Osage first try (ding ding)

[red hill]

Doin' good, Kelly. I'm working on taking the late wood off an osage stave now and following along on this thread.  Learnin' quite a lot that is going to be helpful.
I just showed your thread to a H.S. senior that is enlisting in the Army after graduation. I used your thread to show some of the things soldiers may do to cope with stress and boredom. He seemed impressed.
Keep it coming, brother.
Stan

[KellyG]

Will do. george I will take her down to floor tiller. I am almost there and let it set. Don't know how I will know when it is ready. Once at floor tiller I guess that I will put tape on the back strap it to a 2x4 and hope that takes some of the twist and turns out of it.
I know once it heats up here my shooting it will not happen. It will get to hot and dry to risk shooting it.  
Semo's letter that was on the back of the bow said it was a Augs cut stave if I remember.

Red Hill glad you are learning from my attempts, Make sure you hit Brokentooth's thread also. He is on his seconed thread that I know of and this one he is on know shows things I did not have to do. And other tools I don't have.
Also glad to here some young man may get something out of it. One time I though about being a recuiter almost put that packet in. I was afraid they put me in NY or LA or some other big city. I would not do well don't relate well with the people you are trying to recuite and you want do well. now if I were to have gotton some out of the way country town then I think I would have done well. I would have cheated though.
Show some kid pics of me in alaska on a moose, bear, or dall sheep hunt. Me and friends after fishing a run of reds. Heck me in in Baghdad my first tour learning how to Fly Fish. Yep would have be cheatn so I could not bring my self to drop that packet.
Thanks, God Bless, Happy Building
Kelly

[SEMO_HUNTER]

Kelly, if that is indeed an August stave then it's plenty dry. That's what I've been building from and I've been all the way down inside some of them and they are plenty dry all the way through. I don't think you will have anything to worry about.
Just don't leave it out in the sun too long.
Which may be a good way to remove some of the twist? Leave it in the sun, or put tension on it the way you want it to go while it's sitting in the sun. Hmmmm......might work?

[KellyG]

Semo,
by the end of May that would start to work. Today it was rainy and cloudy and it is not going to be the same for the next few days.

I dont mind the rain or the cold; just can't stand them togather.

[KellyG]

oh and your little bow is coming alone. I bet if you put some sinew on it it will really be more than a bunny thumper.
Kelly

[SEMO_HUNTER]

It's done and I shot it last night in the garage for a bit, the limbs needed exercising and the string needed stretching.
I hit my target wt. of 40# @28 and it is actually about 42# @28 but that was before the finish sanding to remove the file marks. Now that it's all nice and smooth it's probably dead on 40# which is about the best I can hope for with a short flat bow, it's only 57" tip to tip.

It shoots amazing well, I was stacking arrows in the heart on my target inside the garage from about 15 feet. It's going to get a Satin finish today and I'll get some final pics for ya this afternoon or tonight.

[George Tsoukalas]

Excellent, Semo. Congratulations! Jawge

[SEMO_HUNTER]

Thanks Jawge, it turned out rather nice considering what I started out with. This was an experiment and a challenge for my own abilities just to see if I could take the ugliest, most unforgiving stave that I had and make something pretty and shootable out of it. I really stepped outside my comfort zone on this one.
Mission accomplished.    

Now I know that if I can do this with the worst of the worst, then a nice straight stave is a piece of cake.

[hova]

thats what im talkin about semo. pick the nastiest stick you got , and if you can find the bow in all that mess , then youre good to go.


kel  , looking awesome! depending on how much twist you have , you might try lashing it to a 2x4. i did this with some of that honey locust i have . split it , tied one end down , but a scrap of 2x4 in the middle to give it a little reflex , then used a bar clamp(pipe wrench would work too) , twisted it , and lashed the other end down. i just took it off there the  other day to check on it , and its just about straight. if i would have had a better split , i might get a real bow out of it. as it sits though , iits probably going to be a 12# kids bow. <1" wide , and a hair thicker than 1/4".

you're just makin all of us too proud kel. hows the insurgent activity during the wet season?i always listen for news in kirkuk.


-hov

[SEMO_HUNTER]

Hova- Yep, that's exactly what I had in mind, ugly nasty stave to pretty, smooth, and shootable.

That piece of locust you got might surprize you how many pounds you could get out of it if you backed it with sinew. Or rawhide.
I've heard that you can gain as much as 20-30lbs depending on how thick you lay it on there.

[KellyG]

Semo,
Sound like you might have a nice little bow. Heck if you backed yours you would really have a nice stalking stick.

