Humidity During Construction

[YosemiteSam]

Here in CA, we'v got hot, dry summers, damp, humid winters (fog shuts down the country schools) and variable spring/fall.  I just finished floor tillering a couple board bows and a storm moved in last night.  It's still warm -- 70 degrees with 85%+ humidity, so it's windows open everywhere.  It will dry out again but there are a few more storms on the way.  Do I need to put the wood aside & pick it back up once we start running heaters inside?  Should I continue with the build and just expect a few pounds more draw weight after things start drying?  Or is this just my rookie brain worrying about nothing?  The boards are red oak, if that's any help.  And I plan to make a couple more and that board is sitting on the floor of my garage (dry floor but plenty humid at the moment).

[Bowjunkie]

Get it off the cement garage floor. That may be the WORST place to keep it. The wood can draw moisture out of the floor, big time.

You need someplace relatively dry and stable to store it. How about near your hot water tank? Many are in a separate, smaller room, and their function maintains a good relative humidity for bow wood. Put a hygrometer in there and see what the r.h. is. You may like what you find.

[Mad Max]

I keep my bow blanks inside the house with the A/C going.
weight the bow in grams, when it quits loosing weight I work on it, bringing it in side every day until finished.

[scrub-buster]

I don't tiller bows when its raining or wet outside.  I rough out bow blanks and store them inside the house.  I'll put a bow in my hotbox for a while if I think it still needs to dry out a little more.

[Roy from Pa]

Build yourself a small hot box, put about a 60 watt bulb in it and store the wood in there.

[takefive]

X 2 on making a hot box.  Make it big enough for a form to fit in, in case you want to make a wood lam R/D bow or backed bow with Perry reflex.  One 60 watt bulb in mine gets it to 90 degrees, two bulbs=130 degrees.
Summers are humid here in Wisconsin, too, and it's still damp in my basement shop.  All the wood I put up in the rafters is around 12% MC right now.  A couple days in the hot box brings it down around 8%.

[Pat B]

If your house has a/c your wood bows and bow blanks should be protected from the elements. You can work on your blank to floor tiller stage without worrying about the M/C but once you begin stressing the bow it needs to be dry.