Build along, super glue and leather bow handle

[frankb]

Wow... very cool and thanks for sharing!

Dude... what I can appreciate... is your ability to realize the need to apply the flat-side of the leather to the wood in order to obtain the crisp finish.  

It takes the skill of an artist to see that.  I aint got it... but you do.  

Does the finished handle Tx feel like wood, or is there a tad of cushion to it? My guess is that it would have more of a solid texture in order to keep the luster.

Looks great, Dave.

Frank

[Dave Bulla]

Frank, the leather is every bit as hard as the wood.  I actually like a smooth slick handle over a leather wrapped one lots of times.  Especially if it fits your hand well.

Ok, here are some preliminary shots showing what I started last night before I figured out I had a bad piece of leather.  On that note, I should mention that I normally use a nice pece of vegetable tanned leather for this but any leather that's not super soft (like deer or elk skin) and is oil free should work fine.  Something about 1/8" thick works well.  I also like it undyed or just a medium light reddish brown works well too.  It really darkens up when you add the glue.  If you use multiple layers, the end result looks like wood with growth rings in it.  You might be able to see it in the first pics I posted.

This just shows the strip of leather I'd planned to use and I was holding it up to see if it was wide enough.  Also, this is not vegtable tanned leather (I don't think), just some that I had laying around and it's quite a bit darker than the leather used on the bow in the first pics.

   

Here's a view from the other side.

   

For the pictorial I thought I'd try to do some extra steps to give a better idea of how it works.  This is tracing the handle outline onto the leather.  I normally don't do that at all.  I just worry about the ends or any place where the will be an edge showing.  If the edge will be the same as the edge of the bow like on the sides of the handle I just let it hang over and trim it after it's glued on.

   

Here I highlighted the pen lines with a silver sharpie so they would show up.

   

[Dave Bulla]

If you look at that last picture, notice the narrow points of the grip.  That is a great place to end the overlay.  However, you can do it any number of ways from straight accross like the first pics, or make it longer so it runs out to the flares and then shape it rounded, pointed, fleur de lis, arrowhead shapes, snake heads etc.  Just be sure to cut it so the edge lines from the smooth side are nice and clean.  

When sanding to final shape, I like to get it where if you run your fingers over it with your eyes closed, you can't feel the edge but even then, the line you cut will still be crisp.  I've found that trying to true up a poorly cut edge line by sanding can be pretty tedious so it's best to get right before you glue it on.

[Dave Bulla]

Here is an example of a possible simple end shape that I WAS going to use on this bow.

 

Here is the trimmed leather held down in place with my fingers to show how it conforms to the bumps and humps.

 

Of course there would be at least one additional layer on top of this one if this leather had worked.

[Dave Bulla]

Here I made another stupid mistake.  I'm putting the glue on the leather and though it's hard to see, the ink from the ball point pen and the silver sharpie both bled and ran.  I was afraid it would bleed out onto the wood and penetrate enough to make removal difficult so I wiped it off with a paper towel and then with some acetone.

 

Not all the ink came off but enough so I started putting the glue on again and now I noticed that the glue was beading up on the leather.  The only reason I could figure was that the piece of scrap leather had been oiled or greased in the past.  Good clean and dry leather is important for this so that it will absorb the super glue.  It has to penetrate deeply to give it that good hardness that polishes up so well.

 

[Dave Bulla]

Now that I've showed the screw ups of yesterday, I'll try to do it right tonight...

Here is a new piece of leather.  It's not the vegetable tanned stuff I said I like but I'm gonna try it anyway.  It's some surplus boot leather from Lacrosse Boot company.  Somebody posted a couple years ago on *********** about them selling "blems" cheap and I bought two of them.  It's nice and dry, medium soft but a little dark.  We'll see what I end up with I guess.  I'm holding my fingers about where I plan to have the overlay end.

 

Here is a piece cut to length and with enough width to hang over the edges a bit.

 

Here I've rounded the ends and am holding it in place.  I folded the leather in half and used my pocket knife to round both of them together.

 

[Dave Bulla]

This time is looking better.  The glue is sinking right into the leather.  I put it on until it won't take anymore and I also put some on the bow.

 

I think we've seen me do this before eh?

