Primitive Archer
Main Discussion Area => Bows => Topic started by: Caveman_Sam on May 02, 2013, 05:13:42 pm
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So, Gentlemen.
I split my log! Turns out splitting wedges and a sledge hammer do the trick!
Its in roughly equal quarters. 2 are slightly banana shaped off to one side due to the bottom of the trunk being bigger than the top, I think. 1 is pretty good and 1 is Exellent, dead straight with a mild and even natural recurve (or decurve not sure on this..? The stave bends away from the direction you would pull to draw it.. Aparently this is good for speed and power (possibly the same thing?)
Im worried that in the drying process they might twist again? I'm asking for advice on how to store them to ensure that I keep the sweet recurve stave straight and recurved..
Also should I be waxing up the ends? Or will all the inner exposed fibres keep things drying evenly?
Many thanks to every one who has commented on my previous posts and given me the encouragement and knowledge to get this far! I don't know any bowyers and I'm a 1st generation wood worker in my family. So hence why my questions might seem a little noobish. This so far has been my only point of call where I can actually ask questions and have them answered. So ill say it again! Many thanks guys! :) .
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It would help to have a sense for the dimensions of the log you split, and the species. Is this an 8 foot log that's 12 inches in diameter? or just a little sapling that barely split into four usable quarters? I'd definitely seal the ends, and I might also get the bark off ASAP and seal what will be the bow's back. If the stave is thin or narrow enough to bend at this point, it will probably twist or warp as it dries. Best to leave it overly wide and thick enough that you can't bend it, so while it will take longer to dry it will also dry in the same shape that it's in now.
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Fair point. Its Ash, 6'4 by 9 or 10" The quarters are large. Maybe not quite large enough to split again, but there will be a lot of wood taken off these to make a bow.
Definitely cant twist them, they're still hard enough to pick up!
I placed the reflex stave belly down, so that the weight of the stave isn't pushing it back straight, although I guess there is weight on the limbs.
Ive been trying to learn how to chase rings on small staff sized pieces of hazel. Its a bit daunting because I'm inexperienced. The rings on the ash staves look to be pretty wide though.
When I take the bark off I should chase a ring? how many down? Do you still need heart wood and outer wood? Or is that for english longbows?
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Sam,
I havn't made that many bow only 7 and I would suggest a flat bow that is a long bow. It is a simpler design and you will find as I that it will be a bit of a challenge for your first bow.
Welcome to the addiction :) Mine started when I decided this winter to make a bow for myself instead of buying an expensive fg bow...I love them (the self bows).
greg
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Fair point. Its Ash, 6'4 by 9 or 10" The quarters are large. Maybe not quite large enough to split again, but there will be a lot of wood taken off these to make a bow.
Definitely cant twist them, they're still hard enough to pick up!
I placed the reflex stave belly down, so that the weight of the stave isn't pushing it back straight, although I guess there is weight on the limbs.
Ive been trying to learn how to chase rings on small staff sized pieces of hazel. Its a bit daunting because I'm inexperienced. The rings on the ash staves look to be pretty wide though.
When I take the bark off I should chase a ring? how many down? Do you still need heart wood and outer wood? Or is that for english longbows?
I think with ash you just carefully remove the bark and that is your back. I chased a ring on hickory once and it was a pain. Woods you chase rings on are osage orange and locust.
Greg
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For ash, the sap wood ring under the bark will be your bows back - so there will be no chasing rings in your future.
I would remove the bark (as much as you can wo digging into the sap wood) and then coat the back and end with shellac. Then wait for about a year unless you do some sort of quick drying (you can read numerous posts about the process).
Russ
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The English Ash I get here in Bournemouth is excellent without needing to chase a ring. When I take the tree down, I split the logs then rip the bark off as quickly as possible. Either with a drawknife or it was cut at the right time then just by pulling it off in one go. Then the ends are sealed with PVA glue or some paint, and left for a good year or so.
Ash needs to be REALLY dry to avoid getting any set, but if you have a bow design ready to go, rough a stave or two out to almost floor tiller size, then it'll dry far quicker. Don't keep it anywhere too hot early on, but gradually moving it inside, then somewhere with decent airflow and not too hot/cold should be fine over a period of a few months.
Ash will need to be heat treated before, during and sometimes even after tillering to keep it quick and resist set, and you'll have the same problems I do, if you're working in Cornwall - the coastal air makes everything annoyingly humid, so every time you work on the bow a bit, put it somewhere dry and warm for a day or two before doing more work on it.
