Primitive Archer
Main Discussion Area => Bows => Topic started by: H Rhodes on March 27, 2014, 07:04:31 pm
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I am blessed with a shop full of power tools, but this week it dawned on me which one I use the most in my bow and arrow building. If I were a brand new bowyer on a tight budget and a small work shop, and could only afford one good power tool, it would be a good belt/disc sander. I enjoy splitting staves from logs, and roughing the profiles down with a hatchet, and hogging off wood with my farrier's rasp. I have three hacksaw blades taped together and a chainsaw file that makes short work of my string nocks. Working with hand tools is enjoyable for me and I could make it without my bandsaw, table saw, etc., but that belt sander is my go to. Shaping handles, reducing limbs to side profiles, tillering down to longstringing, shaping tips, the list goes on. Tapering arrows, sanding, making field points from nails, sharpening trade points, etc... Belt sander. Best money I have spent on a power tool. It takes a little practice and you have to be cautious or you can sure remove too much wood and ruin a stave in a heartbeat, but most of your rough tillering can be done with it. Once I am to floor tiller or long string then I alternate between rasp and scraper, finishing off with scraper. My belt sander saves my elbows from the scorching case of tennis elbow that I have in both arms from all that rasping. It is the one tool that keeps me building bows in spite of the inflammation. I think new bowyers fixate on getting that big band saw, and I agree they sure are nice, but give a good bench style belt/disc sander combo some thought. You can do a lot with it.
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Right on Howard! My belt sander is my best friend. I use it for tillering up to about 2 inches away from full draw and then scrape with a pair of scissors broke in two for a set of scrapers. I wouldn't want to be without it anymore.
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Absolutely! It and my draw knife are the only two indispensable tools. Every thing else is a luxury for me.
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Dust becomes the huge problem though. You need a vacuum dust collection system more than anything then.
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Dust becomes the huge problem though. You need a vacuum dust collection system more than anything then.
Yeah. I am trying to get me one up and running right now. Stupid connecting thingys, none of them are even close to the sizes I need. I bought that cyclone thing from woodcraft, and some hoses which are ridiculously priced in my opinion for a simple hose. The outside of the bandsaw connector is 4", and the inside of the shop vac hole is around 2 5/8", maybe a smudge more. My shop vac is a rigid 16 gallon, my bandsaw is a grizzly 14".So I figure I need something with an inside dia of 4", and something with an outside dia of 2 5/8" or close. I bought a connector that said 4" for my bandsaw, but it wasn't even close to 4", like 3 3/4" inside dia, and 3 7/8" outside dia???
EDIT: I do love my cheapo craftsman belt sander. It has been a trooper so far. I had to modify it a bit, take the back part off to sand laminates. And take some part off that constantly hooked the belt and ruined the belt, and caused it to run slow.
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All of my time is outdoors so none needed. Rain moves me indoors and I just won't run the sander. Central Texas so the cold is seldom a concern.
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Yeah, indoors is a pain cause they sure do make some bad dust. I work under a shed outside usually. When I am pushed indoors I have a big squirrel cage fan that changes the air out. Breathing that saw dust just isn't an option. It'll kill you over time. Good dust masks and ventilation is where it's at.
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I agree. I would take an edge sander over any other tool if I had to. I do like my bandsaw though.
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I agree. I would take an edge sander over any other tool if I had to. I do like my bandsaw though.
Yeah, laminate wise, I can't do squat without my bandsaw. I can't do squat laminate wise without my belt sander either though! I need em both! If I had to pick one tool, I would choose a bandsaweltsander, >:D
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I used a belt sander when I first started out but I haven't used it on a bow for several years now. I have learned how to cut them out closer to dimensions on the band saw and use a farriers rasp to get them shaped and partially tillered. I think my bows improved when I switched to hand tools. The only thing I use my belt sander for now is shaping the bow tip for nock overlays. I might give it another try this summer when I can take it outside.
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I used a belt sander when I first started out but I haven't used it on a bow for several years now. I have learned how to cut them out closer to dimensions on the band saw and use a farriers rasp to get them shaped and partially tillered. I think my bows improved when I switched to hand tools. The only thing I use my belt sander for now is shaping the bow tip for nock overlays. I might give it another try this summer when I can take it outside.
