I finished my first bow, which shoots pretty well for something I've never made before, and I'm currently looking at a second red oak stave with essentially perfect grain.  It's sitting behind me here in the living room.  (Understanding wife.)

I can tell I need to make this one a little heavier than the first, as I can certainly draw more than it ended up being.  What I'm wondering is do you know a way to make the roughing out part go faster?  Is there some way to saw the wood so that a large part of the initial shaping is done and I can move on to tillering?  It took me weeks of cutting on this first bow because I can't do a lot in a stretch.  If I had found a way to cut off that wood on the belly of the limbs instead I could have been shooting a long time ago, as tillering wasn't the black art I thought it was.

Anybody got any ideas?  I like bow building, but my arthritis is currently complaining a LOT, and I can't keep using my breakthrough pain pills for "I tried to carve a bow in a day."  Also, I want to tell all of you who have posted in encouragement that this is all your fault.  Now I have to build arrows too.

Do you have any wood working tools?
Sanders, band saw, etc.

I have a jigsaw, a few drills, and a Dremel.  Not really the shop one would need for large scale woodworking.  Most of my working life has been using stuff like multimeters and oscilloscopes.  I tried all the different settings, but my scope won't cut wood.

A circular saw is a pretty inexpensive tool that you could use to cut the outline of the bow.  That's what I used before I bought a table saw.  Those sanding drums that work in a drill might save some time taking down the limb thickness, too.

I found a cheap table saw at a pawn shop. It make pretty quick work of the board bow. Sometimes too quick but that wasn't the saws fault!

you could probably pick up a cheap bandsaw off of craigslist or something. It's not going to cut through a thick stave or wide board very fast, but it'll be alot faster than a cabinet scraper.

I personally use an electric hand planer to do the initial front profile and removal of most of the belly wood. Then I go the the belt sander ... I very rarely use much hand tool action to do the tillering ... I'm just too impatient, plus I have no shop so no realy place to strap down the stave.

If you are on a tight budget, a draw knife will make really quick work of the front profile and with a little care can take wood off the belly of a board stave too.

I've been looking for a drawknife for some time, even before I started on making bows.  It's a matter of finding one when I have money, which is very, very seldom.  The tools I have make a bow, they're just very slow for hands like mine.

I have a friend trying to acquire me a bandsaw, I'll keep after him.  He knows someone that's moving and can't take theirs.  

I take it jigsaw is right out, eh?

Check my site for info. Advice: beginners should not try to seed up the process with power tools which remove too much wood too fast.
http://georgeandjoni.home.comcast.net/~georgeandjoni/index.html
Jawge

On my first few board bows I used a hand saw and even a hatchet. Just be careful with the hatchet and use short strokes as you chop away unwanted wood.
Later I bought a farrier's rasp. That thing removes wood pretty fast, as well.
You could also use a jigsaw. Remember to stay outside the lines of the bow's profile.

I used a jigsaw with a 10tpi woodcutting bosch blade with great success on my first few bows. Keep it outside the lines and take your time, let the blade do the work, dont force it. Also clamp your wood down. This is a time saver but you can also end up with scrap wood if you go too fast or dont pay full attention to the task at hand.

A farrier's rasp has made my life so much easier.  I actually have a few of those jigsaw blades here, so I'm going to hunt for them.

If my arms and shoulders would put up with it, I could use the farrier's rasp alone.  I have all the time in the world, so to speak.  But with my advanced arthritis, if I don't find some way to make it easier on myself I will just have to wait until I can buy bows before I can shoot them.  And I thought making this first one was rather fun.

Try a Stanley sureform. Its like a planer but with holes in the blade and removes wood fast. I mean fast. Too fast if your not careful. Cheap, I think less than $20 at Lowes. I used one to cut down a board to tiller in a couple of hours. It is coarse so use it first then go to your rasp to remove deep cuts. Just don't go too fast or you will wind up with a 25# bow. Trust me on this one. I have several.......  

The Surform is on my short list.  I think I'm gonna let this bow board sit until I can get my hands on one.  While I want to reduce load on my messed up hands, I'm not so impatient as to be willing to start throwing boards away either.  I have plenty of reading to be doing anyway.  Plenty of stuff to learn.

Got my drawknife at Tractor supply for $18. If it aint in stock just ask them to order it. Over 30 bows under its belt and still going strong. Found another at a flea market for $15.

Nothing beats the coarse side of a Ferrier rasp for hogging off wood in a hurry and still being in control..

I don't have a lot of tools myself, just a handsaw and some (horrible) blue handled rasp/chisel combo tools.  What I do is cut a whole bunch of kerfs into the belly, sides, handle, and tip overlays and carefully chisel them off, then finish up with the rasp.  if you are careful with the depth of cut, and cut the kerfs close together, then you can remove a lot of wood quickly that way and not have to rasp for ever and a day to get to shape.

QuoteOriginally posted by Pete W:
Nothing beats the coarse side of a Ferrier rasp for hogging off wood in a hurry and still being in control..

I started with a sure form rasp. Once I got a farriers rasp it was night and day better. I have never touched the sure form since.