White Oak backed Ipe, An update and a repair.

[LittleBen]

Yeah exactly Roy, the forward portion of the riser extends several inches beyond the belly side of the riser. It's the forward portion of the riser which is providing the fades. Again same way a power lam works ... this is just a really serious power lam. The belly side riser block is really just to allow for the high wrist grip.

I'll get a picture up when I get home that shows it more clearly.

[wood carver 2]

I really like that bow LittleBen.
I shoot in the basement, I'm getting very good at 9 1/2 yards.    :D  
I'd shoot in the yard, but someone would likely call the police.
Dave.

[Buemaker]

Looking good. Should not be any problem with this one, looks very much like a Dryad design. Bue--.

[LittleBen]

Hopefully this shows how the fade out works more clearly. I don't wanna mislead anyone trying something like this that the riser is just stuck on there.

[Razorbak]

really nice work

[LittleBen]

This took me forever, but here is a pic at what I call full draw (25") and a pic of a group shot at 40yards with this bow and some trusty Surewood Doug Fir arrows. Don't mind my crappy looking cardboard and duct tape quiver ... sometimes you just got no money ...

 
 

 

Dave Grant also shot this bow at ~ 27" draw and tiller looked fine. I'll see if I can dig up a picture of that.

[PEARL DRUMS]

Turned out real nice Ben.

[LittleBen]

Thanks PD. I knew you'd be lurking on here somewhere. I've had a couple really heartbreaking failures recently so it was nice to get this one shooting nicely.

One of those failures I should tell you was the hickory backed takedown you told me had too much grain runout. You were right and the bottom limb exploded. Made a new set of limbs, tillered them as cleanly and slowly as I could, and the white oak backing on those broke too ... at least it wasn;t catastrophic explosion like th first set.

I think I'm going back to hickory and bamboo permanently because I've never had a problem with really straight grained hickory backing nor with bamboo

[PEARL DRUMS]

Decent grained hickory is HARD to beat with anything, but fiberglass. Its consistent from piece to piece and certainly isn't finicky like plant backings get. That 3 piece will be cool once you get a good set of limbs for it. Id do up some hick backed yew or osage......MMMMM!

[LittleBen]

I know! I've been wanting to do some osage, and yew also but it's so expensive. I need a source for yew boards for backing.
I made a takedown for the bow swap, don't knw if you saw it, but it was a 68" with the same size riser, and R/D longbow limbs, and it worked much better. I think I'm going to go to a nice R?D longbow limb for any takedowns for now on. The recurve is just too much stress in a short limb on a takedown. Plus honestly I think a good R/D is just as fast for a wood limb.

I think I may just do up a nice new riser to match them though. Osage and walnut or something like that. Also I drilled the holes for the limb bolts and alignment pins at a distance of only 1.75" and I'd rather go to 2.5" or 3" for ease of alignment.

[Bowjunkie]

I've shot over a hunded arrows through every wooden bow I've made prior to final sanding, stain, and finish. On occasion, I've had to give a scrape here and a little sanding there, then shoot some more, etc. before I could accept it as done being made.

[LittleBen]

I'm with you on that Bowjunkie. Just being so far from the range now, I usually do all the finish sandin, try to give a real good workout on the tillering tree etc. Being summer and humid I also put on the finish to protect it during the shooting session. If I do some scraping, I just add some more finish on it. I've been using wipe on poly so it's pretty quick.

15 months left in the city and I can move back to NY and I'll have my own range ... how I can;t wait.

[Bowjunkie]

Hey, you're making it work with what you have available and that's what counts. We're all in different situations and some of us are lucky to have the space available for bowmaking, shooting, hunting, etc. Nice bow either way. Keep up the good work!

[takefive]

Had to go back and look at your bow again because it amazes me that it's all wood.  That's just beautiful work.  Well done!

[LittleBen]

Thanks Gregg, this one has been treating me really well. Been shooting it quite a bit. Probably has 400 shots or so through it. Has taken about 1" of string follow at rest.
Settled into just about 40# @25" and was chrono'd at 138-140fps @ 25" draw with 515gr arrow.

[Roy from Pa]

Oh I guess its ok:)

[bigbob2]

Those full draw shots look terrific. Great achievement all round!

[Zradix]

This bow is cool.

[Roy from Pa]

Very nice, Ben.....

[bigbob2]

That's a great result. One to be proud of.