Posted by Shane [ 70.252.55.148 ] on March 27, 2006 at 21:35:17:
In Reply to: Re: Is it my Imagination;.. posted by manualblock on March 27, 2006 at 19:46:09:
Well, I'll give you a quick and dirty version. You start by cutting the appropriate diameter and characteristic tree. Then you split the 6-7' piece you cut lengthwise into quarters or whatever you can depending on the diameter. This gives you a stave to work on. With osage you must remove the bark and sapwood, then find an appropriate thickness of ring to follow the length of the stave. You want a single ring to be the back of the bow with no nicks, etc.... Then you cut the side to side profile and handle out. Then you thin the limbs out from the handle to the tips till it is bending in a nice smooth arc on each limb without any flat spots or hinges. Each limb is different and most want to leave the lower limb "stronger" than the upper due to most of the stress is on the lower limb. When you get to this "tillering" of the bow you start removing wood with a hand scraper. A thin shaving, I mean 1/64" can mean the difference between success and failure. Lots of other steps involved and each piece of wood reacts differently depending on its natural characteristics and style of bow. My last bow, "Purple Willy", is a laminated osage/bamboo reflex/deflex longbow. These are more involved yet, but tend to provide better performance. To see more on this type of bowmaking goto the link below. Ferret has a wonderful page. When I started making bows there were just a few guys really doing it and it was just starting on the web. We had a little rendevous in Mo that year and that's where I learned. We had about 100 people total. Last year there were over 600 from all over the world. Another site about it is www.tradgang.com . That's wher everybody hangs out, but since I don't mess with them anymore I haven't really kept up on things.
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