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Below are pics of the bow before and after bracing for the first time. You can see in the second pic that the limb to the right is bending more than the left one. There also appears to be a slight hing in the center of the right limb. The bow would probably pull 90 lbs at this point so we have plenty of room to remove wood and even things out.
This is a little better. I marked the hinge so I wouldn’t take off any more wood in that area, took a few scrapes off the strong limb and this is the result (first pic). It’s still way heavy so I took a little more wood of both limbs (second pic). Little at a time.
The top limb is a bit stiff so a few more scrapes off that one. A few minor adjustments, and an arrow shelf later and here you have it.
Ok, now we’re gonna get something done. I had plenty of time today to work on this project.
Yesterday afternoon I whittled a small peg and superglued it into the one worm hole I was concerned with, then I cut it off and worked the limb like any other.
After getting it all cleaned up and semi smooth with the draw knife I started in with the scraper (I use an old sheath knife) to reduce the thickness a little at a time until the limbs started bending.
At this point I could just tiller the bow out and finish it off, but that’d be too easy. I’ve always been rather fond of curves so what the heck. Once the bow was floor tillered and bending fairly well, I greased the limb tips and put them(one at a time of course) in the oven to heat up. I usually heat the wood until it’s too hot to handle but be careful, it needs to be heated throughout, not just the outside. I grease the wood to cut down on losing any moisture that’s still in the wood, causing it to become brittle. Once the wood is hot and flexible, into the form it goes.
A little test after both tips are bent and everything is cooled.
Now I’ll cut in the knocks and we’re ready to start some serious tillering.
I took the belly side down to near the line I’d drawn on both top and bottom limbs with a hatchet.
After the heavy work was done, I cleaned everything up with a drawknife. You can really see the backset in the second pic below.
I had a little help today.
I didn’t get around to posting this yesterday, but I was able to draw a rough outline of the bow on the wood, split off the excess on one side of the stave, and drawknife down the sides pretty close to what the finished bow will look like straight on.
I start off by starting a hatchet at one end and driving it down with a hammer. This can be a rather risky thing to try as the split will often try to run into the stave(as we’ll see later). This piece of wood behaved remarkably well though. As you can see from the photo below I was able to split off a narrow piece that will one day make a fine kids bow.
After the excess was split off, I used a sharp draw knife to take the wood down to the line’s I’d drawn. A note on drawn lines – I usually draw an outline on the stave, but this is only a reference. The grain will dictate where the line should really be and you often won’t know that until you start in with the knife. If I go inside my line on one side, I just compensate by leaving a little extra on the opposite.
In the pic below, you can see a split trying to run into the stave and inside my line. From experience, I know that if I were to continue on with this split, it would curve over and angle into what will be the back of the bow (facing the camera)-(if that makes any since). If you’ve worked with osage much, you probably know what I’m saying. Anyway, I just backed the draw knife out and used a hatchet to take the split off before it ran any deeper. Easy fix if you catch it early.
Below is the stave after taking it down to the profile lines and smoothing it up with the draw knife.
You can see I’ve drawn the lines for taking wood off the belly side. Also you can see some back set:D This stave’s got about an inch and a half or so.
