Sunday 27 March 2016

Starting a Yew Longbow

A guy came to visit last week, he'd not done much shooting and wanted to try some bows to see what he was comfortable with. I generally prefer to make bows for experienced archers so they don't go for something too light, of conversely get over bowed and need 10# taking off later. But this chap was willing to drive up to visit, and seemed to settle into the bows very quickly, shooting better at 10 yards than many other people, he settled on 60# at 28" as being a good weight, although his draw is a bit less (although it was expanding as he got used to the bows).
I've got a couple of bows on the book but they are higher weights and having just made a 50# I felt the 60 would be a comfortable step up for me. The 80# and the warbows can be made in succession allowing me to get a feel for the heavy stuff.
Anyhow we sorted through some staves and I had a tall skinny one which looked about right. Once a stave has been chosen it sort of gathers momentum on it's own so I've roughed it out and got it bending a bit. there's a dodgy shake at one point, but hopefully it doesn't go too deep and will disappear as the bow is worked down. You'll see I'm pulling it to the full 60# from the start.

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