 

[Holm-Made]

Cool idea Dave,  I'll definately be trying this on my next bow.  Chad

[Dave Bulla]

Well, we're gettin closer.  The next step is to use a good sharp knife and trim the edges.  I lay it over at an angle like I'm already trying to round off that first layer.

 

A heavy coat of glue goes on after trimming to shape and we're ready for a 2nd smaller layer.  Here I've only put glue on about two thirds of the leather so you can see the difference and how the leather really soaks up the glue and gets a lot darker.

 

Repeat the skiving/triming with a sharp knife like done on the first layer.

 

And here is after doing a third and final layer along with pretty close shaping with the knife.

 

[Dave Bulla]

Ok, moving right along now....

Once things are trimmed pretty close to where we want them with the knife, it's time to soak the leather with thin super glue.  Use plenty of it so it really gets in there.

     

Sand everything back down to smooth with 100 grit paper to get rid of the little high spots that will have been left with the knife.  I usually sand the leather and the handle all the way around like it was a single piece to get that smooth transition.  Repeat the soak and sand with 100 grit if needed.  Basically, if it starts to fuzz up bad, you need to put more glue on.  Pay particular attention to the fade transitions areas.  Try to avoid accidently sanding a groove into the back of the bow where it and the leather meets.  Go for a nice smooth flow.

     

Here it is after sanding and soaking twice more (after the 100 grit) first with 220 and then 400 grit.  It's also got a fresh coat of glue in the pic put on after the 220 and 400 sandings.  Once you get to the 400 grit it starts to get a nice satin finish.  If you are going to use an outer wrap on your handle, you could sand this with 400 grit and stop.

     

[kcdaniels]

Now thats pretty darn cool    Have to to try that on my next bow!
Good job    

Dan

[John Cooper]

Do you have any pics of you scraping your superglued finger off the leather?  :p   Just kidding!  I'm going to have to try this sometime because it looks really cool!  Thanks for the tutorial.

~John

[Luke Vander Vennen]

very cool

I'll have to try that for tip overlays

[Dave Bulla]

Well, this part is done!

I sanded with worn out 400 grit paper and would have used 600 if I had some.  Then I used some Six-0 steel wool and to get a super fine shine, I dug out a sheet of 2400 grit micromesh polishing cloth I had from my pool playing days.  That makes it look like glass!  Since most of you won't have anything that fine, just flip your 400 or 600 grit paper over and use the back side or you can even use a dollar bill.

Here is a straight on view.  I really like how the layers of leather show a little and look like wood grain.  By the way, there is no finish on that at all except the crazy glue.  A little car wax on there and it will shine like wet paint.

     

And a side view.

     

My objective for this whole project was to of course show my method to round out the back of the handle so it feels better in the hand.  But my goals during the process were to get as smooth of a transition as possible from the overlay to the back of the limb and to have the whole overlay be as smooth and even in finish as I could get it.  I think I got it right where I wanted because I can't feel the transition with my fingers and I can't find a blemish in the finish.

It's a little tricky to shape an overlay until you think of it just like shaping the other side of the handle.  If you can build a bulbous handle in your stave, you can repeat the same process in the overlay and get the nice flowing lines that just melt in the hand and please the eye.  It's a simple matter of going from a convex shape to a nearly concave  one as you fade into the back of the bow.  I'm sure glad Dean Torges has shared his methods for shaping handles...  I actually started out doing this leather overlay because he recommended it to round out the handle in his book.  But it was my own idea to use super glue and sand it to a fine polish.  I showed it to Dean at Mojam and he liked it enough that he said he now uses the super glue himself.  I don't know if he does the polish like I do but he uses it to "size" the leather before putting the wrap on the handle.

I actually like this dark leather more than I thought I would.  It contrasts nice with the white sapwood.  It almost looks like ebony.  I might have to try this color again sometime.  I wonder how colored leathers like green, red and blue would work????

Well, it's late now and tomorrow is easter.  I gotta run and pretend I'm a rabbit if ya know what I mean.                  

[Timo]

Turned out real nice Dave! Thanks for posting.  

['46]

thanks dave...

[clintopher]

Great buildalong Dave.  Thanks.

Clint

[JC]

Very slick, thanks for sharing Dave.

Hey, show the wrapped lace handle too...I thought that was unique look.

[DCM]

That turned out great Dave.  Thanks for posting.

[Huntrdfk]

That is amazing.  Thanks for sharing that Dave.


David