Bill,
The new Shrew high poundage, high performance bow is already being built according to the specifications I gave to Gregg and Ron. It looks like the bow is going to be even better than I imagined. The use of the advanced materials is going to make the limbs lighter, stiffer, stronger and better performing, while the bow itself will look as good as any Shrew ever produced -- which means it will be gorgeous. The bow is designed to be able to be built for the heaviest and most potentially dangerous animals that roam the earth and to do so in a relatively light, high performing, modern design reflex/deflex longbow. Because the bow is so well suited to hunting large and dangerous game (depending on the weight that the archer is capable of drawing), it is my understanding the bow may be named the "SHREW SAFARI". Up to a certain weight (around 75 to 80 pounds) the standard 5/8" BowBolt and standard Shrew grip will be available. Above that, the larger diameter 3/4" BowBolt would probably be used, and the grip size would have to be increased somewhat to accommodate it. Of course, the bow could always be purchased as a one piece, but I naturally prefer a two piece for travel.
Even though the Shrew Safari has not been officially announced by Ron, I know the orders are already coming in, so it is going to be a hot new item. I don't know of any other bow like it. This bow is the culmination of several years of using various combinations of natural and advanced building materials in order to utilize them to the maximum benefit. When my Shrew Buffalo Bow was built two years ago, the material choices were very limited. There was a wide variety of veneers to choose from, but the solid phenolic riser and the bamboo cores were pretty much required in order to provide the strength and toughness needed for a BowBolt and for the potential abuses that places like the Outback of Australia or the thick bush of Africa can throw at the bowhunter. Now, with the new materials that have been adopted for use in numerous applications in the Shrew line, additional design options have become available.
No, the Shrew Safari does not have foam cores! I am a huge fan of foam cores and have the first Shrew bow ever built with the foam. It is great for light to moderate weight bows and produces very consistent limbs that are not affected by moisture. In well designed bows, foam cores tend to result in limbs that are smooth and fast. Bamboo is great too and tends to be less subject to damage from abuse, especially in longbow limbs. The bamboo limbs do tend to be heavier, which can result in lower speed with normal weights of arrows in light to moderate weight bows. For heavy draw weight bows shooting very heavy arrows for large game, limbs need to have some mass to move an arrow well. The trouble is that bamboo core limbs can develop too much mass as the draw weight of the bow increases to the point needed to hunt the really big critters. So, how does a bowyer keep the toughness of bamboo and get the limbs lighter and faster while maintaining the draw weight at a level high enough to throw heavy arrows with sharp points at really big and often dangerous animals? That's where the modern materials come into play that the Shrew masters have been using for the last few years. Even in the last 9 months there have been new materials incorporated into some models of Shrews. With all the various materials at hand, it was a matter of designing a bow that would effectively use the best of them to create a state-of-the-art, short, reflex/deflex longbow for the adventurer trad archer to take on safari.
After coming back from Australia, and following discussions there with Andy Ivy about how I thought a better bow could be built for buffalo in Oz and for all the dangerous game in Africa, I started talking with Gregg Coffey about creating an upgraded version of my wonderful Shrew Buffalo Bow. Gregg and I shared our design ideas and came up with a concept. Gregg then took the ideas to Ron who reviewed them and agreed they ought to produce a superior bow. The okay was given on the project. Now the first bow has been glued up and is ready to be worked into the finished product. It already is looking like a winner. In fact, with only rumors circulating, there are already 4 firm orders that have been placed for the Shrew Safari. I won't leak out the secrets at this point, but you can probably expect that the bow will still use the tough-as-nails, tried-and-true bamboo cores that are in my great little Shrew Buffalo Bow. But instead of the thick laminations of only bamboo in the cores, you can imagine multiple laminations of other modern materials that are found in the more exotic Shrew bows that have been built in recent times. Despite the fact that syntactic foam is a wonderful material in the right bows, you won't find any in the Shrew Safari. The advanced materials that will be laminated together with the bamboo in the limbs will allow the limbs to be thinner (belly to back) than the all-bamboo core limbs, but the strength of the limbs will actually be higher. Think in terms of the advantages of plywood, or for a closer comparison, of the advantages that were seen when bows were first developed using fiberglass laminations on the backs and bellies of the limbs versus all-wood self bows. The laminations of modern advanced materials creates another significant leap in performance design. The Shrew Safari limbs will be lighter, faster, just as quiet, tougher and good looking. Okay, that is the theory anyway. The real test will be in the shooting of the bow, but I have no doubt it will be a real winner. Without going into a lot of detail, one thing that has been determined is that with the new materials layup design, all the old rules go out the window. The limbs start producing high draw weights with less material than was expected, meaning that it will be easy to get a high draw weight bow with lighter mass in the limbs and lighter overall mass for the bow. That means a really high draw weight Safari Shrew will weigh about the same or less when carried than my Buffalo Bow, which itself is a delight to carry for mile after mile. Also, the lighter mass and higher modulus limbs will develop higher speeds and cast the arrows faster. My favorite part about that is the ability to shoot a lower draw weight bow and get the same performance of a bow built like my Buffalo Bow that is several pounds of draw weight more. The Shrew Safari bow that is currently being built also has a very nice, smooth draw curve that increases at a steady rate that is even better than anticipated.
I hope I am not jumping the gun for Ron and Gregg on the Shrew Safari bow (or whatever name Ron chooses to call it). I know Ron will make the official announcement to the world if and when he decides the bow is up to his and Gregg's high standards for a Shrew bow. If the bow doesn't live up to those standards, I'm sure it will never officially be introduced. I'm just glad the two of them are so responsive to the needs of their customers, that Ron created the platform from which some of the best hunting bows in the world have been built and can be adapted to new models, and that Gregg has the skill to bring the concepts to reality in the form of new Shrew bows that many of us can use and enjoy.
By the way, I don't get any discounts, free merchandise or other inducements. What I do get is a couple of great guys who will listen to my ideas about what I want and help bring them to life if they seem appropriate. (There are other great bowyers out there who are also very responsive to their customers, and several of them are friends of mine whose bows I own and treasure.) I have been dreaming about this new concept bow for the last year, and once the design was completed with the help of the Shrew guys, the gestation period for the birth of the bow has been pretty short. I am excited, but I already have another Shrew currently being built and unfortunately am down on the list a ways and to get a new Shrew Safari. Fortunately, I order two new Shrews a year, so I am always only about six or eight months out on the waiting list. That is one reason I have more than a dozen Shrews, with one now being built and three more on order. I don't spec out the bows until the last month or so in order to be able to make sure I get the latest and greatest Ron and Gregg have available.
Oh, Bill, don't tell anyone about the Shrew Safari -- it's a secret!
Allan
P.S. Ron, if you read this and decide I should have kept my mouth shut, call me and I will edit out this post.
Topic: Somewhere over the rainbow -- back from the land of Oz (Chapter One) (Read 19391 times)
