Fred Arnold 2017 Bow Trade, Pictures Please, housekeeping issues

[penderbender]

That walnut looks great kyle. I like heavy bows goat! Haha cheers- Brendan

[stuckinthemud]

Working on steaming the handle to get the string centered up. I coated the wood with veggy oil, then wet paper towels, and coated it on foil. I had to show the colors of the oiled wood whil I'm at it.

Kyle

How do you know if you are over-heating the wood beneath the foil?

[Mo_coon-catcher]

I don't for sure. But as long as there is steam coming out of the ends, then it shouldn't burn. It's not a sealed container to make the pressure rose any appreciable amount. So the water that's in direct contact with the wood should be boiling temperature, with the steam being a bit above that. So as long as the paper towels stay wet, the wood won't burn. I've done this a few times with good luck. I can put the heat gun almost on the foil for 30-40 minutes and not burn the wood underneath. If you remove the foil and towel while it's still hot, the towel will dry almost immediately from steaming.

I'll find out this evening if the steaming and bending held. I was able to move the tips a little under 1/2". So between that and the handle moving a little, ye string will hopefully line up with the handle. It should be close enough I can fine tune with the nocks. I left the tips about 7/8" wide.

Kyle

[DC]

It sounded a bit iffy to me when I first heard of it but quite a few have used it with success. I don't know of any failures but maybe they're shy

[stuckinthemud]

Watching with interest, the laurel is such a pain to get to bend, I'll try anything

[Mo_coon-catcher]

I think you should try it. Coat the wood well so it doesn't soak up water and crack, make the rag as wet as possible without dripping, wrap it well with foil to hold as much of the steam as possible. Then you can directly apply the heat for an hour without hurting anything, it should be plenty hot enough through to bend properly and stay where you put it. I've done entire limbs like this and it works well for that too.

Kyle

[Swamp Thang]

I got my source to save gar scales for me another guy looking for some  long gar skin my bows roughed out the other one is tiller ed just have to sand and add some character maybe flip the tips a tad and sinew! I'm so excited!

[stuckinthemud]

So, here's the laurel ready for the next steaming session. Bark is stripped, limbs are moving about 4", tips are 3/4 wide for the moment. Inner third is 1 1/16 .

I've cut the end of the straight limb out of the photo; looks a lot like Kyle's but with no colour, don't cha think?

[Mo_coon-catcher]

Stuck, that does have a similar profile to the walnit im working. I bet you'll get good shooter out of it.

I got the walnut pulled back to 25" today. At the moment it's sitting at about 5/8" of set. Which I don't think is too bad for this stage of the game. The steamibg did its job well. The string now lines up through te center of the handle. Though I did crush a good don't in the side of it. I'll try to steam out as much as I can before I shape out the handle. I'm glad the big holes are holding well. I have soaked yhem in super glue a couple ones to make sure they're well saturated. At this stage they have become exposed on the belly side too. I'm going to take it to ahooting and shoot it in to make sure the holes don't open up or ease a splinter before I put some reinforcement wraps around them. But even with 7/8" tips it feels good on the hand with decent speed and not much thump. And I expect it to get better once at full draw and with the tips worked down to 3/8".

Kyle

[stuckinthemud]

One of the neighbours has had some tree surgeons clear their yard and they've let me have the hardwood. After work I picked Up the timber which is bright orange in colour . No, its not Osage. Any ideas? The neighbours dont know what It is as the plot has been more like a jungle for years

[koan]

Stuck...that would be red mullberry..... Brian

[stuckinthemud]

Ooooh, Turkish horn bow one step closer

[Dakota Kid]

Black locust is fairly orange or yellow or somewhere in between. If it has thorns and deeply fissured bark it's locust.

[stuckinthemud]

Before he'd felled it  the TS thought it might be damson, but the timber would be purple if that were true. So going with a fruit tree, it could be mulberry. The bark is similar to cherry on the young branches but more grainy on the main stem, its not fissured bark. Hopefully the TS will be back next week as I didn't get his number

[PatM]

I would never trust a surgeon who is not sure before he starts cutting.