Lightweight Bowmaking and Relaxed Bow Wood Gathering скачать в хорошем качестве

Lightweight Bowmaking and Relaxed Bow Wood Gathering

Last month I went on a haul for bow-wood. This one’s the first from the batch. It’s Ash and the finish is shellac over leather dye. I hope this build shows that you don’t need pristine straight wood to make an accurate target bow, and you don’t need a high draw weight for enjoyable shooting. If anything, lighter bows are the most fun since they wont tire you out so fast. This bow only draws 22# at 28”. I think that even if you can shoot a heavy warbow, you should still practice making and shooting light ones. If you make bows from trees, you need to compromise. Forcing a design on the wood is asking for failure. This isn’t a full on how-to but I’ll still walk you through the basic steps. I lost the chopping footage for this particular ash tree, so I showed a variety of footage from the rest of the haul. I definitely found some neat staves, and many of them will definitely show up in future videos. After choosing a sapling you’ll have to decide how to lay out the bow. With most species, the wood right under the bark is the best choice for the bow’s back. It’s always better to spend a little longer looking for the right wood, rather than much more time fixing problems. But stubborn bow makers do enjoy a challenge. With larger trees it’s worth it to split the tree and make multiple bows, but with smaller saplings or those that won’t split well, its best to carve the bow directly, without splitting the wood. Once some dimensions are laid out with a pencil, the rough-out stage can begin. I like to use an axe or a drawknife, but bandsaws and chisels are also popular choices. For finer work, rasps and files are very useful. A good scraping tool is a necessity. I like a cabinet scraper, which is just a rectangle of carbon steel, sharpened by rolling a burr with a metal rod. I also keep a dull screwdriver handy, for splitting out knots without cutting the wood fibers. After the rough out I dried the bow for about a month as I worked on other projects. Throughout the build I also I heat treated the bow off camera. Most do this with a heat gun. I think the best method is slowly with coals. But making fires all day really aggravates my bark allergies so to avoid dealing with all that firewood I use a silicone heated panel bending strip. These are usually sold as guitar-or violin making equipment. After heating, I left the bow clamped to a form to give it reflex. I also steamed the entire bow early on to do some straightening, as well as the handle, to fix tip alignment. Next up is floor tillering, where each limb is forced against the ground to reveal the stiff parts, which are then worked down. Once the tips start moving more than a few inches I’ll begin checking the tiller by pulling the bow with a long string. The stave isnt a bow yet, and it wont be until its braced with a tight string. After several rounds of floor and long string tillering, it’s time to brace the bow with a shorter string. At this point my main tool is a cabinet scraper. Occasionally I’ll use a gooseneck scraper too. Altogether, about half the time spent making a bow goes into tillering, despite that the total amount of wood removed is only a small fraction. The central idea in tillering is to never pull harder than the intended draw weight. As you remove more wood from the stiff bending areas, the bow will pull farther each time. When the bow pulls to your full draw length at the target draw weight, it’s time to start shooting in the bow. If you’re happy with the performance and the bow is stable, you can finish the bow if you’d like. Keep in mind, if you ever need to make adjustments, the finish will get in the way. Ultimately simple finishes are the most practical. If you have any questions, or for help with your own build, find me in the comments or any of the major bow-making forums. If you’re on reddit I run an AMA series at r/Bowyer with my favorite bowyers. What kinda bows would you like to see me make? And what from? No matter what tools and wood you have, chances are there’s a bow design that can work for you. If you have any physical limitations, there might be a workaround. Chances are someone else has made a bow in similar circumstances. Let me know and I can help get you started. Go make a bow! -Dan HOEDOWN and MARATHON MAN by Jason Shaw are licensed under a Attribution 3.0 United States License. https://freemusicarchive.org/music/Ja... https://freemusicarchive.org/music/Ja...