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I still haven't managed to get my hands on a draw knife. Been to a few 2nd hand and junkshop kind of places n a car boot and still cant find an old one. I was told all new ones are rubbish as no one is making decent ones any more. I'm considering forking out the £95 for a Ben Orford one.. its hand made by him and he seems very experienced and trustworthy so even though its new I feel it could be good. I still haven't got a shave horse or a workbench/vice set up though, so i'm not sure even having one would let me use it.
I started off with a small multi tool and a few screwdrivers when my g/f bought me a log for my birthday cos i had been banging on about wanting to make a bow. Now I have a sledge hammer, steel wedge, wooden wedges that I carved with; Small forest Axe, Mora 711 knife, handsaws x2, file, wood rasp (also sandpaper and wood glue n stuff left over from making an african harp!) So the collection is going well! lol
It was cut in mid/early February.. I Stored it for about 6/8 weeks with sealed ends before comming on here n ppl said I needed to split it asap. dunno if the bark will 'rip' off. Best tool for job that I own atm seems to be the mora knife. Any reason that this tool is just wrong? ive been playing with stripping hazel bark with it and im ok at it/quite confident. I know it will be slower.. but there will be many small shaves rather than fewer longer/larger ones from a draw knife.
With hazel bark there seems to be the skin of the bark.. and then an underside of residue/thicker and squishy fibres. after these are gone there seems to be the somewhat veiny remains of the squishy layer attached to the first layer of wood. To remove the veiny remains you 'have' to cut into this first layer. Is this the same for ash?
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Hard to describe without seeing it as you do it, but in essence, you have bark, then cambium (soft and squishy) and then the solid back of your bow. These may be thicker/thinner than other woods, and even vary within the same species so you kind of have to play it by eye as you go. The last piece of ash I worked on had the green/grey bark, then an almost pink/brown layer of cambium and the moment I was through that I saw nice clean white wood which was the back of the bow.
The mora will be perfect for getting the bark off, so have at it with that. The worst case scenario is that you dig into the nice solid back of the bow by accident, but if that happens you just have to chase a ring all the way along instead. I tend to remove all the outer bark any way possible, and leave the cambium fairly intact. As the bow is worked down and moves towards being finished, the cambium either dries and flakes off, or can be sanded/scraped off in time. Or left on! Bows look stunning with streaks of cambium remaining!
As for the use of a drawknife without a shaving horse - I've never had a horse or bench, and I love using my drawknife. A little unusual probably, but what I do is either lean the stave against something and use the drawknife downwards, or more preferably wedge the tip of the stave up against a wall, back up and lower it down until it's just above horizontal. Tuck a towel between the other end and my body, and lean into the stave so I'm keeping it steady, then use the drawknife cutting towards me, as if it were on a shaving horse.
Even better, pick up a cheap Black & Decker workmate, the tool box type with clamping wooden vice lid. You can store all your bow making tools in it, and use the lid to hold a stave or bow fairly rigid while you work on it.
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Ahh ok, soI will use the knife to take off the bark skin, going into the layer of cambium in order to get underneath it. If I actually take off any white wood at all I have gone too deep? So its just the bark skin that dries hard and is a pain to get off, the camium will actually come off easier at a later date?
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Don't focus on finding that illusive cambium. It is a VERY thin layer, only one or a few CELLS thick. The cambium is usually taken off together with the bark. Don't expect you need to remove the bark first and then remove the cambium as a second task - it's all done in one go. In ash, the bark and cambium are very easy to distinguish from the wood. The latter is much lighter in color and much harder in texture. If you take a dull tool, you'll not have a problem with removing the bark and cambium, while the wood is too hard for the dull tool.
Try to peel the bark off in one piece, if that's possible. If it's stuck tight to the wood, you can use a sharp (draw)knife to get half of the thickness of the bark off the wood. Be careful not to dig into the wood with the sharp knife. Then take a dull knife or scraper and remove the last half of the thickness of the bark. Apply a lot of pressure and make scraping movements, rather than slicing movements. The bark (and cambium) will flake off, while your tool will slide over the harder wood.
Do some testing on a piece of scrap wood, or the edges of the staves near the tips where you have plenty of wood to spare.
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Thats fantastic advice! Could something as dull as a round metal kitchen knife do the trick?
What is your opinions on this as a small traveling version of a draw knife.. until I can get my paws on one?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HYWaWA_2gVU
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don't chase rings on hazel, either. It's probably a pain anyway...
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Don't focus on finding that illusive cambium. It is a VERY thin layer, only one or a few CELLS thick. The cambium is usually taken off together with the bark. Don't expect you need to remove the bark first and then remove the cambium as a second task - it's all done in one go.
