Here is a bow that I started back in July. I have been pretty busy since then so I had to make time to finish it up, all it needed was tip overlays and a finish to complete. This was my first attempt at Yew and also a backed recurve and it proved to be quite a challenge. The Yew wasn't a challenge ,it is a wonderful wood to work with, the curves didn't line up very well after glue up so I had to do a little heat straightening, which was a bit scary because of the possibility of the glue joint seperating, but it worked just fine.
I built this bow with with no owner in mind, just a fun experiment. If the draw weight would come out to my liking I would probably keep it for myself but the tillering proved to be a little more challenging than I anticipated, since I lhave made several R/D BBO's with great results I had no idea the recurves would give me so much trouble tillering. I was trying to achieve a 55# draw weight but she came in at 45#, not really that big of a deal just not what I am used to. After shooting this bow for the first time I was pretty amazed by its speed, shooting my 55# spined arrows, well, as straight as an arrow. Well to make a short story even longer, our family was over for Thanksgiving the other night and my nephew, who is now 13 was wondering If I could make him another bow with more draw weight. So I let him shoot this bow and it fit like a glove! He enjoyed shooting it alot and it was a lot of fun watching him shoot it. He doesn't know it yet but it will be his X-mas present this year.
I used steam to bend the core and bamboo. I was definately going for a big curve but lost some of it while tillering. I definately learned alot about tillering these type of bows. The early string weight really throws you off. I have it figured out in my head for tillering the next one, hopefully sometime this winter.
Here are the bows specs, 45#@26", 60" NTN, bamboo back Yew belly, 1 1/4" starting at fade to midlimb tapering to less than 3/8 tips, horn tip overlays. The bamboo is dyed with black aniline dye and I used my finger to give it a fiddle back look. The strike plate is turtle shell and the shelf is layered leather set with CA.
-"Justin,That bow is gorgeous.I like the dye job on the boo." -mullet
-"That much recurve is challenging to tiller. Really fools you early on to take a lot of wood off. Really a gorgeous implement.
" -snedeker
-"very impressive! that is one gorgeous bow, very nice work. I bet it is a snappy shooter. bamboo and yew is a deadly combination, light and fast." -juniper junkie
-"Tips and handles often make the bow, tiller and everything else being equal. The handle on jbell's bow is a real bar raiser. Next goal: improve my handles!" -OldBow [attachment deleted by admin]
