Primitive Archer
Main Discussion Area => Bows => Topic started by: SLIMBOB on February 01, 2014, 08:08:13 pm
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Really got me perplexed. An Osage self bow I made last spring was drawing 52lb at 27 inches then. I figured it would settle in 50lb. I noticed the last couple of times I strung it (last fall) that it was a bit difficult to string. Felt heavy. I shot it and it was definitely pulling more than 50 but I didn't weigh it. I strung it during Xmas and knew something was wrong. Way heavy just to string so I unstrung and let it set. Today I put it on the scale. 5 1/2 inch brace height. 10lbs at 10 inches, 30lbs at 15 inches. That's as far as I drew it. It's gaining 4lbs per inch. At that rate it will hit 50lbs at 20 inches, 78lbs at 27 inches??? Maybe others have experienced this and I'm just behind, but I've built countless Osage bows in all seasons. Green wood, dry wood, seasoned wood you name it and I've never seen this before or even heard anybody talk about it. The stave was given to me bark on last Feb. Supposed to have been dry and it certainly seemed to be. It worked like dry wood and I can tell the difference. Not a single check any where. It finished out then with a couple of inches of reflex and that is where it sits now. Pipe straight. Better than the alternative I guess, but has anyone else ever had this happen???
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Dried versus cured.
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Thought about that, but that much weight? It picked up nearly 40lbs.
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I think a couple things might be at play. 1st I would say the moisture was probably higher than you thought. The next thing I have also seen happen when I let a bow get a little out of tiller and repair the tiller before I get to full draw. I think the bow suffers a little compression losses but then heels up as it cures. I am guess the bow will drop down as you draw it further and end up maybe 10# or so heavy when you get to full draw.
Just for the heck of it I would pull the bow 1" at a time past 15" and go back to 15" every time and recheck the weight. I bet it stats gradually dropping and more rapidly dropping as you apprach full draw.
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Yes, this happens when I use osage that is extremely dense and heavy. Mine gain about 2lb per month for three to six months after they are finished. I don't see this effect with light-weight osage.
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Slim, I've had RH change my white woods but only a couple of pounds but never experienced what you've described...Would be interesting to know what actually went on with yours.
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Badger, I did not pull it past 15 inches, but I worked it up to that just to be safe. I will do as you suggested and see if it makes a difference. Tiller looks just as good today as it did then, granted only at 15 inches. Shot this thing a bunch over the summer and so it's well shot in. Or it was.
Jackcrafty, I would not have said this was a particularly dense piece of wood. Might have been. Smallish diameter stave with a pretty high crown. Very knotty piece of wood, neon yellow. Seemed pretty average to me at the time as far as density went. It took very little set from start to finish, but may be. 40lbs??
Shot a bunch of mine today. All the others are where they should be so RH not a factor as far as I can tell. Pretty wet day really. RH got extremely low last week, but only for a day or 2.
Refigured and its 30lbs. I've never had one change half that much.
I've had them lose a little weight on hot humid days, and gain a little on bitter cold and dry days, but it's near 80 here today after a rain.
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I've only had it happen once and it was with ironwood. SOY made me an ironwood takedown that was a pleasant45#@28". A year later 74#@28". I figured it was a bit higher in moisture in MN where it was made and it dried out some more here in drier KS. Josh
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Yup my Osage recurve was originally 50# now it's closer to 70#
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Interesting. Never had one change much at all. If anything they lost weight. This one has become one of my favorites, so I'm gonna try Badgers advice first. If it will settle around 60lbs I'm ok. If not, and I will have to retiller it as I cant draw it back as it is. Scared to!
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I've had an osage molly gain weight like that.
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And I've had a black locust molly gain weight, just not to the same extent I'd expect Osage could gain weight since BL does a more thorough job of crushing its belly ::)
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too high MC when it was made tillering allowed the wood to dry thoroughly , and possibly a lower RH now than when tillered.Was your stave fairly thick? Could have been dry on the outside and green on the inside. When Air drying lumber , the rule is at least 1 year for every inch the thicker you go though the less that rule applies. A 6x6 will not likely be as dry on the inside after 6 years as a 1x6 will be after a year. Through the cycles of drying and rehydrating a piece of wood will regain less and less moisture once lost. This is seasoning.
Disregard if you already know this of course.
Yes, this happens when I use osage that is extremely dense and heavy. Mine gain about 2lb per month for three to six months after they are finished. I don't see this effect with light-weight osage.
You live in a very dry climate don't you Patrick? Where do you get your Osage from? I think this is a case of the same cause and effect. JMHO
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I get my osage from various sources, but mainly from the heartland (Missouri and surrounding states). I don't use Texas osage any more.
