I picked up a piece of koa at a woodcraft store last weekend and was wandering if anyone had any experience with this wood. I cant find much info on it other than it is similar to black walnut in characteristics and workability. My dad is a huge Taylor guitar guy and I guess koa is one of their fancy woods that they use in their guitars. He wants me to incorporate the koa in a bow for him. I build selfbows and some hickory backed bows so I had thought about building a hickory backed koa if that would work??? If that wouldnt work I could just build him an osage bow with koa tips, handle and underlays but I know he would rather have more of it in the bow than that. So do you guys think it would work with a hickory backing?
Sixby uses it a lot, search under Eaglewing bows