soap tree

[terryzac]

is the soap tree any good for making a selfbow. have to knock one down at home.

thank you
terry

[Stickbow Hunter]

Our Queensland Red Ash - Alphitonia excelsa - makes an excellent self bow mate. It is such a good wood you can even make an English D section longbow from it.

Jeff

[terryzac]

thanks jeff. will be taking care when dropping it


terry

[perry]

I am sorry Jeff, I cant agree with you that Red Ash is a good timber for making a D section Bow from, at least anything that grows within cooey of my district. It is a superb timber for wider lenticular cross section and flat bellied bows though. One of the best I've seen and used. I just don't think it has the right compression modulous for an deep D cross section

Perhaps it is similar to Pink Ash Alphitonia Petriei in that it depends on the soil conditions and the degree of shade and wind protection. In general Pink Ash needs to grow in a sandy soil to make good bow wood. Starting life in a protected spot amounst taller tree's helps it grow straight and tall also

I have seen Red Ash bows that stayed within 3" of string follow but rarely. I have even seen the more common Pink Ash make a good D sectioned bow, well only one that Greybeard made - every other one has suffered excess string follow and I've seen dozens of them made.

I am yet to find an Australian Timber suitable for Selfbows that was a good choice for an ELB in my opinion.

regards Jacko

[Dennis La Varenne]

Terry,

Jeff and I have cut quite a bit of soap tree (Alphitonia excelsa) over the past several years amd I have made 4 English longbows from it ranging up to 70lbs at 28 inches drawlength. This wood has all been coastal riparian wood. All have taken a moderate amount of string follow, but never more than 1 1/2 inches at the very most. But, that is the nature of the bow design with its narrow high cambered belly rather than the wood itself. All of the very many ELBs I have made have taken similar string follow. Only one remained straight while I had it and it was made from Osage with full thickness of sapwood left on, and in this case, the Osage was really exceptional with a lot of reflex in the log.

The thing I found with Soapwood was that if tillered with normal care to bend into the handle in the English tillering tradition, even with this amount of string follow, they are very nice to shoot because of their remarkable lightness and the speed is greater than you would expect. I attribute the speed to the very light limbs which don't have much inertia to overcome at loose in order to reach maximum limb speed. My bows were all built in Victoria where the humidity is much lower year round and the wood doesn't take long to dry sufficiently. You will need to allow for this in Queensland if you live there and I cannot offer you any drying advice in this regard.

The wood is quite soft and care needs to be taken when you clamp it in a vice because it dents easily and will not take knocks too well - not ruining - but certainly can be disfiguring if you whack a tree limb when shooting, and so forth. That can be obviated with a commonsense amount of care.

I have found that for a bow of 40 - 50lbs, an ELB limb width of 1 1/8" at the handle would be about right for a 68" bow. Heavier ELBs will go to about 1 1/4" wide and say 72" inches long or longer. Length will help reduce the bending load on the narrow belly.

The smallest bow from soapwood I have ever made was a little wide flatbow of 51 inches long and 2 1/4" wide at the flares which easily drew 60 lbs at 26 inches. It had a rigid handle of 8 inches out to the flares which left only 43 inches of working limb and developed only 1/2' of string follow. At full draw, it lookes as if the string was about to leave the nocks. I made two or three similar bows from memory - all successful - so it will make an excellent flat bow as well.

So, I would recommend you go with it and make whatever bows you feel like from it. Find out by doing it. A soapwood ELB is no slouch by any means if you do your part well.

I just remembered now (Jeff reminded me) that I have made one soapwood which did develop about 2 1/2" of string follow. It is a little bow of 40lbs at 28" which I made for Jeff's son when he was a little bloke. Can't tell you the length just now. I will have to get Jeff to find it for me to measure. I made it up here in Queensland. I brought the dry wood up from Victoria and I just seemed to sag a bit while I was making it, possibly because the humidity was up a bit. However, despite this, it was still surprisingly quick for such a little bow and still has the best horns I have ever made for an ELB from some NT buffalo tips. None of my other bows I made from it in Victoria developed string follow out of the usual for an ELB once sealed.

Regards,

[Stickbow Hunter]

I am sorry Jeff, I cant agree with you that Red Ash is a good timber for making a D section Bow from, at least anything that grows within cooey of my district.

Perry,

I was just giving my opinion from observing D section longbows that I have seen and have here that have been made from Red Ash. Perhaps our differing observations has something to do with where the wood was obtained.

Jeff

[perry]

Hence the point I made Jeff about soil conditions etc Personnelly I would opt for a working handle and 76" if I where to make an ELB from Red Ash for my 28 1/4" draw. Better to go with less stress than push it with a shorter bow. Don't get me wrong, other things equal a bow with 3" of string follow makes for a sweet accurate shooter, 2 1/4 makes for sweet, accurate and a little bit more zip.

regards Jacko

[Dennis La Varenne]

Terry,

There is something in what Perry and Jeff are saying about location I think.

As I mentioned earlier, the stuff I have been lucky to have obtained was coastal riparian from the Maryborough, Queensland district. However, I have seen it from Kingaroy and as far west as St George. That from the Kingaroy district was consistently 'gritty' in texture and to the feel of a scraper. It was also significantly lighter in colour and the bows made from it were much more bulky for the same draw weight. It gave the impression of being more brittle too.

That which I used was a pinkish colour with a grey tinge to it. It tended to make a less bulky bow for the same draw weight and worked very easily. The grittiness of the Kingaroy stuff was almost certainly due to uptake of soil minerals which were deposited in the lignin.

Perry's advice to make a longer long bow is not to be dismissed either and the premise he bases that on is sound. However, for his length draw, a Soapwood can successfully be made a bit shorter at 72". His recommended 76" WILL keep bending loads down and result in a bit less string follow. It is up to you how long you want to make a bow and have it a practical length for your intended use. Any ELB with less than 2" of string follow can fairly be regarded as a success, but any bow that shoots and doesn't break whatever the amount of string follow is also a success.

Regards,

[Dennis La Varenne]

Terry et al,

Small addendum to my first post above. Jeff and I checked that little bow and it draws 49lbs at 28 inches which was Jeff's son's drawlength at the time. Overall is is 67 1/2 inches nock to nock. It has 1 3/4 inches string follow largely because of the fairly stiff mid section, but certainly puts on the power early in the draw.

That suggests that a longer bow would easily hold much lower string follow.

I have my chronograph with me, so it would be interesting to chronograph it with 10 grains per pound draw weight arrows. There are no signs of any frets.

Regards,