And yes, my climate is VERY dry. I've gotten rid of all of my staves that can't handle the dryness. The woods with the highest specific gravity seem to do best.
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I had a heat treated winged elm bow go from 50 to 70 once over the course of about 6 months. It was reflexed about an inch and is still dead flat after shooting a lot at 70 pounds and then retillering it to 45lbs. I guessed that it had to do with moisture content, but as someone said above, maybe the dried wood as opposed to cured wood is the deal. It is an odd phenom. The last thing you expect is a bow to gain a bunch of weight from just sitting around.
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Thanks lostarrow. It was not thick. It was a stave from a small diameter limb in the half round. Less than 2 inches thick from memory. It has to be that the stave has dried out over the last year. PatM thinks maybe it's seasoned more, and that is possible, but it's only been a year since the bark came off so I don't know. Seems that it lost moisture and hardened up. But in no way did it behave like a moisture laden piece of wood. No drying checks at all, it took little set after hundreds of shots and it has the same reflex now that it had when I put it on the rack, so it did not pull into reflex as a green drying stave will do. Yet, here we are.
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Wasn't dry.
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Dry vs. seasoned.
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Just kidding here...
Confusing Kg and Pounds >:D
Del
I've never done it :-[ ::)
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Guys, Tim Baker doesn't post here anymore. It's OK to accept that seasoning and drying are two different things. ::)
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Ive never had one change that I noticed. Ive used osage 10 months old up to 20 plus years.
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Green vs dry/seasoned is much more important than seasoned vs. dry.....much, much more important in my way of building bows.
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Del, not it. Though that answer would seem more plausible than wet v dry, or dry v seasoned. My pea brain cant reconcile a 30lb increase in roughly 6 months. I finished the bow and posted on here in June, but then shot it a bunch all summer. Eye opener for me. Obviously it's either wet v dry or dry v seasoned and it can make that much difference in that short of time on certain pieces of wood. Very dense pieces are affected like this according to Patrick. In thinking back on this piece of wood as I was working on it, it is thin ringed, high crowned and I was particularly taken with it once I started working on it. It didn't seem to be unusually dense from appearance, but it did perform exceptionally well. Started with 3 inches of reflex and settled at 2 which it still retains. The inch it lost is not noticeable as it is spread out along its length, so maybe more dense than I suspected. I'm gonna take Badgers advice and see what happens today. Keep you posted.
PatM and Pearl, seasoned v dry are two different things and I recognize that. Big difference at least as far as Osage is concerned and I suspect other woods as well. But I think of seasoned as in years to see a noticeable difference not months. My thinking may change now.
This wood was not wet (green). Wet wood feels different to me when worked and anybody that has drawknifed the two know what I'm saying. Dry wood is hard and seems more brittle, wet slices like cheese.
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Hey Bob, maybe your batteries where failing in them bow scales....;)?
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Oh, that's nothing! I always gain weight around the holidays!
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Ha! I'd consider any idea at this point. Dead batteries or too much pumpkin pie. At first I thought I had just become extremely weak and wimpy and couldn't pull my 50lb bow half way back anymore. At least it's not that. I know you PEARL have built a ton of Osage bows and you haven't seen it, nor have I. Others say they have a time or two. I want to find some more of this wood!
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Guys, Tim Baker doesn't post here anymore. It's OK to accept that seasoning and drying are two different things. ::)
Curious why Tim Baker doesn't seem to post on this or any other bow making forum any more?
When I moved from NC to the Rockys I had to re-tiller all of my osage bows. The went from mid-50's to high 60's.
Patrick
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I think Tim Baker got tired of being jumped on by all the wanna' be experts on the bow building sites. I understand he took a different direction in life and now longer makes bows.
Made an osage bow, well seasoned and dried osage sprout wood, some of my best. The bow went from 65# to 75# in the year after I made it, the guy who bought it shot it a bunch during this time, almost daily. Go figure, this is the only bow I have had react this way. The wood sat in my shop for years before I made a bow out of it.
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TOO MANY COOKIES!! >:D ::) :o [sorry, I can't pass up a chance for a wise crack]
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I get my osage from various sources, but mainly from the heartland (Missouri and surrounding states). I don't use Texas osage any more.
Dang It Mr. Patrick... You have my Undivided Attention Now!!!
Would you tell me why you no longer use Texas Bodark?
Inquiring Minds Gotta Know!
:)
-gus
PS. Sorry for the Hijack... But Dang!!!
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Steve's advice looks to have been spot on. I did some precise measurements this morning;
5 7/8 inch brace height.
