eightwgt

Not having shot a longbow or one of the ' hybrids.... I want to get some opinions and benefits of each design........ Having a lot of woodworking experiance as well as laminating experiance, I am going to build my own bow, and really want to get started so I am digging for info.......Any and all comments / advice is appreciated greatly

Thanks !

Tom

dkbs

Hello
I just finished building a longbow(reflex-deflex) a few weeks ago. I buildt it from plans from Three Rivers Archery. Bought some supplies from Three Rivers Archery, Bingham Projects and most of the wood laminations from Old Master Craft. Go to this site, it has some good info on building a laminated bow. http://www.stickbow.com/
Good Luck with your project. Next Saturday the whitetail season opens here in Wisconsin and my homemade longbow is going afield.
Dan

Arthur P

There are several good videos out on making bows. Probably the hardest thing about it is deciding what kind of bow you want. You can get the vids and everything else you need from Bingham. I' d recommend starting out with a plain jane r/d longbow for the first effort because the learning curve on the first one is awful steep. Recurves throw a few more wrinkles at you than longbows do and, even though it' s not likely, there' s always a chance that the first bow will be a screw-up. Once you get the feel for it, then lay your ears back and go for the fancy woods, stripes, overlays...

I did accent stripes and overlays on my first longbow, but I had a little supervision from a guy who' d already made about 25 bows. I did all the work myself, but his guidance made it a lot easier than it would have been, just mucking my way along by myself. The videos explain the steps very well but, obviously, it' s not quite the same as getting in there and doing it. It ain' t rocket science though. Well, maybe a little. Shaping the riser and limb tips is where the artistry is. Everything else is pretty much a by-the-numbers process.

The real heart of the whole thing is glue-up, lay-up and getting it all in the form without having the lams slide out of position. Just be sure everything is clean, that you don' t leave a single spot on the gluing surfaces dry, and pucker up your shorts when you put the top on the form and clamp it down.

Here' s the whole process, from what everything' s called to putting the final finish on the bow:

http://www.stickbow.com/FEATURES/BOW...G/glossary.CFM

eightwgt

Arthur

I am looking at building a R/D longbow I saw on this site - its a kit which should make it a little easier.....
http://forum.hunting.net/asppg/fb.asp?m=365787

Being pretty experianced at woodworking, laminating, boatbuilding I think I can handle it pretty well....just wish I had a belt and drum sander - I am sure it would make the riser work WAY easier.... =)

Let me know what ya think.......and THANKS for the input

Arthur P

The link brought me right back here, so I can' t comment about the kit.

Yep, you' d really be ahead of the game if you had a good belt sander that uses a wide belt. Very nice for nocking off all the excess epoxy after coming out of the hot box (you won' t believe how ugly they are when you pull them out of there!) and to profile the limbs. In fact, I' d rate the belt sander as a ' must have' item. Instead of a plain drum sander, it' d be nicer to have an oscillating spindle sander with several different sizes of mandrels and sanding drums.

As you' re making that first bow, you' ll think of at least a dozen things you' ll do differently on the next one. And there' ll be at least a dozen boogers on it that you' ll be intimately familiar with and stick out like a sore thumb to your eye, but nobody else is likely to notice.

I have to say that I enjoyed making my bow immensely. Almost as much as I enjoy shooting it.