Toughest bow wood...

[gobblegrunter]

When it comes to ordering a bow from today's modern bowyers, what are the best performing, most rugged, and durable wood choices to choose for both riser and limb cores/veneers?

The most recent issue of TBM has an article called "The Osage Hunting Bow" in which the author challenges the reader to find a better overall wood for bows than osage. Granted, he is mainly referring to self-made primitive bows from what I can gather. But I wonder, when ordering a bow from today's bowyers, with advanced finishing materials, etc, is there a big enough difference regarding durability, etc to choose one wood over another?

[chanumpa]

Pacific Yew backed with bamboo.Performance ,speed and grace.

[Sixby]

Recurves , Zebrawood, hickory, hard maple.red elm
Longbows, Carbonized actionboo, maple, hickory.
red elm./ Different wood in different places. If I were to build a bow with same core and same veneers it would be zebrawood or maple or actionboo in the longbow.

[Bob B.]

Chanumpa,

Amen brother, Yew and Boo are a superb combo, possibly the sweetest combo one can get.  that said, osage is realtough stuff, as is iron wood.  

I am not sure the type of wood makes much difference in the durability of a bow.  I would reckon the finish has as much to do with it as the wood does.

Bob.

[Big Ed]

Yew is hard to beat.

[americanhunter7]

I have an Osage with a maple core.

[Shaun]

Yew is fine bow wood but soft as white pine - NOT durable. Generally the heavier the wood the more durable. Osage is hard to beat but some exotic woods are tougher.

[bigcountry]

Osage is a good combo for a selfbow.  Great in compression and awesome in tension.  Compliments each other well.  The downside is the early wood.  So the layers is the weak spot.  Not a great wood risers and such but works fine.  Just for you to take advantage of its strength, you can't break the growth ring.  Yew is king of the conifers but I don't know if it competes with others.

For overall toughness, you can't beat hophornbeam.  This is the stuff they used to make wood gears out of in mills.  Hickory also, about tough as it gets.

IPE, and some of the heavier than water woods are about as tough as it gets but also have thier drawbacks.

[ishoot4thrills]

Osage is the heaviest, hardest, and strongest wood in North America. Great for solid wood self-bows. I don't know about it being the best performing wood in laminated bows though. It may just be too heavy for best performance, but it would depend on the thickness of the laminate.

I just know I love the stuff! It's absolutely beautiful!

[DesertDude]

I have always found laminated maple (action/diamond wood) very strong......

[Roy Steele]

Hickory ans Hornbeam geart in tention but weak in compression and suck up moisture. Yew is solf,light and brittle exceptable to cold. Make a bow if backed.
  You don't start with the back of your bow with the early wood. And yes there not talking about  glass or backed bows, They mean selfbows.
  And after 20 years of building selfbows. Dozzens of bows out of every wood I could fine.
  O'sage would have to be the wood. You can do any and everything wrong while building your bow and it'll still make a bow and hold together.
  Sorry but the finish has nothing to do with how good the wood is.

[Jim now in Kentucky]

Looks to me like the query and the responses are mixing construction types.

First off, a bow that is all one material from back to belly, is a self bow. Not a self-made bow. It can be that too. And a laminated bow can be self-made, but it's not a self bow.

"both riser and limb cores/veneers?" Really no observable difference in performance of different woods in these uses--just a difference in weight. the fiberglass layers on a laminated bow store and release all the energy. That's why foam-core bows can work. No great strength to the foam, but not much is needed in the core.

Not making this up. It's in all the books that deal with the question and dozens of threads here and on other forums. It's not going to change, no  matter how often it gets asked.

Self bows? That's another question.

[Bob B.]

Roy,

I appreciate your post.  Thanks for education me.  Have you ever made a bow out of lemon wood?  A friend of mine had a slef bow made of this and it was slower but man he shot the daylights out of it.  

Bob.

[Mike Vines]

I firmly believe that with todays advancement in technology that 95%+ of the bow's performance is built into the design of the bow.  Bow woods are just for looks, and don't matter in the performance aspect of it.  A self bow on the other hand is a whole different story, and I'm unable to comment because I have no working knowledge of them, but boy that osage is one of the nicest woods I have ever seen.

[gobblegrunter]

I'm new to traditional shooting overall, let-alone self-bows. I suppose my original question/post reflects that. The feedback though has already been quite educational. When I said "finish" I suppose what I really meant is "laminated" and when I mentioned "self-made" what I meant was "self bow". Needless to say, in addition to the valuable opinions on the various woods, I've gotten an education in terminology as well! Thanks!

So, from what I'm gathering, the laminated bows put out by today's bowyers don't depend as much on toughness/durability of individual woods quite like self-bows do (makes good sense). Infact, it seems as though, all woods are on level playing fields when it comes to laminated bows...do I have that correct?

[Friend]

As far as I know, Desert Iron Wood is the heaviest wood in North America.

Osage - 56#s/cu.ft.

Desert Iron Wood - 66#'s/cu.ft. (3#'s > gaboon)

I would expect that its name alone suggests toughness.

[Jim now in Kentucky]

gobblegrunte, there will be some who claim one wood or another is best for core wood. Then we get into the definition of "best." As far as strength or toughness are concerned, I let my foam core comment stand for itself.

[buckeye_hunter]

According to a recent article in Traditional Bowhunter Magazine for the strongest wood.... the answer is Osage.

[heydeerman]

Osage, Hedge Apple, Boise D'Ark, and Bodark are some of the toughest bow woods a man can get.

[Friend]

I stand corrected that Desert Iron wood is not the heaviest wood in North America.

The heaviest wood in North America and also, the hardest type of wood in the world is Snakewood, which can be found in Florida

Snakewood- 81#'s/cuft
Desert Iron Wood - 66#'s/cuft
Osage - 56#s/cuft