Good weight to aim for?

[Mo_coon-catcher]

I'm working on my second attempt at making an EWB. My first attempt was at MoJam and it was ERC backed with 1/4" of maple. That bow didn't have a chance to see what it could do. First flexing session we pulled it back to about brace using a long string. The bend was good and smooth, the weight was heavy but nothing excessive. As soon as it reached brace it went boom. So I started another one with a very tight ringed dense piece of osage I had bought at MoJam. That peice of wood is dark orange all the way through, hard as a rock and has atleast 30 rpi. Right now I have the stave at 69 1/2" nock to nock. And it's a little under 1 1/2" at the handle tapering to 1/2" tips and is about 1" thick tapering to the same 1/2". This thing is rediculously stout. With a long string moving the tips about 4-5" it's already pulling 150 lbs. I've tried to brace it up at a low brace and I cant get the string to stay on at the moment, so I'm taking a break from it for a while and letting it rest (or me).

I'm wanting to get as much weight out of this price of wood as possible at as long of draw as it should be stressed to. I'm thinking 150lbs at 30" sounds reasonable unless it can go higher and further. I'm not concerned about making this bow shoot able by me at the moment. I have more wood I can make something I can shoot. Which the heaviest I've tried was a 120# @ 30" yew that I pulled to my normal anchor point of 27". I'm confident I could get to 30" with some practice on form. I've got a very straight stave of 5 year old white ash I'll try to make a 100# bow out of when I get this one finished.

All advice welcome.
Thanks,
Kyle

[mikekeswick]

I'd leave the tips 1/2 for now but the 1 1/2 wide handle is too wide.  1 1/4 would be more than enough leave it that width for 12 inchs, then taper to 3/4 12 from the tips then into your nocks.
although it will feel ridiculously heavy at this point that is a good thing! Cut some small wedges of wood 1/8th high and 1/2 long superglue and bind them to the back for temporary nocks. Above these cut a couple of grooves for a stringer.
Than if you are sure the tiller is good enough get it braced. These heavy bows tend to need bracing early or else you will start losing weight fast. As long as your stave isn't reflexed a lot then a 3 4 inch brace is enough.
Good luck.

[Del the cat]

Dunno what draw length you are after, but 69 1/2" is a bit on the short side... ok for 28" maybe 30" at a push, but it will be working very hard... mind it is Osage
Remember a lot of warbows were 75 -80 " long
At Warbow weights they will barely flex if you try to floor tiller, and bracing 'en is a total night mare. If you can see the bend at floor tiller and brace it easy, you are under weight!
Del

[Mo_coon-catcher]

With the long stri the bend is looking hopes to me with the tips moving about 4-5", so I think I'll try to get it braces up to there. And I think I've figured out my issue with the string staying on when I try to brace it. I rounded the tips before filing in a pair of knocks on each tip. So the round section on the belly is wedging the string off as I let off pressure from the stringer. I think I need to flatten the belly side at the tips and I'll probably go ahead and glue on some temporary overlays. And I think the stave is plenty stiff at the moment, I think. I put all my weight into it and even lift myself off the ground putting pressure on the handle and it flexes less than 1" past straight and it has about 1/2" reflex. And with the stringer I'm having trouble getting it flexed enough to slide the main string 2" into the nocks. I've been trying to lock both my hands in place in the handle and use my legs to push myself and the bow up into place then lock one arms in place while holding the bow and slide the string with the other. It's not wanting the cooperate too well. And I'll be perfectly happy if I can get a 30" draw out of it.

Thanks,
Kyle

[Ian.]

Do you know what the Mass Calculator is? Pretty much your best friend with heavy bows. Good lucky with the bow, not something I would try.

[Mo_coon-catcher]

I've got the bow weakened up a bunch and I've hit the first low bracing this morning. And it is stout! On the long string I've pulled it back back as far as my current tree setup would allow me to before the scale bumps into the pulley. I'm going to fix that issue when the rain quits. Which was about 12" of movement and pulling about 105#, much better than the 150# at 6" of movement. This morning I beaced it to a 4" brace with the help of my buddy. And the d97 string stretched almost 1" when I relaxed the bow onto it. Im not used to that at all. The brace had a couple of spots that needed touched by nothing too serious. I did a short test pull on a scale to get an idea of the current weight and its pulling 50# with about 2" of string movement. And it's still holding te full 1" reflex the stave started with. I also had to straighten a kink  that made the string rest to the side of the handle and made the bow stoat around a bit. I've decided to keep the draw length to 28" and make the next one I build go the full 32". And here's a couple of pictures of the progress.

Kyle

[ajooter]

Looking good kyle.  I would say the inner 2/3 s on the left limb is still a little stiff.but I see you have a natural kink your dealing with.  I'm gonna get backnow on my hhb elb soon hopefully. 

[Mo_coon-catcher]

Well the bow started to take a smidgen of ser early on when pulled to 120#, so ifiguhred it didn't want to go above that. So I got it back to 24" at 120# when a couple of knota decided to take large frets. One of which formed by a drying check that splintered up a bit at the same time. So I went ahead and super glued the knots and wrapped those with silk thread and wrapped the other knots as a precaution for splintering. I'm going to drop the weight to 90# while leaving those areas alone and see how it likes to be pulled that weight. The set isn't too bad at this point considering he weight it was pulled and ye length I'm working with. About 1 1/2" at this point.

I'll keep updated as I go and will hopefully be having a full draw of it in the end.

Kyle

[loon]

Almost seemed like all the hype about osage was warranted  hahahahaha

Blergh, knots.

good luck. For Osage you shouldn't go that long I don't think - http://poorfolkbows.com/aelb1.htm - I suspect his tiller wasn't very good for the length of the bow at least, though

[Badger]

  For a fairly accurate reading of your current weight with a long string just read what it says on the scale at where the string is. Forget about the tip movement. If your string is hanging down loose to about 10" and it reads 150#@ 24" it will read pretty close to the same thing braced even though the tips are moving 3 times as much. Take a physical weight of the bow. At 69" you are going to want an arc of the circle tiller almost for sure. The bow should weight about 35 oz, not less than about 31 oz.

[Mo_coon-catcher]

I got the bow shooting, though I've got some tiller touch ups and finish work to do. It started with about 1" reflex and ended up with less than 1" deflex. So about 2" set total. The center is still a bit stiff, though all the reflex was at the handle with straight limbs. The tips are still a bit stiff too. I thought it looked decent until I looked at a picture. Most of the set occurred while trying to push it to 150#. It started taking too muc set too quick, so I backed it down to 120#, and the knots states to chrysal. Taking almost all the rast of the set pulled to this weight. So I backed it back down some more and settled in at 100# @ 30". I've only shot it at 24" due to only being able to pull it that far, partially due to a mental block of shooting ~650gr arrows. Still launched those little buggers about 185 yards. The handshock wasn't that bad considering it was massively under drawn with massive tips. I will say, that osage sure can take some abuse and still shoot. I need to start using the mass formula, it might make these bows a bit simpler.

Kyle