Hophornbeam, first try...

[Sockrsblur]

So guys this is my first try at this. I will admit to being one of those guys that reads and reads with great intrest but never scraped a piece of wood. My thought was to practice on some white wood then when I feel like I have a chance at success get a piece of osage from Mike Yancey. I love the idea of going to the woods and get my own staves but most everything I cut does not look to good after splitting. Any and all tips and constructive criticism you might have the patience to pass along are graciously recieved.

[Sockrsblur]

This winter I cut a few sections out of two fallen trees that we always called iron wood after a lot of reading here I believe them to be Hophornbeam.

 

 

Most all of this I find has significant twist these two were fairly straight.

 

[Bowjunkie]

How long was it down? White wood degrades rapidly. Unless I know for sure that it was alive and healthy when it went down, and then was down no more than a couple weeks, I'd keep looking, no matter how nice it looked otherwise.

[LittleBen]

Nice James.

I agree with Jeff that if it was down too long the wood may be ddecaying already. Since it looks like it was off the ground it'll probably be OK a little longer ... how long no one knows.

Glad to see though that you found some straight hophornbeam. I';ve looked many times on my parents land (35 acres all wooded) and haven't seen a straight piece yet. When I do it's coming down.

[Sockrsblur]

I cut the trees in February. This is the first section I decided to work. It's 4.5" at the base. In Feb I sealed the ends multiple times and split the log. I took my time removing the bark and it has sat in the garage for 2 months.
Searching the forum I came up with my bow length and lay out plan...

66" bow targeting 50-55 lbs @28"

The end of my stave looked to have some rot or poor wood at the stump end so I kept cutting it off till I had  better looking wood.

 

 

 

[Sockrsblur]

[LittleBen]

Yeah the otside of that log looks a little punky at least in the early photos.

If the back of th ebow is at all punky it will njot survive.

If the outside of the log is in fact punky, you could probably just decrown the stave and get down to quality wood.

[Pat B]

Look at the root! The tree has been dead long enough for the root ball to rot off. I would not use that wood for bows.
  HHB is a great bow wood, not just any ole' whitewood. The TG Trade Bow I'm building now in HHB.  
   Wait a few weeks and cut a live tree when the bark will slip, cut it, split it, peel the bark, seal the back and ends and set aside to season.

[Sockrsblur]

Ok thanks for the input guys. Ill get my tools together, build a filtering tree and gizmo...
Pat I have read all your posts I can find, thank for  posting. Can we talk a little about layout still?
For HHB I was thinking 66" bow 50-55 @ 28"
Handle 4" slightly swelled,
3"fades(1" to 1 3/4"),
limbs 1 3/4" out to 6" from tip, 6" from tip straight taper to 1/2" tips?
What is a general guide for wood depth at handle? 2" or 3"?
I had planned to reduce the stave to 67" in length, 2" wide x 2" deep, sound reasonable?

[Pat B]

1 3/4" would be the widest I'd go. Maybe 1 5/8" to 1 1/2" then out 8"to 10" then a straight taper to 1/2" tips(for now). Leave the tips 1/2" thick too. You can reduce the width to 3/8" or less later after you see how the string tracks.  2" deep at the handle is fine for now. Leave the handle full width until you see how the string tracks. You can make slight adjustments later by removing wood from one side or the other of the handle or tips once you get to brace.  I like a bulbous handle so 1 1/2" deep is plenty for me. You will easily be able to make 50# to 55#@28" with the 66" length.

[Sockrsblur]

Pat that's great! Thank you sir, ill look for a tree to take when the leaves are out too.

[Sockrsblur]

I placed my first order with Grizzly today, kinda excited!  I ordered the cheapest Oscilating spinal slander and a belt/disc combo sander. I couldn't get my self to spend the money for them to drop off a bansaw so I ordered a cheap table top 10" 1/3hp saw.

[Sockrsblur]

[Sockrsblur]

Hello guys...
If nothing more I will at the very least be breaking  some wood this winter!        

Over the summer I did find a small HHB that seemed to not have to much twist in it. When I took off the bark I was shocked how nice it removed in comparison to the winter cut wood it had previously done.

 

 

I built a sturdy bench with 4x4 base to attach a 6" vice to.

   

   

Just today screwed a tiller tree to a stud in the wall. I still have to adjust the ruler to account for the 4x4 block the bow will sit on...

I have had a red oak board glued up for a while now, that's going to be my first tillering victim! Then I have a few HHb,an ash and a red oak stave to at least try.

 

[fujimo]

i milled a slot in my ruler. so that i could move it up and down, to accommodate different bow- ones with thicker handles and ones with thinner handles!- cos for some obscure, and mystical reason,  draw length is measured from the back of the bow, to the groove in the arrow nock   :D

[Bowjunkie]

Only if that's how you'd rather measure it. Actually, the standard is to measure to the deepest part of the grip on the shooter's side and add 1 3/4", regardless of grip depth front to back.... so I adhere my draw length ruler to the wall with double sided tape and leave it there.

[ColonelSandersLite]

Originally posted by fujimo:
for some obscure, and mystical reason,  draw length is measured from the back of the bow, to the groove in the arrow nock    :D  

It's probably not as mystical as it seems.  I suspect that what they did was just figure out how thick the handles of most bows got and just ran with that number.  This was probably done so all the measures from a customers point of view match up.  Mostly because a customer likely won't know as much about bows as a bowyer.  This way a customer, knowing his draw length is, lets just say 26", can get a bow with X# @ 26" and 26" arrows and everything should work together fine most of the time.

If you're not going to sell your bow, measure it however you like.  I'm using the AMO standard myself.  How I do it: I have my tillering tree marked in 1" graduations from the belly side of the handle.  Then, I figure out what I call an offset for this bow.  Since I know how my handle is going to be carved before I tiller, I can know to subtract how deep the pivot point is from my current measure then add 1.75" and keep that number in mind when I'm working the bow.

So for example, suppose that I'm working on a bow that will have a simple rounded handle 1.25" in the middle the handle, in its uncarved state is 1.75".  I know that my pivot point is going to be 0.5" higher on the tillering tree than where the bow actually sits.  So from there, I subtract 0.5" from 1.75" to get 1.25" and while working on this bow, I know to add 1.25" to every draw.  So if I want to pull the bow back to 26", I pull until it's 24.75" on the tillering tree, giving an AMO 26" pull.

[ColonelSandersLite]

Originally posted by Bowjunkie:
Actually, the standard is to measure to the deepest part of the grip on the shooter's side and add 1 3/4"

That's wrong.  It's the pivot point, not the deepest part of the handle.  With modern style grips, the pivot point is the deepest part of the handle.  With more traditional handles, it is not.  To see why, imagine a traditional mostly round handle that is 1.5" thick in the middle, and 1.25" thick at the top and base.  The pivot point in this case is going to be at about the 1.4" thick portion of the handle (depending on how aggressive the taper is).  Draw a bow, and and move your drawing hand up/down.  You will feel the spot that the bow actually pivots around in your bow hand.

[Bowjunkie]

Yes, it's the pivot point. That's how I should have said it. In fact, my own favorite grip style is one where the pivot point can NOT be the deepest part of the grip.

I don't have to move my hand up and down to find it, I know exactly where the pivot point is... it's right where I put it by way of design and relative limb strength.

[fujimo]

thanks fellas  i stand corrected  :D   , i am not going to dispute this topic- have read many threads on here about this topic, and seems to be so many varied points of view- personally- i like what you have to say- seems to make more sense, only variance is that i like to shoot bend thru the handle self bows, and no way the handle is 1 3/4" thick- but all sounds good!
cheers
wayne