Christmas did be a big favour by stopping me messing with the Yew bow, I'd heat treated it and left it clamped up for over a week.It's looking really pretty now and is pulling straight and true, I'm only using a scraper and fine sandpaper on it now.
The grain and character is looking very handsome, the colour is that of an old mature bow. It feels fast too.
Ah, but the bad news, the cracks are still visble, I think they are harmless but may render it unacceptable.
Anyhow I shall finish it and shoot a couple of hundred arrows through it, if it performs really well I may offer it to the Lady it was intended for.
Here's a couple of pics showing it's best and worst, bear in mind the wood hasn't been polished, a few coats of Danish oil will make it even darker and smoother looking.
Any comments or opinions on the character and the cracks would be most welcomed, I feel the wood is begining to like the idea of becoming a bow, I know that sound fanciful, but
sue me!
Please excuse my ignorance, but why is the back of this bow 'lumpy'? is this to do with chasing growth rings in the yew? Marvellous looking wood though
ReplyDeleteIndeed you are spot on! The ripples are there in both heart and sap wood (often relating to knots further round the tree). The sapwood was fairly thick and I reduced it a little but I stayed faithful to the growth rings as much as possible as this provides the strongest possible back for the bow.
ReplyDeleteHi Del,
ReplyDeleteI am really enjoying reading and learning from your diary,With that split I would be trying a trick I have used on wood carvings I have made, I would use your L/V superglue, run some glue into the split then immediately sand or scrape over the area forcing wood dust into the split. repeating this till the split is filled with self coloured wood.
Please keep up the good work here.
Will Spalding.(BillBow on Primative Archer)
Cheers, I've done the wood dust and LV supergle, but not tried the scraping trick. I'll give it a go sometime.
ReplyDelete