

Active member
Well.. if nothing else Mick.. you'll have the sweetest smelling bow on the line.
Sounds like a good project to me...
 

chris

New member
allo
the first bow i made was from a slege hammer handle joined at the middle,
it shatered while tillering:thumbsdow so i tryed again:),and again:)then i tryed a pickaxe handle
and .......it worked
longbow about 25-30lb at 28in
shot it a few times ,was brill longbow i made myself:thumbsup:
then came home from work and it was snaped in 2 (wife had put it behind a chair) will get a stave one of the days and do it propery.
chris
 

Yew Selfbow

Active member
... had a look at my Holly stave last night... moisture's coming down a treat....should be able to start work on it about May - June time
 

orius

New member
It'll be good to see the outcome, every now and then I get a weird Idea in my head about building a bow yet I've never got it off the ground. I've got some hickory and ash here and was looking round for a suitable wood to make the centre lamination. Keep the thread going YS . Your choice of Hawthorn is very interesting. I've often crafted walking sticks from hawthorn but never thought of it as a bow stave wood, although I have seen it written that a good bow can be made out of most woods, obviously each will have its own characteristics. Keep us informed
 
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