Can a selfbow be re-tillered (any volunteers?)

[robtattoo]

I have a beautiful Osage selfbow, built by Shaun Webb. It's been sitting on the rack for about a year now & I'm a little leery of drawing it.

When Shaun built her for me I had a drawlength of 29" & the bow was tillered at 67#@29"
The concern I have is that since then, my drawlength has stretched to a smidge over 30"

The bow is 64" ntn & I was wondering, if it's possible, could someone re-tiller it for me to draw around 60-62#@31" ?

[Jason Jelinek]

30-31" draw is awfully long for a 64" ntn selfbow, especially if it has a rigid handle.

If it were me I would use a bow 68" ntn for a draw length that long.

[Art B]

Hey Robtattoo, are you basing your current draw length on the use of glass or wood bows? If glass bows, then your draw length will probably be shorter for these wood bows. You may only need to reduce draw weight for you Osage bow. If that's all that needs done, just string 'er up and remove even amounts of wood with a scraper and sanding block until you get the weight you want. Apply some tru-oil after that and you're good to go.

But.......depending on the bow you have, a 30" draw length would be long for the bow's length as Jason mentioned. But still doable. Can you put up an unstrung back and side profile picture?

My brother shot my first Osage which is the same length as yours for several years at 30" without hurting it. And it was tillered for 26". Osage is just great bow wood! ART