Quick shop tour, and some bows ...

[LittleBen]

Finally got a reasonable shop setup here in the basement.

Snagged some free cabinets you can see on the left, they need a tabletop still. I will probably make a sharpening station on them, at least with a small inset piece of granite (snagged that for free too).

Main workbench in the center of frame, it's only 24" x 72" but I find that to be perfect for building bows, which is really most of what I (like to) do even though the wife usually has other plans for my time.

Bandsaw off to the right, along with a cheap table saw,  and behind that is my planer on mobile stand, and my materials rack, again mostly bow stuff. I don't keep general woodworking materials like ply or anything on hand really becaus I don't have much space and I don't use them much.

In the back left, I have two more workbenches, the large one on the cabinets against the back wall will probably be kept clean for finer/cleaner type work, like building model airplanes, and arrow building. The smaller one is mainly for tool organizing and more household type BS.

Ended up installing 5 of the 8' t8 fixtures. It seemed like overkill but I'm glad I did. I got them for literally $1 each so it made sense, and it turns out the level of light is great, I actually still need a little more light around the bandsaw, so one of the old fixtures will get wired back in soon. The pictures make it seem dim, but it's ridiculously bright in there.

That's about it. I'll follow up with some more pics.

     

[Mad Max]

Nice
Get to work   :cool:

[LittleBen]

Originally posted by Mad Max:
Nice
Get to work      :cool:    

Got a 1 year old and a pregnant wife, I'm always working, just not on bows lol.

Works in progress.

Super gnarly yew billets. This one will probably take a while just because patience is limited and at this point it's basically just scraper work. And obviously splicing.
These came from a 2.25" thick x 5" x 36" yew live edge board that was too nasty to be sold as a billet. I decided it would probably make a really really sweet looking longbow of lower weight. Scooped that board and another for barely more than the cost of shipping so what the heck. if nothing else I've got enough yew for maybe 100 veneers.
I counted the rings on this tree and determined that it was growing (and probably large enough to make a bow) when Lincoln gave the emancipation proclomation in 1861. Thats pretty cool. 150+ years for maybe 8-10" of tree diameter.
   
   

[LittleBen]

I have a problem with hoarding bow wood
Sneak preview of a sinew backed ERC in the works there. Its benign at floor tiller, but still too heavy. Needs to get down some more before I steam the recurves although I am debating just making a saw kerf with the bandsaw to bend them. I think i prefer if its more natural though, just steamed.
   

Here are some buckthorn billets I just roughed out. Been seasoning for about 2 years. They will need to keep seasoning as work continues I think but they seem pretty dry; dry enough not to check at least.    

[LittleBen]

Here are some bows since MadMax was heckling me about it. I don't think any of these have been posted. Truth is I haven't completed a bow in over a year since my son was born, and most of my best I've given away, anyway, enough excuses.

66" hickory/hickory/ipe tri lam 45#@26, tillered to 30" but I forget what it scaled and I got too lazy to write it on the bow. Shedua and bocote/cocobolo riser.
           

[LittleBen]

62" Hickory/hickory/ipe tri-lam, curly soft maple riser 47#@26"
             

[LittleBen]

66" hickory/hickory/ipe tri lam 35#@26, again, tillered to 30" but I forget the weight. Cherry and cocobolo riser
           

[mwosborn]

Nice looking shop.  I agree you can't have too much light.

[takefive]

Good looking bows!  Your shop looks sweet, too.  Looks roomy.
Bet you'll like buckthorn.  It reminds me of maple, just a little softer.  The salmon colored heartwood is pretty.

[glenbo]

Looks great Ben

[Mad Max]

Nice Ben

[Roy from Pa]

Very nice, Ben.

[macbow]

Very nice Ben.
Would like to see a formula for the bow. Like the design.

[Bob W.]

Nice shop and Beautiful Trilambs! X2 on the design!

[LittleBen]

Originally posted by macbow:
Very nice Ben.
Would like to see a formula for the bow. Like the design.

I can give you the basic rundown of what I do. If you want stack thicknesses I will have to go measure later.

3 lams, 1.5" wide, all lams are tapered at .002"; always hickory back, almost always Ipe belly, core of whatever I've got, I'm not picky although I like walnut. Use a lot of hickory core because I have a ton of it not suitable for backing and I've been too lazy to grind new walnut lams.

12" riser block sandwiched between the backing and the core lam. So from back to belly it goes backing, riser, core, belly. Then a glued on handle block maybe 10" or whatever looks right.

Typically I keep the limbs nearly parallel to ~2/3 then taper to tips. Typically a hair under 1/2" wide. You can obviously go as narrow as you dare. I use the side taper as the first means for tillering. I only belly tiller if I need to after side tilllering. I find the .006" total taper gets me close enough that side tillering, trapping the back, and rounding the corners usually gets the tiller done. It's pretty cool to get a wood bow off the form, cut a front profile, round the corners, quick floor tiller check, and go basically right to a low brace. It's very very quick to tiller a bow glued up like this. The work is all upfront making good lams.

Stack thickness at the fades runs from around .400" for around 35#@28" to .500" at the fades for 60#@28".

The downsides: little bit of handshock. These bows are definately wider than need be, but I do that purposely so that they are not likely to be damaged from overdrawing. I have used this design at 67" long for 65# @ 31" without failure or too much set. Walnut core helps with the handshock too.
Tend not to be the absolute fastest for my shorter draw. The longer bows don't typically top 150fps @ 10gpp and my short draw of under 26". Shorter versions have hit 160, but I prefer longer.
Tend to be a little loud for a wood bow, they end up with a relatively wide flat limb, and it resonates a lot like a glass bow limb does, but I also shoot 3 under which seems to always be louder.

I don't have a printout of the form, but it's nothing special, just a typical R/D form with some blocks for flipping the tips.

I hope that gets at some of what you were looking for. If not just ask specifically, I have no secrets left to keep about my approaches.

[deadsilence]

Those bows are awesome!  Can you provide the lam thickness for each lam? and how long with power lam is?  Can we see some unstrung profiles?

[LittleBen]

I will post unstrung profiles shortly.

There are no power lams the riser block acts as a thick powerlam and is 12" long.

The lams are all equal thickness or very close, at least usually. Sometimes it might vary a bit but I try to keep them the same or close. If you vary too many factors it becomes impossible to hit a target weight consistently.
I will post stack thicknesses for the bows with the unstrung profiles but you can also see my last post where I mention the general range of stacks I'm using.

[kennym]

Great shop Ben. And light is underrated for sure. I finally got some LED lites in my shop and love em!

Good looking bows too, but you know the rules on full draw pics....    :D

[LittleBen]

I know, I will get full draw pics soon. I need to build a new tillerring tree or get my wife to photograph

[fujimo]

whooooaaaa!! this is a kid friendly site- we dont need to any pics yer wife took of ya!!    :D  

shop looks awesome- and as always- your bows are fantastic!
great to have some dedicated space i bet!!