Bamboo Jatoba longbow build along

[Coldfingers]

KEN,

You da man.

Have copy of Deans tape, Bandsaw, and a few other tidbits if ya need em. Feel free to give a call and pay homage with tidbits.

Scotty.

[Many Arrows Lost]

Scotty,

Got kabob peices yet to be delivered. See you soon.

KT

[Many Arrows Lost]

Ok Folks,
It has been a very long day I've had friends in the ditch and others pop in for dinner so you'll have to bare with me as I forgot to take a couple pictures.

 
I started the day by taking it apart.

 
Then I got a call that my friends wife was in the ditch. He's out of town so off I went. Turns out she spun down the road a ways the went backwards about thirty feet into the woods. Blew two tires on one side as she was spinning. I guess she didn't check the tires 'cause she tried to get back onto the road and almost made it. She and 5 of the 6 kids(the other one was out of town with his dad.) were shook up, but not even a scratch on anyone. Thank God!

 
Anyhow, there's the dismembered bow.

 
Tapered the boo to the shape of the bow. That is the upper half.

 
Sanded the boo so that it is just under 1/8th thick at the tips and about 3/16ths in the handle area. Pretty tricky sanding the thickness taper. I found that a 12 inch sanding block with 80 grit sand paper works the best for me. Took some of it down with my bench sander though.

I didn't get a picture of the glue up but it is real simular to last time. Sorry.    

I may get 'er on the tillering stick tomorrow.

Later,

KT

[Bpaul]

Great to watch as you work through this.  And great you got to have another go at the project.  

Thanks for taking the time to post, looking forward to more.

B

[J]

Good to see your friend and her kids are safe.  

That snow scared me for a second!  I was in Valdez for 4 months but never experienced an Alaskan winter.  Wish I saw the northern lights, though.

Can't wait to see the bow as it comes to life.  Good luck and thanks for sharing.

[Coldfingers]

Ken,

My cell number is 460-0470. Feel free to call if I can hook you up with anything.

Looks like you are having a good time making the best of the NoonMoon. Your work is encouraging me to get off my dead... and finish a bow before spring bear season.

Did you get a chance to hit the Clearwater for Silvers? I made it down for one day with Lilhunter. What a great time. Right arm was sore the next day. Hit em durring the first snow. Between the colorfull salmon, dark woods, white snow and crystal clear water, it was an eye candy day. Flyrod has permenent set now ;*)

J...Valdeze gets snow...Fairbanks gets WINTER!

Scotty

[Eric Krewson]

1/8" is still too thick at the tips, go down to 1/16"

[sticshooter]

I love this stuff.<><      

[Many Arrows Lost]

Once again I must apologize for the slowness with the project but I did get in a couple hours work after church Sunday nite.

 
Here is the stave out of the glue-up mode. Tapered to match the Boo. Eric Looks like I lucked out, the boo thickness at the tips is right at 1/16th. Yee Haw! (Hey Scotty, what's the code on furnace installation?  )

 
Here it is belly up on the floor. Had to try something different for lighting.

 
The handle cutout.
 
the tips with tiller string installed
 
Got everything rounded and smoothed out enough to pull 15 inches. Looks pretty stiff on the left side. Actually I got real brave and decided to see if it would draw to 29.5. Ha Ha there ain't no way. I got it back to about 18 inches and she stopped right there. Yee Haw! It held together. Gotta scrape some belly off it I reckon, I could use a little of that myself come to think of it.  :D  

My duties with the Civil Air Patrol took me elsewhere tonight so no further progress on the bow. I think it's going to be a keeper and a beauty to boot. There is some wonderfull grain showing up in the belly. (By the way if any of your kids are intersted in airplanes, look up the local CAP Cadet program.)

I hope to get after it again tomorrow.

KT

PS I understand that I should sand off the yellow waxlike outer layer of Bamboo. Is that right? I plan on using an outdoor poly----- finish. Any suggestions?

[rocdoc]

Kenneth.  I hate to burst your bubble, but if I were you I would set this one aside and start another '1st' 'boo backed bow.  You can always go back to this one later, after you've made a few, and see what inspirations might come over you.

