Article: Carving an Ash Flat Bow - George Aitchison

[Tony]

You can view the page at http://www.bushcraftuk.com/forum/content.php?r=446-Carving-an-Ash-Flat-Bow-George-Aitchison

 

[winst0nsmith]

Thanks for posting, I split an ash log for staves last week. This will be very handy.

 

[Water Gypsy]

Thanks for posting. Really interesting read. Finished bow looks awesome

 

[whats wrong with you all]

Looks really good will definitely have to try this some time soon!

 

[Aaron Rushton]

great article, jsut need to season a bit of ash now.

 

[treebloke]

I am sure its not quite as easy as you made it look, good write up.

 

[Brewers Whoop]

Excellent, clear write up and photos George, and a really nice bow. Thanks for taking the trouble to post.

 

[Seoras]

Cheers for the kind comments guys.

It would be great to see some other bows you have made.

George

 

[Bernard55]

Could you put some backing , maybe sinew , on that type of bow ? It could help not to break a weak but otherwise good bow !!

 

[Seoras]

Could you put some backing , maybe sinew , on that type of bow ? It could help not to break a weak but otherwise good bow !!

Backing the bow would help strengthen it if there were weak spots. In particular backing should stop splinters popping out from the back of the bow.

Why do you ask as the bow pulls at 40lbs and has been shooting well for over 4 years?

Cheers

George

 

[dwardo]

Great article that. Good clear instructions including felling and roughing out which a lot seem to miss.
As said above the best backing for a bow is air. The reason we make bows from wood is that it is superior to most materials in compression and tension.
Backings like sinew are only needed when using less than ideal woods and also extreme designs like short highly re-flexed horn sinew composites. These horn sinew bows or high reflex wood sinew bows are only as efficient as a well designed wooden bow with no backing when using the same weight arrows.
Backings like silk are just an insurance policy and should keep the bow together if it blows rather than bits flying everywhere. Also looks nice too

 

[Journeyman]

Hi George,
A good article I just finished mine a couple of months ago on the level4 course with John and am now making arrows.

Chris

 

[swright81076]

Hmmm. There's a few dozen ash trees in my local woods that are too be felled due to die back. Might get in there first and liberate the bows within.

touched by nature

 

[boatman]

Like the bow but I thought that the principle of the Holmgaard type bow was to have the upper limbs relatively unbending with the bend and power coming from wide flat bow lower limbs in much the same way as the stiff upper limbs, ears, of the horse bow. This is certainly true of mine.

 

[Seoras]

Like the bow but I thought that the principle of the Holmgaard type bow was to have the upper limbs relatively unbending with the bend and power coming from wide flat bow lower limbs in much the same way as the stiff upper limbs, ears, of the horse bow. This is certainly true of mine.

Hi Boatman

You are quite right in what you say.

I say at the beginning of the doc that my Flatbow is 'based' on the holmegaard but it is not a replica.

My Holmgaard step by step is here.

http://dl.dropbox.com/u/74263979/Holmegaard Bow Making.pdf

I do like both these bows. The Ash flatbow is very strong but the Holmgaard though lighter is much faster. Must be the D sectioned tips.

Let me know what you think of the Holmgaard doc?

Cheers

George

 

[boatman]

Very good clear description thanks for that.

 

[Ijon86]

what draw weight do you think that bow would have ?

 

[Seoras]

If I remember the Ash flatbow is just over 40lbs and the Holmegaard is about 35lbs.

On a high arc the flatbow has gone 140m and the Holmegaard 120m.

Fairly standard modern man made arrows were used.

Cheers

George

 

[OTerndrup]

thankyou for posting this the pdf is really useful to get an idea of general dimensions of a bow