The English ash I've used had pretty thick cambium (or at least, thick in comparison to some other types) and still needed to be removed once the bark was off. I like leaving it on, as it looks pretty ace when it's streaky. It dries a nice colour too, once the air gets to it.
Awesome idea about using a blunt tool to remove the bark - would never have thought of it! I always get stuck in with a drawknife and end up gouging chunks out of the back.
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so after I have taken the bark off will i need to 'back' the bow?
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Nope! That's what's so nice about using a clean stave. Whip the bark off, and there's your back. All it will need is some sanding and finishing when the tillering is done, and some rounding of cut/rasped edges as you go. If you do accidentally dig too deep, its not the end of the world, but you may have to remove the rest of the back surface and go down to the next untouched ring.
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Right right.. so if I do go into the first layer its on so long as I don't take off the whole ring layer and hit the one underneath?
Ive got alot of big gnarly knotts.. I think this tree was carefully grown, and the branches removed from the trunk a lot, causing 1/2.5 inch knobbly mounds at 5 or 6 points on the staves back. Ill remove the bark around them while I wait for a reply.. :)
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Yeah, you basically want the back to be as untouched as possible, so in an ideal world you remove the bark/cambium and don't touch the back ever again. However in real life (and especially with knots etc) you may find yourself breaking that rule. Depending where in the limb it is, sometimes you can get away with it, but the better way of approaching this is to try and leave it perfect.
I would heartily recommend getting a copy of the Bowyer's Bible. There are four volumes, but the first volume will give you pretty much all you need to get cracking. Be careful around knots - leave them proud. The tree should thicken the rings around it to provide growing strength, so try not to violate rings around knots.
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Volume 1 and 2 are in the post ;) i'm scraping and i've worked out what has been going on. because it was harvested in winter the first layer of wood is the darker stuff that makes the boundaries between the rings.. assuming that the larger whiter sections of rings happen when the tree grows a lot with all the sun in summer. Im guessing that winter is not the best time to harvest wood for bows because you were saying I was after 'sap' wood and that would be the new growth ring from the summer? Am I on the right track?
Do I want the hard winter ring or the larger growth one under it? Maybe the hard winter ring makes a good back actually now thinking about it..
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Also the 1/4ers are about 5 to 6.5 inches across.. is it worth splitting them again to get 8ths?
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Aim for a width of at least 2" but preferably 2½" of the back of the bow. The tips may be narrower, but the center must the this wide minimum. Ash is easy to split, as long as there are few knots/defects.
Volume 1 and 2 are in the post ;) i'm scraping and i've worked out what has been going on. because it was harvested in winter the first layer of wood is the darker stuff that makes the boundaries between the rings.. assuming that the larger whiter sections of rings happen when the tree grows a lot with all the sun in summer. Im guessing that winter is not the best time to harvest wood for bows because you were saying I was after 'sap' wood and that would be the new growth ring from the summer? Am I on the right track?
Do I want the hard winter ring or the larger growth one under it? Maybe the hard winter ring makes a good back actually now thinking about it..
No, you are confusing things.
First, trees (and thus wood) grow from early spring to fall. There is no wood formed in the winter. The layer you call 'winter growth ring' is the so called latewood. The layer that was produced in the spring is called earlywood. One annual growth ring is composed of earlywood and latewood. It's not strictly demarcated, since the spring does not abruptly stop. But in ring porous woods such as ash (or hickory or oak, for that matter) you can clearly see the boundary between the latewood from one year, and the earlywood from the next year. This boundary is the darker colored latewood in ash. But you can't find the boundary between the earlywood from one year and the latewood from the same year since that is gradual. The earlywood is spongy, porous wood, which you want to avoid in woods (holes are weak). Latewood is more dense and preferred in ring porous woods.
Sapwood consists of several annual growth rings. Depending on the species of wood, about three to twenty rings. Not all species have visible sapwood, but most woods have their sapwood clearly demarcated from the heartwood by a lighter color (such as oaks). Ash has no such thing; you can't visually see where the sapwood ends and the heartwood begins. That is not a problem, since both the sapwood and heartwood in ash are equally good.
Wood can be cut at any time of year. Winter is just as good as spring of summer. Don't let anyone tell you otherwise. Yet, it is theoretically true that ash wood harvested in May will have a thin layer of earlywood directly underneath the cambium, while ash wood harvested in December will have a layer of latewood directly underneath the cambium. But that is really unimportant and will not effect the bow, nor will it pose a problem in working with the wood. In practice, it is about impossible to get the earlywood on the back of the bow. This layer is so soft, you automatically remove it and always end up with the latewood on the back of a ring porous wood bow. As long as the back is one growth ring, it does not matter how deep in this single ring you are.