You REALLY do need to taper the wood AND bamboo.  The 'boo on my bamboo backed bows is almost paper thin at the edges before glue up and that's AFTER cutting it to shape.  I can tell you that Eric is right, you will have a bamboo bow with a thin layer of wood on the belly.  

Maybe you could make the limbs in the ELB style and get it to work, but it's gonna be tough.

Good luck man and don't worry about the mistakes.   I've had more than one bow that I've set aside and came back to later and made a shooter out of it.

[Many Arrows Lost]

Well folks,

I must say that with all the input I've had on this project I've been able to come up with something that works. I've been super busy the last couple of days but finally got in another couple of hours tonite. I was really torn between thinning the limbs and going with the slim english longbow style. In all my scurrying around I've gone back and forth. tonight when i got home I made up my mind to do the latter and slim the limbs done to 1 inch wide.

 
Here it is all slimmed down. Way slimmer than I wanted in the beginning but Oh well. As the pictures will bear out Eric, rocdoc, Ionian and anyone else I may have missed predicted what should happen...it happened.

 
The wood is about 1/4" thick at mid limb, I was suprised at how thick the boo was having only cut a1/4" off each side.

 
There it is at 28" some work left to get it right but enough for tonight.

 
After all the activity it has taken a 1 3/4" set.

It draws really pretty smooth, although there is some stacking in about the last inch or so. I hope it will hold up and that the boo will not overpower the jatoba over time. I can't wait to get some finish on it and shoot it. I plan on adding some purple heart to the handle area so it will fit my paw better.

Later,
KT

[Hun]

Hey brother, I like your bow. Bet it will be a looker after finished. The set is not that bad. It may still be a shooter for ya. I have seen bows for 3to4 hundred bucks with 1.1/2 of set. Keep us posted on the next one. I really enjoyed this build along.

[Jimmy]

Good job KT, Don't worry about the set, It will be a real nice gentle mannered bow. Next time during glue up just add a couple 2x4's under the limb tips and clamp the handle area to the bench. This will give you some reflex.  I still would like to see ya order Dean's Tape it is worth every penny and then some.

Jim Nichols

[rocdoc]

Good job Kenneth!

Being able to 'adapt' a bow's style to the material you're using is one of the keys to being a good bowyer......at least that's what I've been told ;-)

Looks to me like you've got what it takes.....just a few more credit hours at BU (bowyers university) and your there.

[rocdoc]

One thing I forgot to mention about the 'boo....I think someone else did.  You might want to 'trap' the edges of it.  It will cost you a few pounds but will help keep the 'boo from overpowering the Jatoba.

Trapping simply means rasping it down from the back to the belly at about a 45 deg angle.

[Psycho]

Wow. Great stuff. Nice looking wood and bow. It's nice to know what mistakes can be made in this bow building stuff. I'm still a rookie (freshman at BU). Keep at it. I still dream of Alaska. Maybe next Summer (June or July) I'll cut loose and runaway up there for a couple of weeks. OH OH. Now I'm in trouble. Got Alaska in my mind again.
Thanks K.T.

Psycho

[AkDan]

Hey Ken,

Man I didnt even realize this was you LOL.  I'd like to check that bow out.   Also have a bunch of osage and some bamboo for doing bbo's.

Dan

[Josh_IOWA]

many arrows, i like the shape, it's very smooth.  What do you shape your limbs with?

[Lee in S.C.]

Jatoba looks good, I've used it in some glass bows. On your next backing cut out the bow profile then thin it till the edges will cut you. It will naturally taper in thickness from the widest point to the tips. You almost cant get it too thin. The backing is there just to hold things together. I use a scraper to take off the rind.

[Many Arrows Lost]

Well the end of this project is near. I've added a purpleheart handle and put the first couple coats of finish on the bow. I even shot it a half dozen times. It'll take some getting used to for, because I'm not used to a bow quite this slim. Anyway here's a couple more pictures.

 

 

It is really hard to get a picture of it so you can see some of the grain in the limbs. I'm really pretty pleased, and wish to thank everyone here for the rescue operations and advice. This has been a good experience for me and probably saved me from making toothpicks again. My thanks also to the people who make this kind of thing possible via this website.    ,

KT