This may be your comic relief for the day, I don't know. When you're unable to work in the shop, you're left with a lot of time to think, and, as we all know, that's dangerous. I'm finding myself devoting a great deal of time and pipe tobacco to planning something that possibly ought not be done, but that I'll likely try anyway. Since I'm unable to get started on it on my usual time frame - Right Away! - I figured I'd actually seek input in advance. What a concept!
Brent showed up here early in the week with a new ELB, a Rudderbows hickory/ipe/hickory with horn nocks. Actually rather nice. I fear he ordered it too heavy for the shoulder he had rebuilt last fall, 45#, so he could only take a couple of shots, but with my short draw I was able to shoot a couple of ends with it before I tired and I enjoyed it. He got cane arrows with it, first I've ever seen and I was impressed, they looked neat and shot well. Don't know if they can be had in a spine suitable for me but that's an issue for another time.
I want to build myself an ELB type bow so he and I can ELB together. I know I can do the standard thing - hickory/something else/hickory - or hickory with a natural boo back, but I don't want to do that. I got into bow building because I wanted a glassed version of an old wood bow I liked. I was able to pull that off satisfactorily (at least for me) before I went Hill style nuts. Now I'd like to explore the possibilities of an ELB that would have just enough glass in it to give it increased durability, if not increased performance, keep it from being inclined to taking a set, and make breakage substantially less likely, considering that I would be building for a light weight, 30# -35#.
Needless to say, I have some ideas and questions…
First, has it already been done? I wouldn't be surprised at all. If so, what sort of layup was used? Obviously, if there is information already out there, I'd like to get ahold of it.
If that's a "no", here are a couple of approaches I've come up with. You can give me your reactions… laughing and/or throwing up do not count as helpful…
I want to keep the essentially deep oval cross section as much as possible. The addition of any glass will certainly tend to reduce that. My first approach, keeping glass minimal, could be to simply try using one piece of Core-Tuff in place of the usual ipe, i.e. hickory/Core-Tuff/hickory (or some other wood than hickory if something else is obviously better to use with glass). With the back piece kept fairly thin, 1/8" or less and the belly piece at maybe 3/4", I'm thinking I might be able to get a decent D shape cross section.
Note: I'm figuring on a proper bend through the handle design, maybe just one piece of short tapered extra lam in the riser section, kind of like a power lam, mostly to thicken it up very slightly but without overly stiffening it.
My second idea, if the above is for some reason not a good approach, was to make a kind of hexagon design, think flyrod, with glass on both back and belly. The glass strip on the back would be wider than that on the belly. In the finishing, the corners would be rounded off, leaving a long bow with essentially trapped limbs on both sides. This would obviously be a lot more work and a much greater difference from the design and is not my first choice. I don't really think this one is very practical, but I thought I'd throw it out there.
Both approaches would presume fairly substantial tapering of the wood pieces to get tiller. Unless there's something I just don't know (imagine!), I really think I could make that first approach fly.
OK… some of you wood bow guys who have built ELB's and some of you who have theoretical knowledge of the physics of different woods and glass together that I don't have, talk to me….
Topic: Glassed ELB - Feasible? (Read 359 times)
