If you temper it and do it right it won't look all burnt up. You can temper it some time between floor tiller and right before ya brace it,and by the time you finish tillering it out most if not all the color will be gone,yet you still get the advantages and much better set results than not tempering at all...that solves your aesthetic issue...that is how I do most of mine,and most the time will not lose anymore than 2" of total set just like with any other wood. I rarely temper twice...its usually once after a good nice even floor tiller.
I'm just trying to help ya out man..I'm not being demeaning to you.
As far as the mushy thing goes,that was not a comment on your bows...that was in a debate.over someone else's thread who wanted to get rid of some follow in an already over stressed bow,and adding curves will just make it worse and the limbs more "mushy".
So you remember...
...pretty sure you were talking about my bows, specifically a hackberry bow I was building at the time, that had been denounced by pearl drums and you as impossible to patch, even though I had patched many before, and was fully aware of what I was doing? Here's the thread:
http://paleoplanet69529.yuku.com/reply/431314/Re-Recurving-a-warbow#.UPgikPIrcwo"@toomanyknots....dude...im speaking from experience and from what I have seen...im not acting and regurgitating info....and go ahead and waste your time sinewing your tension cracked across the back mushy hackberry limbs and dont heed the advice from some experienced guys." LOL, Anyhoo blackhawk....,
, The bows I've heat treated, I followed Marc St'Louis's example, but with my stove. Even when browning slightly only, I still ended up with it being pretty obvious, which to my tastes, just don't look very pretty. Also, my best results with heat treating was after the bow was fully tillered anyway. I am sure my results would benefit from alot more practice, and also a less crude set up than my stove top. I'm sure my lack of experience with heat treating can be blamed for my results as well. Aesthetically though, I think it looks ok on a primitive bow, but on a longbow or something, it just looks ugly. Just my personal OCD opinion. The way I been tillering bows lately, and have had a good amount of success with in regards of set, by the time I string the bow, I am already down to where it needs only a couple scraps and some final sanding. Which is probably
over longstring tillering it, I know. But it seems to keep set down alot. I would probably end up with alot of burnt wood on the belly I'm thinking though, the way I have been making bows like this lately. But like I said, I will give it another go when I get a heat gun. As the results yall get with heat treating speak for themselves, once again, absolutely no argument there,
. If I was making this bow 100% for performance anyway though, I wouldn't of added overlays at all, and I would of added two or three layers of sinew as well to the inner limbs, making sure to sinew in reflex, one layer at a time, one month at least between layers. I would probably do a cord wrap or a naked handle instead of leather that will just get mucked up eventually in the rain too. Definitely no shelf. ...And I would of
definitely heat treat the belly,
.
If performance isnt a priorioty, but appearance is, then not tempering your bow is a good choice.
I have noticed most of the darker color nearly disappears with a stain applied, you hardly see it.
That is a good point. But in this particular situation, I am not going to lose any sleep over an inch of set.
