Yew longbow
- Thread starter Snufkin
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Smashing looking peice of kit...whats it's drawweight?
I used to have one a few years back and that was a shoulder busting 98Lbs
My mate intends to get one built like the partial one recovered from the Mary Rose and hopes it will have a similar drawweight of 250Lbs+!!!!! nutter!
I used to have one a few years back and that was a shoulder busting 98Lbs
My mate intends to get one built like the partial one recovered from the Mary Rose and hopes it will have a similar drawweight of 250Lbs+!!!!! nutter!
This is a yew selfbow and to be quite honest the ones I've seen for sale are ridiculously expensive £400-500gill said:
(though mine probably isn't worth that). This mostly reflects the cost of materials, bow quality yew being very rare and having to ship it from the US (the best source of yew readily available).Laminated wooden longbows are more affordable.
If you want to do it yourself you can get reasonably priced wood off ebay although if you want a stave you'll be hit with shipping of around $200 (anything over 60" long costs tonnes). The ebay seller I used was nice enough to cut the stave in half thus shipping was only about $25 (I think the billets cost me around $70).
Great looking bow....I would like to be able to do something like that...but I think I spend to much time thinking about doing things rather than getting on with it!
Best Regards,
Best Regards,
Making a usable bow really isn't that difficult, and you also don't need a huge tool kit. All I use is a Workmate, a drawknife, a rasp and a cabinet scraper also a little file to make the nocks.bushman762 said:Great looking bow....I would like to be able to do something like that...but I think I spend to much time thinking about doing things rather than getting on with it!
Best Regards,
Snufkin said:
How on earth did you re-assemble the halves
in order to be strong enough to pull that kind of weight?Does the salmon skin provide with added strength, or is it just 'looks'?
I am well impressed!
Bob
I joined the billets with a v splice, one billet has a v notch four inches long in it and the other end is tapered to fit like this >>. I then dry fit the billets and drill a hole through the sides so I can fit a peg (you need to peg them together or they will slide apart when you glue and clamp them). They are glued up with Resorcinol glue. As a safety measure I wrapped the handle section in linen thread set in epoxy resin.BobFromHolland said:How on earth did you re-assemble the halves
Does the salmon skin provide with added strength, or is it just 'looks'?
I am well impressed!
Bob
The salmon skin does protect the back of the bow from lifting splinters which can lead to breaks. I hadn't intended to back this bow but I did a bit of overzealous drawknifing and started a small split going into the sapwood of one limb. I patched the split with sinew and decided to back it just to cover the patch. Also yew sapwood is so soft the skin protects it from all the little dents and scratches it would inevitably get.
Nice work! I used to see all sorts of yew around churches and old buildings in Britain - but I guess midnight stave shopping with a saw isn't something a person would want to be caught at...
I've never found yew here, though it's supposed to occur. Eventually when I know enough, I may try a bow from vine maple which grows in tree size right at water line.
I've never found yew here, though it's supposed to occur. Eventually when I know enough, I may try a bow from vine maple which grows in tree size right at water line.
Vine maple is a superb bow wood so give it a try, it's also fairly forgiving stuff from what I've heared so would be good for a first attempt. Also you should be able to find yew in BC. I know it's a big place but if you can get into the mountains there you may find some. The best stuff comes from high altitude which provides dense, slow growing wood with lots of growth rings per inch.OldJimbo said:
Old Jimbo, the reason the yew trees are grown in churchyards here in the UK is tradition. Before the days when the fields were fenced like they are these days(probably before the "Enclosures Act" ), cattle would be free to wander pretty much at will. As the yew is a poisonous tree it was not safe to let the cattle get to them. Every Englishman was (and still is I believe!) required by law to practice with the bow at least once a week so as to be able to defend his country if called upon to do so, so everyone needed a bow to practice with, and everyone wanted a good yew bow.
As the churchyard was one of the few places that would always be kept fenced or walled in and the cattle kept out, it was the most logical place to grow the poisonous yew trees where the cattle could not get to them. Not sure how it was decided who could have what wood, but thats why yews are common in churchyards in my understanding.
As the churchyard was one of the few places that would always be kept fenced or walled in and the cattle kept out, it was the most logical place to grow the poisonous yew trees where the cattle could not get to them. Not sure how it was decided who could have what wood, but thats why yews are common in churchyards in my understanding.
Thanks for the information on yew! Not that I'll find much here, it's apparently pretty rare in the north, so I'll just have to admire one in the middle of the next town and fix its image in my mind so that I'll be sure to spot it in my travels. But so far no luck.
But vine maple looks like a possiblity. I always wondered about it, because while common it grows as a bush here. Then in my trail clearing along the coastline, I found a while bunch of trees growing right at cliff edge. we're free to harvest any deciduous tree on crown land, but I still want to know all the tricks before I cut down such a pretty tree!
But vine maple looks like a possiblity. I always wondered about it, because while common it grows as a bush here. Then in my trail clearing along the coastline, I found a while bunch of trees growing right at cliff edge. we're free to harvest any deciduous tree on crown land, but I still want to know all the tricks before I cut down such a pretty tree!
I tried splitting a stave out of a section of 6" alder that i cleared while out for my walk yesterday. I can see that to do a good job, I'll need wedges to keep the split even and neat. I got some flat car spring stock a few years ago and can cut it into sections and sharpen with angle grinder to make wedges. Anyone have better ideas or tips?
I'm dubious about the whole churchyard thing, I think it is more to do with christian assimilation of pagan sites and symbology.Longstrider said:
In medieval times the majority of yew was imported from Spain and Italy as the British stuff isn't much good for war weight bows. It is too fast growing. The imported wood came from high altitude, yielding dense, high ring count wood that could handle the strain of an 80-200lb+ warbow.
In fact the government imposed an import tax on wine. For every cask of wine imported you had to bring in a bowstave. I believe this went up to 5 staves for every keg at one point. Now that is a tax worth reintroducing
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