I'm fairly new to building bows.  I have completed 3 similar to Bingham bows and I am going start making my own lams.  I'm up here in Alaska and my choices of hardwood is limited. My supplier always seems to have an abundance of hickory.  Is it a good choice or should I try for something else.  They have a lot of purple heart, sometimes cherry and maybe ash.  Any advise will be appreciated and probably save me a bunch of money :-)  Ed

Hickory and Ash both make good lams.

Thanks, it's nice to have people that know!

Cherry gets my vote of those you mentioned. Light, resilient, and beautiful. It's underestimated. In glass bows, I prefer cherry and sassafras over the heavier stuff like hickory, ash, purpleheart, osage, etc.

Yep, forgot to say Cherry. I've used it afew times and shoots good.

If in stock, cherry it will be! Thanks guys.
Ed

I have used hickory in lams before.  Worked great!  Haven't used cherry yet, but I plan to, as soon as I find some nice curly stuff.  My dad actually built his kitchen cabinets out of some nice cherry and he's got some left.  I may have to go raid his shop sometime.   :D    Last time I did I found some really nice figured walnut stacked in the corner.

Hickory will work fine as it is pretty stiff maybe enough to overcome the weight of it. Also being stiffer it will take a bit less stack to hit a target weight. Good edge grain sassafrass is great core material-very light and smells good when working it.

I've built bows with Hickory,Cherry and Ash. All work fine but cherry would be my first choise. Use hickory or ash in shorter bows of high poundage.Don't forget plain old maple.A million or so bows, some of them 50 years old and still shooting, can't be all bad.    Bob