Thats what I do, I don't shape the bow or anything with the sander, but I do use it to flatten my lams. The disc attachment is great for flattening the mating areas for overlays.
EDIT: I also do shape tips with it, and also rough shape horn nocks, which saves soooooooooo much work rasping them out.
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That's it, I'm going to go this Saturday and buy a belt\disc sander! I found one for just under 80, a table top one!
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Need a new belt on mine and haven't replaced it because of winter and won't use it unless I can take it out of the shop because of the mountain of dust it generates. Haven't really used it much on bows though but thinking I might start playing with it more on shaping bows. Don't have a bandsaw and the old hatchet, rasp and drawknife system I'm used to is starting to lose it's nostalgic charm as my muscles and joints age. ;)
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Im the oposite I started out with scrapers and rasps now I tiller strictly with a sander :) so much faster for me. 36 grit for lams and shaping. Selfbows a bandsaw is a must though?
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X2 on the 36 grit. That will remove some wood in a hurry. Bandsawing staves is a luxury I enjoy, but when you split one out with hand tools, it seems to me you are really getting involved with the grain and sort of have a feel for what a stave is capable of right of the bat - if that makes any sense... I need to get out of the shop more.....
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Funny, that all these people from all over the planet develop a way of doing this and it can be so different from one person to the next. I have access to several band saws and rarely use them. I typically split mine with a wood chisel and then work it down from there with my belt sander. First the front profile and then the thickness till it starts bending. Then from there it's my draw knife, scraper and sanding block. I'll use a rasp around the handle but I could live without one as my sander will shape it nicely. I think the ability to be creative in so many ways is one of the things that draws me to this.
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I have a 6 x 48 and use it all the time. Jawge
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I don't have a belt/edge sander. I've made a PILE of bows of all types without one. I've carefully weighed the tool purchase decisions I've made so far, and the edge/belt sander has always been down the list a ways. Now that I'm tooled-up pretty good, I thought about maybe getting one, but I honestly don't know how much I'd use it. A lot of my bows are snakey, lumpy osage bows and all their bellies are radiused, so...
Even when the bellies are flat and straight, I won't tiller with a power tool. By the time a bow approaches my tillering tree, power tools are silent and still. I'm not in a hurry and I like working with hand tools, especially good sharp rasps and scrapers. To each their own though I guess. It's all bowmakin, so it's all good.
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Handy tool,really comes in handy for knife making,I don't use it much on bows except for tip shaping/over lays and sometimes a little in shaping the handle,never
use one tillering. Band saw is my main got to power tool for roughing one out then to the rasp and scraper for tillering. :) :) Mine is always out side so dust ant much of a problem. :)
Pappy
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I have a 6 x 48 and use it all the time. Jawge
6x48 :o That's just showin' off now ;D
I've only fairly recently got myself, a cheapy one which, like Toomanyknots I'm modified a bit :laugh:
That reminds me, I also had trouble adapting my dust extractor to fit the belt sander. I used some plastic domestic waste water fittings in the end. When I connected it up there was't enough air flow and the BIG flexible hose concertina'd up and dragged the extractor across the floor!
I had to open up the air flow holes as much as possible and even then it needed a couple of air bleed holes drilled into the fittings. Without the air flow the extractor can overheat. I'll post a pic of what I did if it will be any help.
I'm slowly getting into it more and it's V handy for flattening tips and overlayes and takin' some waggles out of a profile (that's the waggles I don't want. Not the ones I've specially left in :) )
To me the bandsaw is the big labour (and elbow) saver.
Del
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Clearly a belt sander is the way to go. No wonder you guys can turn 'em out so fast! Working indoors I try to keep the dust to a minimal, but since it's inevitable anyway...next paycheck.
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Not me Howard! Hand tools=control=less mistakes=better bows! For me anyway.
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I only use a belt sander for creating small pieces of exotic wood for tip overlays, flattening the bow tip for the tip overlay, rough profiling of horn nocks, flattening bamboo backings and creating power lams. My actual laminations are made on a thickness planer (which I don't own, but I know where to find one nearby). For everything else I use hand tools. But the things I do on a belt sander, I could nearly impossibly do with any other tool. Or at least not nearly as quick!
But I think I need a new belt sander, because it appears my dad broke mine when he used it...
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I had to choose really carefully when I decided to buy a power tool to help with making bows, and I didn't even consider a belt sander. Regretting that now!
