" Changzhu " one piece Traditional Bhutanese Bow

[legend]

Hello All ,
Anyone tell me any information regarding sizes and dimensions / or bow builds for a Traditional Bamboo " Changzhu " one piece bow ?

[DaveMac]

I looked at these a while ago although didn't know what they were called. I was trying to emulate one of dave mead's horse bows which use bamboo limbs also. No idea of exact dimensions but starting at about 5cm or 2" tapering to 1cm 3/8" would be my guess, if you can get the bamboo that wide have an experiment and let us know (I have only been able to obtain 4cm 1 1/2" wide moso).

I'm putting the finishing touches on my 6th bow, but when I first started getting interested in this I think I'd planned to build about 20 or so in my mind before I'd finished the first, thinking of where to get the materials etc... I realised that I needed to stop over thinking it and just build something. If I make mistakes (which I do all the time) I try to not make them again. I can mess up ash boards and bamboo flooring bows and I will gain some experience for when I do start work on some osage or ipe 

In case I'm being too subtle, I'm saying if I were you I'd finish your first (if your like me you'll probably want to do that again) once you've built something your happy with (like you I'm just starting out, still not made anything I'm happy with, proud of but not happy with) then think about expanding your horizons.

[Weylin]

Don't tease us like that! I thought you were going to show us one that you made. 

[Limbit]

The bow they traditionally use is made from two pieces of bamboo lap-spliced at the handle. The handle to my knowledge, looking at pictures of their bows and seeing the way Aboriginals here in Taiwan make bamboo bows, is simply bound with thread. It isn't "spliced" per se. There is a natural even taper if the bamboo is taken from lower down the stalk as the bamboo naturally tapers from the base up and is thickest at the base. I think it would be absolutely critical to get the right type of bamboo. As close to the species they are using as possible since bamboo differs so much between species. I'm not sure at all about what species they are using, but it probably is similar to Tonkin and could most likely be supplemented with this. There is an official Bhutanese website (in English) about Bhutanese archery. It is their national sport, so there is a lot of interest in it there. I'm sure you could contact a traditional bow maker through the site. They had a bio of one master a few years back who seemed straight out of the stone age. He was given a room in the king's palace grounds and a salary just to practice traditional archery daily. What a job... I saw a video of the national team shooting traditional bows at something like 145 yards with light-weight arrows and they were so accurate that the opposing team simply stood near the target taunting the shooter without a second thought of getting hit. Pretty incredible. They must have a lot of free time over there.

[Limbit]

The website is "Yangphel Archery" if you want to check it out.

[leonwood]

There are some great documentaries on youtube. One of them is called “the archesrs of Buthan” and is very interesting