Dabbling About

I've got the 60 Pounder finished off and ready for collection.
You can see in the un-braced and braced pics the little bit of deflex bend just above the grip, this is visible still at full draw and illustrates nicely how you have to allow for the character of the stave. The overall deflex is pretty much the 1" it started with as a raw stave. The arrow plate is particularly hansome being made from the very tip of the horn which was used for the nocks.


Earlier in the week I'd been musing on what to do next and saw the broken Take down bow, I'd been thinking of ways of mending for some time so decided to have a go.

It had broken off the very root of the limb initiating where the bamboo back had been reduced to plug into the socket, this time I would leave the bamboo back untouched as much as possible. It still may fail as the dimensions of the joint are the same as before. Overall the bow is about 1 3/4" shorter, but the working portion of the upper limb is now almost identical to that of the lower which is quite pleasing. Usually the upper limb is a bit longer due to the grip extending 3" below true centre and only 1" above it.
This first pic shows my approach.
At the top is the broken off male part of the joint, I rasped away all the splintered wood leaving the clean bamboo and a little heartwood, blended back to the full limb thickness. A chunk of Yew heartwood was shaped up to glue in allowing plenty to re-shape the plug.
Second pic shows it half inserted in the socket. The socket is slightly tapered internally so as I gradually remove wood from the root end of the plug part it pushes in a little further each time.
Once finished the socket was good and tight, but once I applied a little wag and flexed the bow a few times while checking the tiller (which needed some adjustment) a slight fore and aft movement became apparent. I got over this by letting in a half moon shaped bit of horn a bit like a woodruff key at the heel of the joint, leaving it slightly proud ensured a good tight fit and the horn, being much harder won't compress in the same way as the Yew heartwood.