Although I did go for a really nice power planer which has made roughing out staves and hogging off huge amounts of wood incredibly quick and easy.
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I used to use mine for everything almost, then my nice big one took a dump, I use the portable one for tips, I can shape the handle faster with some rasps and mainly use my bandsaw, when I make lam bows I go to my in-laws rip them on the table saw and run them thru the surface planer to get them nice and flat
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I have a 6 x 48 and use it all the time. Jawge
6x48 :o That's just showin' off now ;D
I've only fairly recently got myself, a cheapy one which, like Toomanyknots I'm modified a bit :laugh:
That reminds me, I also had trouble adapting my dust extractor to fit the belt sander. I used some plastic domestic waste water fittings in the end. When I connected it up there was't enough air flow and the BIG flexible hose concertina'd up and dragged the extractor across the floor!
I had to open up the air flow holes as much as possible and even then it needed a couple of air bleed holes drilled into the fittings. Without the air flow the extractor can overheat. I'll post a pic of what I did if it will be any help.
I'm slowly getting into it more and it's V handy for flattening tips and overlayes and takin' some waggles out of a profile (that's the waggles I don't want. Not the ones I've specially left in :) )
To me the bandsaw is the big labour (and elbow) saver.
Del
I would love to see your pictures. I had trouble finding a good match of connectors to get a good fit on my belt sander. I had to use two different connector things. It still doesn't get good suction enough to get as much of the dust as I would want, a lot of it blows over the edge, which I think is what the edge guard was for, but I took it off to flatten laminates.
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The end stop was sawn off and refitted just below the belt level so it didn't get in the way but it caught as much dust as possible.
The spigot had masking tape wrapped around it to make a good fit with the adaptor. The weight of the hose makes it all a bit wobbly, so the hose does need supporting. It doesn't stop all the dust but it does pretty well. Check the inside of the spigot on the sander is completely open. On this one it had a patern of about five small holes which was hopeless, I had to open right out to full bore.
Hope this gives some ideas.
Oh yeah, you can see the air bleed holes I had to drill on the blck plastic adaptor that came with the extractor... without those holes the suction was collapsing the hole and dragging the extractor across the floor!
Del
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Thanks! I had to remove the back guard of mine too! Thanks for the pictures!
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Not me Howard! Hand tools=control=less mistakes=better bows! For me anyway.
No argument on the control issue. I have to admit that I buggered up a few staves by taking my tillering too far on the belt sander. Now I go slightly beyond floor tiller and then get away from the power tools before I ruin one. I have seen guys who are much more skilled than I am on the band saw dang near finish one out on the saw. Trying that is when I invent a whole new realm of profanity and destroy potential bows. Power tools are definately something to practice on with your less than stellar bow woods until you get some skills under your belt. One second of inattention with any power tool can make stove wood. If I have a particularly fine stave, I do find myself getting away from the sander earlier in the process. PD is right on the money with the "Hand tools=control=less mistakes". With my bad elbows, the sander just keeps me making bows by helping with the hogging off of the obvious areas where wood has got to be removed. I haven't really been around many other bowyers and am looking forward to the classic and seeing the process that others use. There are probably as many ways of building a bow as there are bowyers. I love hearing about everyone else's methods. I have only been doing this for a few years now (maybe 75 bows not counting the three I have going now...) and I seem to learn something new about it every day.
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Self bows I use just a draw knife and scraper with some rasping around the handle. I use the belt sander on the tips to flatten them for overlays.
Laminated bows I do almost everything on the belt sander right down to 1 st stringing.
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A belt sander is my favorite tool! I do most of my tillering with it. I also use my spindle sander. I've been told that it isn't primitive, but I think that most of us cheat a little when it comes down to that.
Dale
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I don't doubt the effectiveness of it and may end up getting one some day but... For me I don't currently use any power tools once the wood is in stave form. Using hand rasps on the tips and handle area is probably my favorite part. Taking my time makes it more personal for me. Now I don't mind if others cheat... :P ;D Just kidding!! >:D There is no right or wrong way to go about it and I see the great value of a good belt sander and the beauty it can produce. However there is something special to look down at 3 or 4 simple metal tools and know they were all that was used in making my bow.
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I'm all hand tools here even for harvesting my wood and I don't think I'll ever use power tools