Ash bow help please

[j111]

Hi All,

I've just finished making my first bow and am looking for some feedback and tips to make the next one better. The bow is ash that was felled in the spring. I roughed it out at the time and then left it for a few months before working on it off and on over the next few months. I shaped it 'by eye' and consequently it's not entirely straight and the handle aint perfectly in the middle but seems to have come out ok. I reckon it draws about 20lbs or less and shoots football size groups over the 15m of my back garden. Will test her out over longer range when I get the chance.

Unbraced:

Braced:

Full draw:

Here you can see the back of the bow, I didn't touch it other than removing the bark. Is that the cambium?

Here you can see how it's a bit wonky.

Here's another stave I've got, it's another quarter of the same section of the other one: It's twisted whilst seasoning. How best to approach it? I'd like to do a better job of the next one and get a heavier draw weight. I've seen that some people stretch a piece of string along the stave to mark a straight centre line. Will this work with a twisted stave?

Here's another from a different ash, it's twisted a bit as well and has a few small knots but reckon I can avoid those:

Any tips would be greatly appreciated.

Cheers

 

[crosslandkelly]

Looks a beaut. Is it your first.
Just reread post, it is your first. Nice one.

 

[WULF]

Dont know much about bows but thats a cracking 1st effort.

 

[j111]

Cheers. I've made one bow out of green hazel before in an afternoon which didn't work out very well..

 

[dwardo]

Sterling job The tiller is brilliant for a first bow nice work.

The bow seems to have taken a bit of set. This makes the bow look like its got an invisible string on it. Rather than being flat it almost looks strung when there is no string on the bow.
Set tends to happen for a few reasons. Iffy bits in the tiller, too much moisture in the wood, a design not best suited to the wood or draw weight, or over-straining the wood early on during tillering.
From the pictures the tiller looks great, maybe bending a bit too much just off the handle in the top limb but being picky. So at a guess I would say the wood is still a bit green.
The tips of the bow are very wide and will rob you of speed/cast. The last parts of the limb do very little of the load sharing work so can be thinned a lot more than you would expect.

Heat treating can be a magic bullet if the limbs have not already taken too much strain. If its something you want to try you need a heat gun then let me know and I will give you the tips I have learnt.

 

[j111]

Thanks for info. Really useful. Reckon it may be over-strained, it's taken on that set as I've finished off tillering over the last few weeks? It does seem to bend a lot for a shortish bow, I didn't think I'd get full draw length out of it. Is heat-treating corrective to set? Presumably I could do it over a fire? Cheers

Sterling job The tiller is brilliant for a first bow nice work.

The bow seems to have taken a bit of set. This makes the bow look like its got an invisible string on it. Rather than being flat it almost looks strung when there is no string on the bow.
Set tends to happen for a few reasons. Iffy bits in the tiller, too much moisture in the wood, a design not best suited to the wood or draw weight, or over-straining the wood early on during tillering.
From the pictures the tiller looks great, maybe bending a bit too much just off the handle in the top limb but being picky. So at a guess I would say the wood is still a bit green.
The tips of the bow are very wide and will rob you of speed/cast. The last parts of the limb do very little of the load sharing work so can be thinned a lot more than you would expect.

Heat treating can be a magic bullet if the limbs have not already taken too much strain. If its something you want to try you need a heat gun then let me know and I will give you the tips I have learnt.

 

[ateallthepies]

Thats a cracking first bow!

My first thought when looking at the un-braced pic' was that the moisture content was a bit high leading to the string follow. If you did not use a weigh scale during tiller then over straining could also be a possibility, probably a combination of both though. Reducing the moisture content could possibly halt any further follow and maybe even add a few pounds to the draw weight but at a risk of increased risk of breakage if already highly strained.

If your going to make more it's worth reading up on wood moisture content and the humidity content of where the wood is dried. This along with never straining the bow much over it's designed draw weight and bow design in general will reduce the string follow enormously. The Traditional Bowyers Bible series is very good along with The Bent Stick and both deal with these and many more subjects.

Steve.

 

[dwardo]

Looking at the bow again i would try a heat treat. If you look very closely at the belly of the limbs using a good light source can you see any hairline cracks running across the limb? Sometimes can look like tiny raised hair like lines?
If there are none then its definitely worth trying to heat treat the limbs. You may need to increase the bend in the mid section of the top limb.
If it works and its only ever an "if" it should add a few pounds of draw and reduce the set. If you decide to try it get your self a heat gun (only cheap) and give us a shout back here

Sorry missed your other post. Yes its possible to do it over a fire but its much more controllable with a heat gun.

 

[j111]

Looking at the bow again i would try a heat treat. If you look very closely at the belly of the limbs using a good light source can you see any hairline cracks running across the limb? Sometimes can look like tiny raised hair like lines?
If there are none then its definitely worth trying to heat treat the limbs. You may need to increase the bend in the mid section of the top limb.
If it works and its only ever an "if" it should add a few pounds of draw and reduce the set. If you decide to try it get your self a heat gun (only cheap) and give us a shout back here

Sorry missed your other post. Yes its possible to do it over a fire but its much more controllable with a heat gun.

I'll probably give that a go at some point. The bow has been living in the shed so probably worth bringing in the house isn't it to properly dry out to start with. In the mean time I will start on one of the other staves. Do you have any tips on how to approach to twistedness of them? should I stretch string down it to give a straight line or follow the twist by eye?
Thanks

 

[LeinsterBushcraft]

This is beautiful work, my friend Dean is currently making one at the moment from some pine.

 

[Niels]

It looks great, I like the handle shape. We call that a pistol grip here.
And for the stave you have, If you can draw a bow on it with a straight line on which both the handle and the nocks are, it doesn't matter how much bends there are in the stave.

 

[ateallthepies]

I posted this in Niels thread but it is equally useful here.

Here is the table on wood moisture content at certain humidity levels and temperature. I now have permission off the original poster on another forum to use it here...

The figures are the lowest moisture content a piece of wood can naturally season to at certain humidity and temperatures. If you use this table in conjunction with Dwardo's scale drying method you will have an accurate picture of your staves moisture content. If you can't naturally season your stave to the correct level, around 9%, you then can force dry in a heat box or a warm place.
Humidity/temperature meters can be bought quite cheaply and are an essential piece of kit for bowyers who might not own moisture meters.

HTH,

Steve.

 

[dwardo]

I'll probably give that a go at some point. The bow has been living in the shed so probably worth bringing in the house isn't it to properly dry out to start with. In the mean time I will start on one of the other staves. Do you have any tips on how to approach to twistedness of them? should I stretch string down it to give a straight line or follow the twist by eye?
Thanks

Best to follow it by eye mate. Draw a center line first following the grain and then measure out from there to the edges. I only ever do this for the very rough initial outlay. After that its by eye and if using hand tools you can feel the grain under the blade. This is where tools like a bandsaw can let you down although they do take a lot less calories to use

Prop-twist which is where the bow twists along its whole length can either be straightened out with heat or if its only a little just leave it in. It will more than likely pull out during the draw. The important thing is that the string bisects the handle.