Hova,
Knock on wood this area is not as bad as down town LA.
Well dont think I am going to get much done on it tonight. I think I am just going to sit back and enjoy what I have put into it so far. I need to get my tillering tree done.
Happy building and God Bless,
Kelly

[SEMO_HUNTER]

If I back it, it will be with snake skins because the poundage is exactly where I want it.

I don't get into all the He man poundage thing, and try to keep mine around 50# or less. I used to shoot 80# back in my younger/dumber days, now my shoulder just won't take it anymore.
This one was designed to be fun to shoot and I'm sure it would even take a whitetail with a razor sharp broadhead. It's got a little zip to it.

[hova]

i dont know how you guys do more than 55lbs. i was out workin on my white oak shorty ,  and its at 55lbs@16 inches. i think i need to recheck my longbow , cause it doesnt feel close to 45# like the shorty does.


that locust isnt thick enough to do anything but testing on. the handle is a knot , and the split ripped out , so one end is a little thicker than the other , and one end is a little narrower. i will mess with it over time , but for right now , its just a reminder to make sure im not cutting down a propeller. there is no way this log would have split even remotely clean.

-hov

[SEMO_HUNTER]

Anymore when I'm splitting a stave and I don't have much room for error, I always score it where I want it to split. A skill saw works well if you have an 1/8" or so in the middle to spare, but the last one I did I didn't have that much room to work with and the cut had to be very precise. A bigger band saw would have came in handy, but all I've got is a small bench top model.....so that was out. I ended up buying a wood saw wheel for my dremel tool and scored a thin line down the middle of the stave about 1/2" deep into the heartwood. Then I split it starting in the middle of the stave and worked my way out toward the ends. It split just like it wanted to go my way and I was very happy with that.

Got some pics coming of the bow I just made. It's finally all finished so when I get some good pics I'll be back to post them for y'all.

[KellyG]

Ok if  I can get the timer figured out on this thing I have the limbs bending a fair amount of the floor tiller. 3" or so at about 1/2" thickness on the limbs. I guess I need to finish the tillering tree, and get it on the long string. Would a pocket string like the one Dick from Seattle work or should I just put in temp grove.
Once I get the timer on the camera figured out  I will get Pics up of the floor tillering.
Here are a couple of the line drawn at 1/2 and inch.
Here is the twisted limb You can see my pencil mark I made with my half inch gage.
 
Just did a close up to show the gap after strapping down the knotty end. It has a little reflex and a lot of deflex.
 
Well can't wait to hear if what my next step should be. Please let me know and if someone had gave me their wisdom and you would not do it that way also let me know. I may not use the info on this build but I am sure  I will use it.
Thanks for the help and sage advise,
Kelly

[Pat B]

Kelly, I just use temporary nocks about the depth of 1/2 the thickness of the chainsaw file. Just enough to hole the tiller string. Get the tree made and put the bow up on the tree and with only a little bit of pull see how the limbs bend. Exercise it first but only short pulls.
  Be sure your long string is not too long. Ideally just long enough to go over both nocks and not put tension on the bow.
  Don't worry about the twist either, at least not for now. Wood bows will still shoot fine with some twist and it is not detrimental to the bow to shoot it with some twist in it.

[KellyG]

Pat define some twist please. I cant quick ever geat a good pick that shows the twist but I would not define it as some. It is really only in about the last 8" or less of the limb. I need to get a shot look down the bow It will not go center once I put the string on it I say between 1-2" off.
Thanks,
Kelly

[hova]

i dont know how you guys use temporary grooves. i cant get the string to stay on unless i go deep...


lookin great as usual kel,keep it up


-hov

[SEMO_HUNTER]

I agree with all of Pat's advice on this one. Just cut as short of grooves for nocks as you can get by with, because later on you can cut one side deeper than the other side to take a bit of the twist out. The short flat bow I just built has twist in one limb but not the other and it shoots awesome.
If your looking down the bow from the end that had the twist looking toward the center, the limb tip points to the right at about 2 o'clock versus 12 o'clock being straight even. If that gives you any idea of what you can get away with?

Every bow is different though and the each have their own level of forgiveness to them, some seem like they have to be perfect to get them to shoot accurately. Then some are extremely forgiving and will shoot great no matter what you do or don't do to them. That's why I love my new little short Indian bow, I beleive that it's the most forgiving one that I have built yet.......and the most crooked by a long shot......go figure.

[KellyG]

Thanks Hov
Semo I will try and get my groves in and my tree done tomorrow. I is really way past my bed time here, so tonight is out of the question.
Take care,
Kelly