A Few (probably) Pretty Basic Board Bow Questions

[JNewton]

Hey, All!

Got a few questions about making a bow. While I have some Vine Maple drying, I thought I'd try my hand at making a Red Oak board bow. I really would like to have had Maple instead, but the selection of boards at my local Home Depot or Lowe's wasn't really great. So, Red Oak it is.....

For a backing material, has anyone here ever used the fiberglass cloth like you would repair boats with? Looking over videos and some other message boards, it does seem folks use it. I was more concerned about getting one layer of that to lay flat. Is any sorta open form with bicycle inner tub strips or clamps needed?  Or will gravity and careful spreading of the epoxy work? I have repaired some boats with this stuff, so it's not my first rodeo with that. It just seems like it would at least look somewhat nicer than drywall tape.

And about tip overlays. I see these, and even have an October Mtn. Products bow that has them. Are they necessary? What do they do for a bow?   

My goal for this bow is a 40# bow I can shoot while my left/bow shoulder mends. Just want it to be durable, and fairly light poundage. 

Jimmie

[Forwardhandle]

If your board is strait grained and doesn't have a lot of run off you could probably get away with out backing at your low draw weight if you keep it long and wide enough for it , I did a red oak board bow when I first started with the fiber glass mesh tape & TB2 didn't require any wrap just laid it down with my fingers the bow ended up breaking due to my poor board selection but the tape held it together from blowing up in my face , do you have any pics of your board ?

[Pat B]

Tip overlays are generally not necessary especially for the bow you want to build.
 If you need a backing there are quite a few that require very little in tools or equipment. Brown grocery bag paper, silk(used neck tie, cheap at thrift shops), silk(blouses from thrift shops), burlap and others. All can be glued down with common wood glue like Tite Bond. TBIII is waterproof. Fiberglass cloth backing can overpowering to the belly of the bow and won't add any more protection to the back than the materials mentioned above. Like Yellowwood said finding a proper board is will get you closer to a successful bow. Adding a backing will only help prevent splinters from lifting. They will not prevent a crappy bow from breaking..

[JNewton]

It does have a bit of grain run off. On the sides, there's not much I know to do about that beyond buying a better board from git-go. On the back and belly of the bow, if I would've laid the bow out diagonally on the board, I might've beat the problem of the grain runout there. I'm very much learning here. Next time I'll at least have something tol draw from when I hit that issue again.  [ Invalid Attachment ]

Here is the probably the worst of the runout on the side of a limb.

 [ Invalid Attachment ]

Pat B., thank you (and you too, Yellowwood!) for your help! I don't know if my photo of the runout on the side of limb will make this post or not. Still trying to figure out posting photos. I just figured even IF there was an "acceptable" amount of runout here, I'd rather back it for reasons like you mentioned.

I'm fairly certain that I'll probably make every conceiveable mistake with tillering and everything else that happens when making a bow. It's a learning thing that I'm hoping I'll get lucky enough to shoot a few times........

Jimme

Added in EDIT: Well back to the drawing board on uploading photos from my phone. I'll try taking some with my little Canon Sureshot digital, uploading those, then see what happens, I guess...... Do those hve to be re-sized smaller?

[Pat B]

Change the camera resolution setting to the lowest setting(640x480).

[JNewton]

[JNewton]

Man, do I have  bunch to learn about posting photos at the new website format.....    

Anyway, the above photo is one of the limbs, viewed from the side. The left side is the back, and the rt. side of it is the belly. There is a short black felt marker line running kinda along the limb.
 

In the photo below, it's being viewed as looking at the back of the bow. These are an attempt to show the grain runout, in the worst areas. I dunno how successful I am at that. Hope my bow making goes better than this, hee hee......      



Jimmie

[YosemiteSam]

My first several were backed with brown paper -- sold in large rolls at Home Depot or Lowes.  It was handy.  I don't know if it works well or not but the only ones that broke are ones that probably had other errors (too short, poorly tillered, etc.).

Burlap has worked well for the bows I made for my boys.  It probably slows them down a bunch but I was more concerned with making them bomb-proof.  The one burlap bow I made for myself was poorly tillered (first one).  It just folded when it broke.

Clay Hayes sells rawhide backing strips on his website.  Might be worth checking with taxidermy shops or online leather shops to see if you can find a cheaper source of deer rawhide.  CH has a good video series about building a simple board bow.