Glass horse bow help

[A. Lucero]

Gettin ready to build my first bow and decided after many days of long thought that I would take on the task of building a glass horse bow. But I do have a few ?'s before I get started. First of all I have no heat box or any spare $$$ to build one so thats the first hurdle I need to get over, so I need a good glue that does not require heat to cure(Bowgrip 100???) or a real cheap way to cure the glue, and I need a form for my bow and have no idea where to start with that at all. My main concern about the form is glued in twist and the loss of shape after being released from the form itself. Can anybody point me in the right direction???

[R.W.]

During a nice hot summer day, placing the glued up bow and form in a car will do a passable job of "heat curing" your bow.

You can use a "box" made of mylar backed insulation, like is used to insulate gas hot water tanks, and 2-4 100 watt light bulbs to heat cure your bow.

Just be sure you check that the bulbs will not touch the insulation material, nor the bow itself.

Lee Valley sells an epoxy glue that is said to be good for skis and golf clubs-that should work for a bow.

Your form MUST be square along its length, or your will build twist into the limbs. A router will do a great job of keeping the "face" of the form square to the main body of the form.

If this is a "one off" project, you can make yourself heavy duty rubber bands by cutting the "bands" off of a car tire inner tube. Probably you can scrounge a punctured tube from a tire shop. A motor cycle tire tube might even be a better bet.

To use the "rubber band technique, you drill holes thru the sides of your form, and insert lenghts of doweling thru the holes. The rubber bands are stretched over the form and bow glue up to clamp the lams together while curing.

I am sure that others with more experience than myself will chime in with good advice, too!

Good luck with your project.

[kennym]

Hey Andres,

Not sure about Bowgrip,I've heard of a few bow casualties with it. Smoothon seems to be most bowyer's choice. A heat box can be as simple as you want,a sheet of building foam ins. (preferably foil faced)taped together and set over the form on the floor with 3-4 droplights inside would work. You want it between 160 and 180 degrees for smoothon.

Here is a bit on how I build forms,there may be better ways,but I haven't found it yet...

   http://kennyscustomarchery.com/Bow_forms.html  


Good luck with your project!!

[shikari]

Kenny is right,use smoothon and build yourself a cheap hot box,mine ended up costing me $20,and if you dont have the tools to make your own form ask a friend to help,its not worth it to waste money on good material and have the project ruined because of cheap glue,stick to smooth on and Kenny's lams are perfect,that's what i used for my horsebow.

[Bob Sarrels]

Smooth on definatly.  This may sound wierd but years ago Jeff Massie from Massie Archery said when he first got started he would completely wrap his form in plastic wrap and the wrap the whole thing in an electric blanket for 36 hours.  He said it worked great but the waiting time sucked.

[A. Lucero]

An electric blanket aint a bad idea, long wait though. I got a few space heaters I was thinkin bout using, but they shut down if they get too hot dont know if they would run long enough to cure b4 shutting off

[A. Lucero]

Canarywood lams :
Tulipwood and rosewood for grip/riser:  
And tulipwood for the syahs:  
Some kick ass wenge I bought for the hell of it!

[shikari]

Seems like a nice combination of wood you have there,what draw weight are you going for?How about a picture of the form and how are you planning to attach the sahiyas?

[A. Lucero]

Dont have a form yet, still tryin to figure that one out. Goin for a 60lb draw weight, gonna attach the syahs using epoxy, then I'm going to wrap them in epoxy soaked fiber glass cloth and finish em off with a layer of resin soaked hemp twine then a top layer of twine to finish it off.

[Moen]

Just a tips.
Before you wrap the fiberglass on, pull out threads and use them. Then you get 50% less weight on you syhas. And twice as strong. I made horsebows up to 140# with this technique. And my syahs never fall of.

Mr Moen.

[A. Lucero]

Thanks for the tip Mr. Moen, I would love to see some pics of your work sometime, help get the creative juices flowing. Still having trouble with the design aspects of the form. I never thought about breaking the glass cloth down and using it like super sinew, it will help cut the wight of my tulipwood syahs.

[Moen]

Look at my post: "Bows for Norway"
I will finish my last horsebow tomorrow. I can take a few pics and post it here.
PM send you.

[Moen]

This is how I attach the siyhas...
I use 6 m/20 ft on each siyha.
   
   
   
   
   
   
And finish...

[**DONOTDELETE**]

kool looking...

[A. Lucero]

Thanks for the pics Moen!