Hopefully new hunting bow this year
 

Here she is after I rawhided the back. 55lbs at 25". Got 4" to go. Hopefully can stay with 55-60lbs finished. Hope and pray.

Looks good. I don't have the necessary tools, forms, patience and skills to build myself a bow.

Tools, cheap, need a 5 dollar scraper, 10 dollar rasp, and hatchet

Patience, absolute essential. Let me put it this way, I have been tillering for two months. Only do it when I am in the mood, alert and have time. And only for 1/2 hour at a time.

Looks good young grasshopper. lol. You have developed the eye for tillering. I told you it would come around. Not to be critical, but is there a knot on the right limb near the tip. I ask because it looks a tad stiff? I ask being knit picky because the tiller looks great.

You can make one with nothing more than a hatchet, axe, or knife. I had a friend make one with nothing but a piece of broken glass (that was after he split the log into a stave with a wedge) He did it to prove a point, but he did it. Took a long time, but like I said, he did it.

I am not sure what to do there. It has about 1-2" of natural reflex. So before I started tillering, I put in 1" of reflex on the other tip for it didn't hold that reflex for some odd reason.

I am hesitate to get it bending to a perfect arc.

Where you been????

I have been doing some camping with my girls, working on the lake cabin, and putting together a science program for our districts summer school. Things have just started to slow down.

Great to have you back Bernie!

I hope to build another bow or three...I have acess to a couple of fantastic self-boyers, but they live about 2 and 4 hours from me.....

Thinking hard about shooting my selfbow at the IBO Traditional Worlds in a couple weeks. I need LOTS more practice though...haven't been able to shoot nearly enough this year.

Tell ya what I have learned, and I know kent might disagree as he has no issues. But I never tiller more than 1/2 hour at a time. And I only do it when I feel like it or in the mood. Let me put this way, I have been working on this bow since March.

Thanks LBR.

Mark, I agree with you. I tiller until I get the slightest bit put out. If things are going well, i will tiller a whole bow in a couple of hours nonstop. If thing get to going back and forth, i will put it up until later. I have a knoted character bow that I chased to one ring above my chosen ring, last fall. I have not touched it since. Now that things are slowing down, i am going to cut it out and finish chaseing it and work the knots down to a few rings above. I will post pics when I get her done, she is going to be a knotted mess. It is eat up with pin knots and great big branch knotts. About 7 or 8 per limb. I will be cussing the tiller on this bow. Which is a norm for a knotted up mess like this. Or at least from my experience. I would like to shoot for around 60lbs, but there is no way I will get that out of this mess. It will most likely be in the 50s.

I have also got to get out and shoot. I have not shot a bow but once since the last deer i shot. I am going to try to get out to Rowels three D range soon and don't want to be laughed out of Odessa.