Ozbow

Not quite finished yet but at the draw stage - Hickory backed Celery Top Pine with kerfed & recurved tips, currently 45#@26". Took a lead from Hunterguy & Greybeard on a 'safe'/going-to-work design. Apologies for the poor pictures, I'll get a few better ones when finished. Hickory CTP R...

If you're using a B50 string (which is the traditional standard, by my understanding) some Red Oak trimmings will be fine. If you're using Dynaflight, you'll need horn or phenolic. No idea where to get it, I'm afraid. Some bigger pictures of the bows would be great. For feedback, it's good to have a...

Thanks everyone for the feedback. Lemonwood wobble.jpg You can see the original centreline veer off to the left and the second centreline not far right of it. Fair bit of wobble there, I may just give it a bit more time clamped and see if it's easily straightened, perhaps even with a little heat. De...

Colin is right in that Dave can give a precise idea of what thickness/width/length will be needed for x-weight, but if you've already cut the width profile to those dimensions, I would probably cut nocks & radius edges ready to start tillering. Your bow should be around 1.5" at it's widest ...

I have an old english oak tree to be cut and dressed to make the one piece out of(Not sure if it is a suitable timber, if anyone has advice it would be helpfull) Eng. Oak can make a bow (and more than passable backings, too) but you'll need to season the timber for some time - up to several years, ...

not to split hairs, but for me and takedowns, tolerances are measured in thousands of a inch It really can be that critical. Exactly! Building a 3pc takedown like you guys manage is a long-way-off pipe dream. Not something for someone with a passing interest in woodworking or bow making to 'have a ...

There was also an excellent buildalong on the US tradgang site by a user called 'Little Ben' who built a 3-piece takedown using very cheap, simple tools within his New York apartment. His limbs were Hickory-backed and glued up with Titebond III. But Little Ben has been making bows for some years and...

Thanks for the quick responses. What kind of bow were you looking to get from it? I was looking to replicate the design I use for Red Oak board bows - a comparison between the two timbers in a design I knew would work. The biggest difference being that the 1" depth measurement on the handle was...

Has anyone had any experience with instability in Lemonwood/Degame? I recently purchase a 140mm x 45mm board and ripped a 1.25" length off of one edge. Using the 45mm edge as a back of the bow, I proceeded to mark a centreline, etc, and cut to shape. Coming back a few days later I've found the ...

Welcome to the forum, Matt. If you've not made a bow before, starting with a take-down might be a little ambitious. I would suggest something simple at first, like a Red Oak board bow. I can't advise you on geometrics of a take-down limb, but for materials you have to select; 1. A backing material 2...

hunterguy1991 wrote:Neil, you'll be able to watch a monster come to life on Monday while you're here mate

I look forward to it! Just don't ask me to draw it

Big bit of wood there, would take an impressive set of muscles to get it bending...

If you ever make it to Melbourne or Ballarat, you might want to head to Masters and pick up a straight-grained length of Red Oak. Even easier to make a bow from that than Spotted Gum & Bamboo - no gluing required, or prepping bamboo. Not that I've tried it much, but I've found flattening bamboo ...

It's pretty disheartening to break a bow, especially when it should be so easy. Keep plugging on though, eh? Welcome to my world! I'd reckon I lose at least 1, maybe 2 bows for every shooter. But then again, I almost never make bows I "know" (with certainty) will work - it's always new ti...

Really like this one, Dave. Nice curves, nice profile, looks to be a great little shooter. The weight would be about right for a bow to shoot all afternoon, so I wouldn't worry about it being 'underweight'. At 30mm it's also pretty narrow (about 1.25"), the Ironbark able to handle that width. T...

You made it on the forum, Wayno! Bit different to Tradgang but you'll find a good bunch of blokes interested in seeing what you are able to make. Looking forward to it!

Good legwork on the black vs white cypress, and good work persevering though the pain. An interesting test would be to compare the density/elasticity/stiffness from one white cypress tree (or flitch), sampling sapwood and heartwood in isolation. Time in the shed is rarely painful, even if I don't g...

Great bow! I love the concept and the finished product has worked great. How many hours all up did it take? How wide were the limbs?

Good research and info on the timber Neil. Just been looking at this bow for a bit and I've got a suggestion. Basically the same thing that I did from first to second kerfed recurve, I would make the recurved section a bit shorter so that you have a little more working limb to work with. This helps...

Following on from this bow, I used timber from the same board to make a laminate bow over the weekend, which subsequently exploded. It showed no sign of compression fractures but, interestingly, did show signs of longitudinal cracking. I spoke with the owner of the local Cypress mill and he was of t...

You can learn as much or more from broken bows and other mistakes. Always good to hear what's worked for others!

I've been tinkering with this one for a few weeks, not been able to get in the workshop much of late. 64" total, 62" ntn, 1.5" wide at the fades, parallel with for 14", tapering to 1/2" at the nocks. 12" static recurve cut in with the kerfing method and a 1/8" Red ...

65@ 28....jpg Might need to take a look at that left limb, mate? I had a similar problem with my cypress one and couldn't for the life of me get it right by eye. I ended up making marks in one inch increments along the working limb, then measured the thickness with calipers and marked this in mm on...

Great bit of tillering there - you're picking it up much quicker than I did/still am! I like the tillering board too, lovely bit of sapwood/heartwood grain there and as Yeoman pointed out, a nice, innovative mechanism with the bolts. After some discussions here, I also had a quick and rough play yes...

I like the curves, looking good. With the Mass/Bamboo combination it should be a pretty fast shooter. I'm tinkering with a similar styled Cypress bow at the moment, the kerfing really does make life easier!

Very nice! I love how neat the arrows are. Wish I was able to do the same!

Beautiful bow & great to see her in action in the video!

Does anybody think that this method of guiding the tillering of an ELB pattern or similar bow through to completion? I can do my own testing, but what I am looking for is corroboration of the technique. It needs somebody else to check what I am proposing who does not have my own bias toward a techn...

I have some Elm lams to back bows with now. I think I shall use some of that to back one of these palings. It'd be the perfect length for a little wannabe archer that lives around here. That'll be interesting to see. I don't think I've seen a bow with an Elm backing... Nezwin, have you made a bow f...

Beautiful! The timber combination looks particularly good.

The way to make a stunning bow form it would be to back it with some other wood, and add Perry Reflex in the process. This would allow for a narrower bow (by viture of the fact a Perry Relfexed stave is stiffer) while taking advantage of its impressive allowable strain. The fact that Nezwin has rec...