Thanks Ryan

[Badger]

Greg, I made mine from about 54" to 68". Most of mine were unbacked when I used osage. I could almost always get the wood to make the draw length but was never happy with the belly cells that got crushed with that much reflex. Wood is designed for about 1% stretch and compress. I think sinew is more effective in highly reflexed designs. But each guy can get different results. I like the bow that Ryan posted above, a little less radical. Steve

[Justin Snyder]

Now I am confused again. The huge amount of reflex is shortening the working section. The small working section is doing huge amounts of bending just to get it braced.  Why would you want to shorten the working area by cutting then re-bending.  If it is recurved that far, I would leave the length long.  I like the smaller recurve that Ryan did also.  Justin

[jamie]

oh my gawd!!!!!!!!!!!!

[GregB]

Justin, I am definitely a rookie at this recurving...but without any more educated replies at this point to your question, here's my two cents worth.

I think the working recurve is contibuting at least 3/4 of it's length to bending/working. Ryan had mentioned the outer predominately recurved section of the limb to tiller until it just begins to start opening up. I'm guessing you'd still leave the last 4" or so almost static to the tips? I guess the key is to get that section of the limb working some, but not to the point where it loses much of the recurve. Needs to retain the recurve memory to snap back in place and spit those arrows!

On the static recurve, most of the limb is bending similar to a typical flat bow, the last 6" or so is completely nonbending. Looks like that last 6" on Ryan's static is narrowed nicely to the tips, but retains the static posture from a thicker than normal back to belly thickness.

Could be that all I've said above is nonsense, but with my lack of experience with recurving Ryan style...it's how I'm evaluating it at this point.

[Justin Snyder]

One thing you nobody can argue with is that Ryan knows what he is doing and builds some pretty recurves. Justin

[GregB]

Yeah, I agree with you Justin. That's why I've attempted to copy his forms and try and learn as much as I can about his techniques.

Ryan probably thinks we all just like him for the great recurve selfbows he makes!

[Justin Snyder]

oh my gawd!!!!!!!!!!!!

  what???

[Pappy]

I cut mine off last night to 57 n-n and got it ready to brace.I plan on doing that today,then
do any straighting it needs and then recurve it and see what happens,any more comments on bracing it first and then re curving it,what problems am I looking at having by doing this.
   Pappy

[Ryano]

Thanks For the nice words guys.  Its really not all that hard it just takes patience.

Greg, Sounds like your heading in the right direction. I would like to see one thats like 62" or 64" never tried a longer one, but that doesn't mean it wouldnt work out nicely. I just think 66" is to long for any osage bow unless it has incredibly narrow tips. Plus most of the benefit of a recurve is to get a smoother draw out of a shorter piece of wood.

 Pappy, Like I said before,I never tried it that way but I don't see why it wouldn't work as long as you leave the tips thick enough...

[GregB]

Ryan, you ever get to steaming several bows and forget to replenish the water supply or am I the only one wearing that badge of honor! Extremely well done osage limb anyone? See the "Life is Good" thread under Primitive musings for a laugh!

Pappy and I worked on one of the recurves Saturday. I had cut it off to 58" ntn, which allowed a wider tip to tweak for alignment if needed. Got the limbs bending pretty good out of the fades, and just beginning to get the recurve section to open up. I'm planning to cut string notches in it this evening, up until now have only bent the limbs while vised.

We had a splinter pop up, which we glued down and wrapped...I think it will hold since we've worked the limb quite a bit since we wrapped it. I'm getting excited and nervous at the same time. Getting to the point where it's closing in on brace, and really don't want it to blow. As short and recurved as the limbs are, I'm just not used to one bending so much this early in the game. whew!

My digital camera is on the blink or I would post some pics, had to take pictures with my 35mm and have them put on a disc for the copperhead bow I'm getting ready to post.