Trashwood/Wingnut sinewfest

[Killdeer]

A skewed schematic?
Those TIAs are the pits!
Hope my sobbing didn't raise the humidity in the drying room...

Killdeer~snif~

[Adam Keiper]

When you guys are drying this thing in your heat box, are you throwing it in by itself or while it is still tied down to the board?

[trashwood]

Adam, in a few days in the hot box the sinew lifts the tips off the blocks (usually).  No use keeping it on the form then.  As soon as the limbs lift free of the blocks on the form I just cut it off.  It took about 4 days for the sinew to lift the tips off the blocks with Wingnuts bow.

Rusty

[Timo]

Trashwood, Have you tried to hot box any bows with statics or recurves?(sinewed of course)

Curious if it would be more inclined to lift the sinew from the curves?(drying faster)

[Adam Keiper]

Thanks Rusty.  I let the sinew dry for a few days on the blocks (~2") as it sat on top of my funace.  Didn't get liftoff, though, so I took it off the blocks and threw in right in the hotbox (105 deg F).  I'm checking reflex daily and so far it's picked up 1/8".  Right now its at 1-11/16" total.

Wonder if I just didn't let it set on the blocks long enough or if 1-2 thin layers of sinew on a 66" bow doesn't provide enough "yank"? (1 thin layer on the whole bow, leftover sinew went on as a 2nd layer on lower limbs).

BTW, The purpose of the sinew in this case is to keep the back intact.  The stave had very thin rings (18/inch) and a myriad of small checks.  Nearing final tiller, I noticed that a few very tiny horizontal cracks were trying to form by jumping across the closely spaced checks.  They just screamed, "Splinter!", therefore I opted for the thin sinew job.

Rusty, I've always enjoyed and learned alot from your bowmaking forays.  Thanks for posting!    

[trashwood]

Timo - I have only made one sinew backed recurve.  At the time I sinewed the bow I cross wrapped the back in the place I tought the sinew would tryt to lift.  When I tillered the bow I cut thru the sinew on the belly.  When the bow was tillered I file off the cross wrapped sinew on the back and wrapped it with B50.  There was only a couple of days that the recurve area was not held down.  the bow has held together with no problem.

One thing I do is I get a pretty aggressive tooth on the back of the bow before I sinew it.  This could be one reason I don't have any problen with the sinew lifting since my first one.

Rusty

[loyd]

Timo, i just sniew to the static, sence it dosent bend anyway, dont have to worry about pull up. loyd

[Timo]

Well she's a holdin anyway!Even pulling them up a bit.I checked it lastnight,and there is very little pressure on the preload.

Can't wait!

Rusty ,wingnut, Hows things going with your sinew bows?

[wingnut]

I started work on the tiller on my little sinew bow yesterday.  Looks pretty good but is a little lighter in draw then I wanted.  Can't complain too much as this was an experiment from the start.  I do think I will go back and put on another course or two of sinew on the limbs to see what it will do.  I'm at 40#s now and would like to get 45#.  Rusty thinks that we should get maybe another 5#s in the process.  I'm also going to force another inch of reflex in durign the process.  

Wish me luck.

Mike

[Timo]

Mike, is that the bow with the funny named stuff on the belly?(can't remember what you called it)  :confused:

[wingnut]

Yep funny named stuff. Garolite.

Holding it's lines real nice, but not quite enough weight.  Rusty told me that we should have put more sinew on when we were doing it.

   

Mike

[Timo]

Mike, curious if you a Rusty have done any playing around with horn?

Got to thinking the other day about mixing horn dust/powder, with hide glue? Think it would have any strengthining effects?Elastic?

[wingnut]

Well this little bow is back in the news.  I walked by it the other day and it went "pissssst, hey mister ya want to kill a deer?"

Of course, I listened and got it outta the pile on the chair.  We went out and flung a few and I was very surprised at the speed and manners.  I didn't like the tiller as much so we went back yto the shop for a little pick me up.  Ended up taking a little off the lower limb to get her bending right.

Put it in the hot box over night at 100 degrees and shot her again when she cool off.

WOW!  now that's what I'm talking about.

It is right on 50# @28 and is only 60" long.

Mike

[wingnut]

BTW I put on some halibut skins I had in the freezer this mornign.

We'll get a look at her tomorrow.

Mike

[DCM]

Sinew, the gift that keeps on giving.

[Jimmy]

Nice thread guys, I just finished up a Garolite belly bow myself. I have made a couple so far, both have turned out real nice.

On this one I decided to use walnut for the core wood, Bamboo backed and thicker (bamboo) than normal and a little more reflex than usual. My thinking The Walnut makes the limbs light, is not doing much of the work as the garolite and the boo is the major power. Well I can say it shoots real nice, and I think it is the fastest bow I have ever made.    Will try to take some pictures one of these days.

Jim Nichols