Bow making step 1 - select the right tree for a stave

Moosez45 said:
I have always wanted to make a bow, a real, well functioning bow. Something I could count on.

Right now, though, I am eyeing that Bowtech Assassin......

:D

Moose
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I figured you would be eying up the Hoyt Carbon Element RKT compound bow. :D
 
I will be watching also I was thinking about giving it a try myself with Osage orange. I understand it is good for bows.
 
I recently took a bow making class. We started with cured staves though. We were given a couple of choices for the wood we would use. I choose osage. It was a three day, all day class and at the end we had functional bows with about 50 pound pulls. We also wound our own strings. The main tool used was a draw knife. We did use rasps and sand paper also. And we did cheat a bit and used a band saw to cut out much of the template (which made the class three days instead of a week). I don't want to hijack this thread but I can put up a couple of pictures of the process and the finished bow if anyone is interested. I hadn't done much work with my hands like this for some time and found it very satisfying and rewarding. Next, is the arrow making class. Mike
 
Bow making is fun, but time consuming.
I've made two thus far. Both self bows; one out of vine maple and the other from red oak. Both are very shootable. I've actually shattered wood arrows with my red oak bow. I still shoot my red oak bow. It's pretty nice.


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Have fun and keep us posted!
 
I've never made a bow, but I've split staves and billets from hundreds of trees for chairs and other stuff. The straighter the grain, obviously the straighter the split. The bark is an indication of how straight the grain of the tree is. Pick one with a nice straight bark pattern and the grain will be good. Twisted bark = twisted grain.
 
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