Any White Oak Guru's out there?

[7 Lakes]

I watched a guy cane the seat of a chair this weekend with what amounted to White Oak veneers.  No splits, pops or breaks even when wrapping it all the way around the frame.

I never did much experimenting with it once I found Hickory.  It seems like it would make a perfect backing?  Particularly for a inexpensive Red Oak, Maple or Cherry bow.

Anyone have any advice on White Oak's use??

[hova]

i have limited experience , i just used some nice quartersawn white oak for a board bow. shoots smooth and hits hard. i love it. the ray flecks are beautiful as well.


i asked similar questions before about using veneer , and the going opinion seemed to be to just use a backing slat . veneer is usually pretty thin...


-hov

[7 Lakes]

Didn't really mean veneer as in 1/42nd.  Probably closer to .060 to .080.  This guy had stripped it out by hand with a pocket knife so it wasn't perfect width by any means.  That's why it suprised me that nothing lifted, even around very pronounced bends.

[George Tsoukalas]

I've made several white oak selfbows. I've vever made a wood backed though so I can't  speak to its suitability but I'm sure it would work. Jawge

[Living_waters]

LOOOOOOVE white oak!

A good white oak backing will perform close to hickory, less the moister issue you have with hickory. I have made plenty of self bows and board bows from white oak, all and all one of my favorites.
TBB2 I believe states that often hickory will break before white oak. Just because it is cheap in some areas does not mean it is not a valuable bow wood.

[SEMO_HUNTER]

I've used white oak in handle lams, but that's about it. All I can testify to is the hardness factor and it is damn hard! It will ruin a sanding belt if you aren't careful with it.

[Art B]

I bet it would heat treat up nice and work great with sinew. Only worked with it once, and that was long ago, but I remember it recurving rather well. But white oak and hickory are two woods I wouldn't use unless I cut and stored myself. Both will deteriate quickly if not properly handled.......Art

[Living_waters]

Art I will agree 100% on the hickory, but our white oak species here I dont have much trouble out of. I have had good success even getting wood from local sawmills, every now and then I will find a gem in the slab pile (thick slab). Red oak here you have to watch and recently I had some live oak that threw me a fit. But White oak is very resistant to decay, that is why it has been prized as a maritime wood since the colonist landed.

[Art B]

You're correct LW, white oak is decay resistant. Or at least it's core wood. I get some WO in from time to time for firewood and it's outer wood/bark is really deteriated bad. More so than other woods I burn. My least favorite firewood. Not a wood I would want to make a stave bow from that's been laying on the ground for any length of time. Inner core wood for boards would be a different story I suspect, but then again, I don't make board bow, just stave bows.

[Living_waters]

Yep the bark is messy on many species. The old timers here call a certain species "cherry bark" and its outer wood does take to disease and fungus quite easy which makes it peel and shed like a cherry tree. But then you have the smoother bark trees like Burr and water oak that are the total opposite. There is an older gentleman I shoot with every now and then that really has admired one of my white oak bows for a couple of years. He is one of those osage only guys that never venture out side the species.  We got in a long discussion one day about white oak and it characteristics as bow wood. Well i dint know it but after I left he picked up a log that was laying by the parking lot of the bow range and took it home to experiment with. A month later he could not wait to tell me about the first 2 white oak bows he made from that log. That log had laid by that parking lot for over a year, they cut it to expand parking and figured some one would pick it up for fire wood.
It may just be my level of bow making skill but white oak is still my "dummy" wood, I dont mess up many WO bows. Hickory is my nemesis, osage I have a hard time consistently hitting my draw weight.

[okie64]

Since we're on the subject of white oak here I was wandering if anyone has tried making a bow from any of the other species in the white oak family like post or chinkapin oak? I have several staves of both that I cut and split last winter and havent tried to get a bow from them yet.

[Art B]

I know it's hard to wait on, and even harder to get sometimes, but well seasoned wood will give you less trouble, than say, well dried/fresh wood Living Waters. Especially when using hickory. Try heat treating the bellies of your hickory bows if using less than well seasoned wood. Tempering mimics seasoning to a certain extent.

As far as hitting the weight you want, getting a short string on as soon as possible, get the bow's profile where you want it, and then draw and set draw length and weight by hand. More hands on as you near the final tillering stage is much more effective than by using a tillering tree IMHO.

Okie, about any nut tree will probably work fine for a bow. Give 'em a try....Art

[Living_waters]

Okie post oak is wonderful if you can find a stave with out a but load of pin nots.

Yeah Art I believe it was you that mentioned my habit of staying too long on the long string, since then I have repented and even my dog runs when I put it on the short string now LOL and he aint scared of nothing.

I was wondering about heat treating, I have one now that I attempted to heat treat and add a silk backing(have lots is why) it had already lifted a splinter. Have not worked on it in a while this house building has all my time at the moment. Basically I don't know what I am doing when I heat treat.

[Brently]

Here in the NW our white oak makes a really good bow.  I have made a couple so far and they came out good.  It is sort of a springy wood and is very hard to break, when you do break it, it just sort of folds over and the wood fibers are still attached.  Just find a good straight tree without twist and you'll have a good chunk of wood.

[okie64]

LW, theres a chapter in tbb4 by Marc St. Louis on heat-treating. I have used his method on quite a few hickory bows with great results.

[Art B]

If you leave the regular string on and do the scraping and sanding, and get the weight you want 'bout an inch short of your draw length, darn near impossible to miss weight LW.

As for heat treating, the idea is to reposition the wood's fibers and then harden them to build up compression strength. Added benefit is reflex/extra weight. Grab you a board and do some experimenting. Read Marc's chapter as Okie suggested...Art