finally started my newest selfbow

[Pat B]

I did a little more this morning. I reduced the limb thickness to 7/16" thick. It's was still too stiff and hardly bending at 1 1/2" wide  so I narrowed it to 1 3/8" wide. You can see the pencil lines here..


I made sure to mark the knots near the edge so I could allow some extra width at those knots


Another thing I thought I would add that is important when using a scraper. If you keep the scraper perpendicular across the stave while scraping it will create undulations on the surface that look like waves.


so I alternate the scraper by slanting it to the left then to the right along with perpendicular



By doing this you take down the crest of these waves keeping the belly relatively flat, without the waves.

I had forgotten about these that my daughter gave me a few years ago for Christmas. She and I have a tradition of watching zombie(Walking Dead, Fear of Walking Dead) shows on TV when she comes to visit. I keep them attached to my bowyers bench for safe keeping...

[hunting badger]

Glad to see you back at it Pat! You build excellent bows! I'll be following! I have built a few self bows, mostly glass bows but the self bow bug has bit me hard, so I'm hoping to learn a lot from your build!

[Pat B]

I hope it is helpful for you Kenneth. Looking forward to seeing your selfbow build.

[Roy from Pa]

I learnt one thing from Pat.

Do not try making a self bow with a stave with a concave back:)

[Pat B]

Thanks for bringing that up Roy. Now I have an excuse if something goes wrong.     

[Flem]

Thats an interesting looking clamping dohicky you got there Pat
How do you apply pressure with it?

[Roy from Pa]

His feet.

[Pat B]

Flem, there is a foot pedal that puts pressure on the stave with the boat trailer roller. Look on the previous page for some good pics of the Stave Master.

[Flem]

Thats pretty slick    Looks a lot more comfortable than a wooden shaving horse.

[Roy from Pa]

Flem that's why old timers use one.

Just sayen:)

Pat

[Pat B]

As you know, Roy, I are old. 

[Roy from Pa]

Heck I have 2 years on you:)

[Pat B]

Well, you can keep um. I'll take mine as they come.   

[Pat B]

Here are a few more things I thought I'd mention. While reducing the belly and using my hands as thickness gauge I mark any area that is too thick with a squiggly line so I know just where to scrape to reduce the thickness. mYou'll see the squiggly line along the top edge.


and as I'm floortillering I study the bend. In this case the bend seem to be mostly mid limb so I draw a line across the limb and put an "X" on the side I don't want to scrape as you see in this pic


that's it for now. more to come.

[Pat B]

I initially thought that I would not make heat corrections but changed my mind. I got out one of my reflex forms and centered the stave on the form and put 2 clamps at the handle


you can see here how far the limb is out of whack



so, like I always do before making heat corrections I coated the belly with cooking oil


I place this little piece of wood between the form and limb as a fulcrum for the first bend


then started heating and clamping. The wood clamp brings the limb back over to the form around the fulcrum I added before



and the "C" clamps bring the limb to the form and the clamp at the end brings the crooked tip to the form.


Once the limb is heated and clamped I go over the limb again from the fade to the tip with the heat gun getting it too hot to touch then let it stay in the form until next session(at least overnight.

[Roy from Pa]

Nice job Pat.

It's amazing how nice osage bends with heat.

[Pat B]

Yeah, Roy, with heat it's like budda.  We'll see how well it takes after it comes off the form. This is only the first heating.

[Roy from Pa]

Yup sometimes it could take 2 or 3 heating's.

[Pat B]

Some times more.

[Roy from Pa]