Still 10lbs at 10 inches
now 26lbs at 15 inches (was 30lbs)
44lbs at 20 inches
That's about 3 1/2lbs per inch, which would bring it in around 68lbs at 27 inches. Still heavy but not as heavy, and I haven't pulled past 21 inches yet. I'll work up to it and see where it lands.
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I think Tim Baker got tired of being jumped on by all the wanna' be experts on the bow building sites. I understand he took a different direction in life and now longer makes bows.
That's not true. There are many experts in the bowbuilding world now. Tim just did not like his word not being the gospel truth anymore.
Dean Torges would be considered an expert by many and he and Baker couldn't see eye to eye on anything.
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Dang It Mr. Patrick... You have my Undivided Attention Now!!!
Would you tell me why you no longer use Texas Bodark?
;D Hahah... I don't use it any more for bows. It works great for everything else though (knife handles, foreshafts, arrows, etc).
I think it grows too fast here. After having three unexpected tension failures with TX bodark, I decided to get picky.
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After having three unexpected tension failures with TX bodark, I decided to get picky.
Egad... That does Stink for sure...
I haven't had this problem as of yet, and hope not too.
But I will keep my eyes peeled in the future.
We're the staves from the same or different trees?
Best Regards,
-gus
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If that's true, and I have no reason to doubt it, it's a shame. Tim Baker brought a scientific approach to all this that I hadn't seen before. The questioning of long held beliefs and the testing of those beliefs to see if they held water. When I started all this it was he and Hamm's writing that I consulted more than any other. Jim Hamm was in there specifically and maybe only because of his expertise in Osage and Indian bows. Be a shame if he left because of others now questioning his beliefs.
Patrick, I've cut some Bodark up north of you on the Llano Estacado that was as good as any I've seen. It does vary in quality though, not just place to place but from one tree to the next. I just assume it is that variable everywhere. Haven't used enough from other states to make any kind of comparison.
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Tim Baker and I are close personnal friends, we live close by each other and visit often, we argue about everything. Tim still plays with bows a bit but prefers the more natural primitive straight bow approach as his chosen style. As far as pleaseant bows to make and shoot I agree with him on that. I have seen Tim make plenty of red oak board bows in about an hour or less that would shoot at 170 fps, faster than his famed mojam bow.
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We're the staves from the same or different trees?
Different trees but I think they all came from East TX.
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I have seen some Real Nice Bodark come out of Michigan, Ohio and the like.
But the Prettiest by Far was in a couple bows that Sasquatch brought to the Knapp In out I'm Burlington last year.
The Rings were 5/8"+ thick with an excellent early to Late ratio.
As I recall it was from near College Staion...
-gus
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I think Tim Baker got tired of being jumped on by all the wanna' be experts on the bow building sites. I understand he took a different direction in life and now longer makes bows.
Made an osage bow, well seasoned and dried osage sprout wood, some of my best. The bow went from 65# to 75# in the year after I made it, the guy who bought it shot it a bunch during this time, almost daily. Go figure, this is the only bow I have had react this way. The wood sat in my shop for years before I made a bow out of it.
lol no Ive personally seen Tim make a yew shortie.
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I stand corrected.
I saw a bunch of very abusive replies sent in Tim's direction on the Stickbow site from some of the now banned hot heads and assumed this was the reason for his departure.
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Eric, you really don't need to stand corrected. What you said was true. Tim does enjoy a good debate or aguement but so many idiots started taking it to a personnal level that he did drop off a lot of the sites he used to frequent.
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Great admiration for what he brought to the table. That is true for many from that generation of bow makers. I got to read volumes of information from many different sources when I started. That was much less true for those guys, who just refigured it out thru trial and error. That includes Steve Gardner and all the others.
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I believe that lots of the "experts" like Tim and Dean don't show up on the different sites anymore because they get constantly hammered with questions about this and that when they do come on. I've seen this on PA and other sites over the years. It is only human nature to put these "icons" of our archery world up on pedestals but in truth they are only regular folks like most of us. I guess celebrity can be a curse or blessing depending on how you accept it.
The cool thing about our addiction is there are as many ways of building wood bows as there are people building them. We have to thank the TBBI contributors for opening the wood bow doors for us and informing us that not only osage and yew but almost any wood will make a good bow if the proper design is used for that specific wood. Tim Baker and Paul Comstock let us know this and showed us how so we could all be successful wood bowyers. By the time TBBIII or TBBIV came out lots of other folks, through their own experimentation, found out that not all that was written in TBBI was gospel. This proves that our sport is alive and well and looking forward to the next generation to grab the "wood bow" baton and run with it.
