Build along, super glue and leather bow handle

[Dave Bulla]

Well, I'm gonna try my hand at a build along guys.

I ain't much good a building a bow but I like the detail work like the sanding, tip overlays and handle work and I kinda accidently came up with my own unique handle treatment that lots of guys who have seen it seem to like.  It involves gluing leather onto the back of the bow handle and saturating it with super glue then rasping, sanding to shape and polishing it to a high shine.  It ends up looking like a dark wood overlay but it has the benefit of being able to follow irregular contours, bumps and dips in the back of the bow so you don't have to violate the growth rings or tediously fit a piece of wood to the back.

I'll try to get a pick of a finished handle up here in a couple of minutes then as time permits, I'll do a sequence of pics from start to finish.  Just keep in mind that I don't do much of anything fast except maybe eat....

['46]

waiting Dave...........  

[Dave Bulla]

Ok, here is a pic of the handle on my first bow I built with the help of Rusty and Wingnut a couple of years ago.  Ignore the rough looking spots where the shelf meets the back overlay.  I started to refinish it last summer and never finished sanding it out like I normally would have.  It gets almost like glass with 600 or finer paper.

 

Here is a side view that shows the shelf nicely.  If you notice, the edge lines on the shelf are nice and crisp where they fade into the wood but the ones on the back overlay are kinda fuzzy.  That's because I glued the first layer of the shelf on with the smooth side of the leather towards the bow and the back overlay had the rough side down.  Of course, now I'll always use the smooth side down.    :rolleyes:  

 

[Luke Vander Vennen]

now that is cool

[Missouri CK]

Dave,

That is pretty solid looking. I'm pretty sure I wouldn't have guessed that it was leather.Great contrast. I'm looking forward to seeing how this is done.

Chris

[luv2bowhunt]

That looks really awesome. I cant wait to follow this build along!!

Kevin.

[clintopher]

Well I just can't imagine why people taking a liking to that, except that it's totally awesome.  I sure coulda use a tutorial like this about a week ago.  That's cool though, there'll be another bow.

Clint

[Dave Bulla]

Here is the candidate for a new handle.  It's an osage sucker bow I made for my daughter that probably has more sapwood than yaller wood in the limbs.  It was about 15 pounds at her draw but one of the character bends with a whoop-dee-doo bothered me so I heated it up and tried to flatten it out and cracked the back in the process.  I had to go down two or three more rings to get under it and now it might pull 5 pounds on a good day.  I kept it because I want to sinew the heck out of it and see what I end up with.  Of course that's probably another pipe dream knowing me.  Well, someday I'll do it.  If not, I'll whack a couple inches off each end and let my son use it.  He's only three and a half so it's about right for him anyway.

 

Here's another angle.  You can see that it is typical osage and has a knot right where you would want to put an overlay but that won't be a problem.  The leather will form right over it while it's soft and will conform perfectly.  After it's been soaked with super glue it will get super hard and I can rasp and sand it to shape.

 

['46]

Dave, I'm following closly. I plan to do this to that gouged osage grip I posted about earlier...you'll be called upon for advce bud  

[Dave Bulla]

I might also do something a bit different for a build along and show some screw ups that I already made tonight....  But for now I'll just give a verbal.

Being as I'm pretty much a just wing it kind of guy I grabbed a piece of the same leather I used on the bow in the first pics and took a series of pics about tracing the outline of the handle, cutting the leather to shape etc but when I got to the part where I was putting the glue on the leather to stick it on the handle, the glue wouldn't stick right and kept beading up like water on a waxed car.  On looking closer, I realized the piece of leather had been treated with boot grease at some time in the past and it wasn't gonna work.  Oh well, I've got some different leather I'll try.  It's a lot darker but the contrast with the white sapwood should look interesting.  If not, I can always cover it up with a wrap.

At least it wasn't like when I was doing the first one and got the shelf leather all glued on, shaped and nearly to finish sanded only to realize I'd put it on the bow with the bow upside down!  I went Yosemite Same for a few minutes on that one.  You remember, the old FRIKEM FRAKEM BRIGGEN BRAGGEN (#@#$@$!!!!!!  OOOOOOOOOOOOOOHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[Dave Bulla]

George, your post was the main reason I decided to try doing this build along.  Hope I cover it well enough for ya.  Just don't be in too big of a hurry.  My slow 'puter takes a long time to deal with 7 megapixel photos and it's kinda a pain but "oh well" eh?

['46]

And thanks for this build along Dave. I still have to do some bending and tillerin of that nasty piece of bodark   :D   before I attack the grip....so it will be awhile.

[Dave Bulla]

Just reread my last post George and realized it sounded like I didn't want to do this but am doing it because of your post and that's not what I wanted to say.

I've wanted to do a pictorial on this for a long time but didn't know how to post pics until about two weeks ago.  Then your post reminded me about doing the pictorial so, here I am.  The "pain" part is the slow 'puter.  The actual pictorial is kinda fun.

By the way, your welcome.

[gordonf]

That's a really cool looking handle Dave. I'll be following along closely.

[cjones]

Dave, I really like the looks of the finished product. Can't wait to see it done step by step. Very cool!  

[Linc]

Now that is sharp looking.Never would have guessed it was leather.    I gotta watch this one.

[Dano]

Dave, I like it. The leather overlays are a great alternative to the normal handle wrap.  

[AZStickman]

Build alongs are a lot of work .... Thanks for taking the time and effort to put this together.... That's a cool handle treatment... Terry

[Ray]

That is a cool handle,show me mo.

[wingnut]

Dave,

I always liked your way of doing the leather.  Now get out in the shop and take them pictures.

Mike