The Hazel is having a few days rest to help seasoning any freshly exposed wood, meanwhile, on the Osage...I've followed a growth ring on the back and decided to go for a shortish flight bow about 70# at 24".
Just to get some sort of reference I took my only full sized Osage bow (45# at 28") over to the flight field and let rip, it sent one of my regular arrow 197 yards and a flight arrow 206 yards.
Osage is pretty heavy, so I'm hoping to do a design with nice slim tips to minimise the moving mass, maybe with some deflex to help get it strung and maybe some reflex or flipped tips for some punch. I've cut it to 58" long to avoid some of the bend and waggle at the end of the stave.
The big problem is a lateral bend in the stave... it will be too stiff to try and bend it at the grip, unless I leave it until the grip is narrowed, but even then bending at the grip is tricky as it takes very little angular bend to make a big difference, also bend tends to spring back, so it's very hit and miss.
I'm messing with the Osage.
I had a cunning plan which was to ignore the last 5" or so of each limb which will be a slim tip/lever, lay the bow out straight and the n fit the tips in along the line of the wood and heat bend 'em into line.
Now that probably doesn't make sense, do I've done a pic.
I did wonder if this idea was totally bonkers, but I'm posting it on Primitive Archer as it progresses and the guys there agreed that it was a sensible game plan, which is very reassuring.
Note I've left the tip wide to encourage the bend to happen where I want it. Also the centre line is still a tad off centre, but it is biased towards the arrow pass. There is no truth in the rumour that I originally marked it out biased the wrong way round and had to lop 1" off one limb... another reason for always cutting a bow 1" longer each end than you want !
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