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Slimbob
I am a little late to the discussion, but back to the original question.Is there a chance that you might be working with tension wood? perhaps pulling some additional set into the bow, at the same time as it attempts to gain more reflex?
It was a stave from a small diameter limb in the half round.
It finished out then with a couple of inches of reflex and that is where it sits now.
willie
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Willie, Possible, but I don't think so. If there was anything remarkable about this bow to me, it is the lack of set it took while being built. Started with 3 inches of reflex and ended with 2 inches of reflex. I expected more set. I just measured it after working with it yesterday and it's just under 2 inches of reflex still. That's within a 1/4 inch of where it was when I finished it. I am sure however, well I believe anyway, that it was reaction wood, but whatever reflex it pulled into had already happened before I started working on it.
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wait. Reaction wood reflex? I need some of that!
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well, perhaps all the reflex happened before you started working on it, or maybe further reflexing was somehow prevented by the compaction of the belly that happened during tillering or from the resistance of the normal wood in the bow to bending. I am not an authority on wood or bows, by any means, but with my latest bow project, I have been playing with some reaction wood, albeit compression wood, and it acts different for sure, especially when adjacent to normal wood in the stave. I did not write my suspicions clearly in the previous post, but if the bow took a remarkable lack of set when tillering, perhaps the expected set was hidden somehow by tension stresses in reaction wood. I find it interesting that your description of the bow in its present state, seems similar to the high early draw weight one would expect to find in a highly reflexed bow. maybe that is why Badger suggests that the weight per/inch draw increase will drop offas you near full draw.
By the way, do you happen to know which way the back of the bow was oriented in the tree? Was the pith of the limb off center?
Did you know that Native Americans often preferred branch bows because they had not yet met Dan Perry , and even if they had, it was too long a ride to find a thickness sander. ;)
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Small diameter limb so the center of the bow was the center of the limb. Back was pulled into reflex so I'm only assuming, but I would bet it was the top of the limb. Can't be sure but all the earmarks...
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Just a quick update to close this out. Turns out Badger was completely right. I finally got this one back to 27 inches today as I took it very slow getting there. 63lbs at 27 inches, so it loosened up a lot as I pulled it farther. I shot it a good bit this evening and checked it again after I had put maybe 25 shots thru it. It held right on 63lbs. So at the end of all this it picked up 11lbs from when I finished it last summer. Still sits at about 1 3/4 inches of reflex. Tiller is right on as well without touching it. Danged if I know, but it's a hammer at that weight.
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If you haven't already, make a 10 strand FF string for that sucker and it will fire arrows like a rocket launcher. (I'm too chicken to use less than 10 strands... but the fewer the better)
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I've got 8 strand on most everything else, but because this one was so heavy at first, I made a 10 strand for it. Yeah, it is way fast.
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How did I miss this?
Well, for what it is worth, I've had that happen with green wood.
But SlimBob, your bow would have taken a huge amount of set after tillering.
Perhaps your scale is inconsistent.
How do you measure weight?
Some things are just a mystery.
:)
Jawge
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George. The entire thing is very strange to me though a few others, badger and jackcrafty have seen it before. It took only an inch of set from stave to finished bow. It has now picked up another 1/4 inch since shooting it at the higher weight. So it started with 3 inches if reflex and now sits at 1 3/4 inch of reflex, 63lbs at 27 inches. It was not a scale that told me it was heavy, I could barely string it. Once strung it was obvious that it was way heavy at just 10, 15 inches. My scale is an old bathroom scale that has served me well for more than a decade. I did build a tiller tree yesterday with a spring scale primarily because of this bow. I wanted to see if there was a difference. At 10 inches the old scale said 10lbs. The new scale said 15lbs at 10 inches. At 20 inches the old scale showed 40ish while the new one showed about 3lbs heavier. At 25 inches they were identical. Never got beyond 25 inches on the old scale. Mystery to me as well, but it is a rocket launcher now. If one is gonna change, I prefer this kind of change! 😊
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I had it happen just very recently. I finished a little rcurve 56" long with 4 1/2" reflex. I wanted to be 50#@26" but I came in light at 50#@28". Let it rest for about 3 weeks and now it is 50#@24". I am thinking if I draw it slowly out to 26 I will loose a tad more.
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Thanks Steve. Without this forum, I would have called a few guys, none of which had ever had this happen by the way, and I would have no real answers. Patrick said that on his really dense Osage, his bows will pick up 2-3lbs per month for a bit, so there is a possible cause. You nailed how to deal with it, and so there's the fix. Appreciate your insight.