hey, bow guys

koyote

koyote

Joined
Mar 29, 2007
Messages
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I'm loooking at making a really simple add on that i can piggyback on bushcrafters (or even just have standalone) for helping out with bow making and other wood chores in the field.

what I'm working out is a basic craw knife blade on one side, scraper on the other, with a 2 or 3 finger handle space on either end and some holes cut for arrow work. The questions are:

how wide does the draw knife blade need to be in a compact tool? I'm thinking about 3-3.5 inches, but I've only made a couple bows and am not sure.

How many holes for arrow straightening, smoothing, and what size? I was thinking 5/16, 11/32, and 3/8?
 
that sounds lik a great idea Christof...:thumbup: looking forward to checking it out...
that specs sound about right for the blade.. as for the holes, most folks shoot 11/32 shafts.. some shoot 23/64, and most light weight bows shoot 5/16 shafts...
 
Mike- yeah, I'm most familiar with the 5/16 and 11/32, but if yoou are out in the field, what are you doing and what sizes do you need? a touch bigger for trimming down a raw shaft? exact size for straightening? I've done a *little8 work with arrows, but not enough to know how to build the tool to be best for real use. (sometiems good tools help develop good habits, too)
 
BarberFobic1992 said:
i dont make arrows or anything, but it seems like it would be useful for other woodcarving stuff.
Click to expand...

That really is part of the point. A fair amount of my outdoors activities over the past couple decades have involved recreationists, DIY types, practical anthropological reconstruction, remote jobsites- even travelling around selling at ren faires for a couple seasons.

So for me there's the minimalist sport of bushcraft, taking off int he woods with a knife and a pair of boots. (okay, maybe pants and a mylar blanket, too) and there's a different orientation- what i'd call a constructional minimalism.

I used to have a complete jewelry shop (limited, but I made a living out of it for a while) that fint in a surplus mechanics bag. 7x7x14.

So part of my thinking is bow specific- in part because i think being able to put together archery gear in a bushcrafting weekend or an extended survival situation is extremely valuable. Partly because if you can make a bow (I am assuming you have a regular knife) you can probably make just about anything else up to a fairly complete furnished cabin if you add the right axe and folding saw.

I'd really like to work this out with one of my convex bushcrafters and scandi neckers and see if someone can do a complete archery set. (i'd probably add some trade points into that)
 
just waiting to figure out final length overall that i need to do and how broad I'll have to make it to fit the holes. Looks liek people are okay with the idea of a 3 to 3.5 inch cutting edge. I want to minimize the length as much as possible.

I'm thinking plain sharp 90 degree angle scraper edge on the back but I could tooth it a bit, or possibly tooth one side of that lightly and leave the smooth edge scraper.

(and yes, I intend to do up a crooked knife at some point, but I'll be asking someone else to design an axe that can do as much as possible in bushcraft carpentry)
 
Great idea. You may want to include some type of saw to cut a nock on one end and a slot on the other to fit the arrowhead.

Also, hunters spend a lot of time on 3D ranges, practicing. Useful tools include a knife sturdy enough to dig an arrow out of a tree stump and a file to sharpen field points.
 
Christoff that is a great idea. You might make the drawknife a little bigger say 4". Alarger hole to rough down arrows would be advisable as well.

I really like how your bushcrafter has evolved.
 
Howdy Chrisof
I hate to say this but I an unclear what you are trying to make. I have 28 years of Bowyery experience. Thats my professional experience, not counting bows I made as a youngster roaming the hills. A draw knife makes a good scraper with out trying to add any thing to it. If you keep the back of the blade plane you can choke up on it and gain great control. As far as you selection for your arrow tool, make only one size grove. The hardest part of accurate archery is having matched arrows. How are you going to match arrows if your starting out your stelle's in several sizes.
I am known for my preference for large knives. It is a personal preference and I'm not trying to sway you from your idea, just adding food for thought. In my search for the ideal back woods knife, and always with the foremost thought that I would be making archery equipment I'm including a picture of my bow bush bow making knives.
Bolos003.jpg

The third knife down is purpose built for bowyery. The round nose makes a great hand hold for use as a draw-knife. It is chisel ground for the same reason, and it makes a fine Foe for splitting out large rounds in to blanks for arrow dowels.
 
MBTull said:
Great idea. You may want to include some type of saw to cut a nock on one end and a slot on the other to fit the arrowhead.

Also, hunters spend a lot of time on 3D ranges, practicing. Useful tools include a knife sturdy enough to dig an arrow out of a tree stump and a file to sharpen field points.
Click to expand...

I'm thinking of expanding a toolkit that's based on a decent sized bushcrafter to start with, so the sturdy knife is there. I was 'assuming' that anyone would have sharpening gear present, but an actual file is a good idea. I'll contemplate saws, but there might be a 'pick your multitool of choice' andswer to that.

wildmike said:
Christoff that is a great idea. You might make the drawknife a little bigger say 4". Alarger hole to rough down arrows would be advisable as well.

I really like how your bushcrafter has evolved.
Click to expand...

4 inches is doable. I'm mostly trying to keep the OAL under that of a decent bushcrafter, so probably 9 inches or so.


bikermikearchery said:
Howdy Chrisof
I hate to say this but I an unclear what you are trying to make. I have 28 years of Bowyery experience. Thats my professional experience, not counting bows I made as a youngster roaming the hills. A draw knife makes a good scraper with out trying to add any thing to it. If you keep the back of the blade plane you can choke up on it and gain great control. As far as you selection for your arrow tool, make only one size grove. The hardest part of accurate archery is having matched arrows. How are you going to match arrows if your starting out your stelle's in several sizes.
I am known for my preference for large knives. It is a personal preference and I'm not trying to sway you from your idea, just adding food for thought. In my search for the ideal back woods knife, and always with the foremost thought that I would be making archery equipment I'm including a picture of my bow bush bow making knives.
Bolos003.jpg

The third knife down is purpose built for bowyery. The round nose makes a great hand hold for use as a draw-knife. It is chisel ground for the same reason, and it makes a fine Foe for splitting out large rounds in to blanks for arrow dowels.
Click to expand...

I have been steadily moving towards a feeling that 5-6.5 inches is ideal for a wilderness knife, with a scandi grind puukko style necker in a 2.5 inch blade as a companion. I actually work the straight spine on most of my bushcrafters just for safer drawknife work.

The idea of the purpose built add on tool is that it's small and can have a lot of utility- it will be chisel ground on the cutting blade for sure. the plane edge on the back for scraping was my initial thought, but I do think I might be able to make it work with some really small jimping across one of the 90 corners. I can't tell until I try on that.

Do you find a lot of advantage to really long blades for the draw cutting? I know on my bow making trials here I've mostly used my largest drawknife for everything.

So, if you were to carry a 10-11 inch OAL knife and a simple drawknife/scraper/arrow carving tool, at a similar OAL, how would you do it?
 
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koyote said:
The idea of the purpose built add on tool is that it's small and can have a lot of utility- it will be chisel ground on the cutting blade for sure. the plane edge on the back for scraping was my initial thought, but I do think I might be able to make it work with some really small jimping across one of the 90 corners. I can't tell until I try on that.

Do you find a lot of advantage to really long blades for the draw cutting? I know on my bow making trials here I've mostly used my largest drawknife for everything.


So, if you were to carry a 10-11 inch OAL knife and a simple drawknife/scraper/arrow carving tool, at a similar OAL, how would you do it?
Click to expand...

Howdy Christof
Actually I like a knife with a 10" to 12" blade the top three knives in the pic have 11" to 12" blades. I can make a bow from standing tree to completion with just the knife.
I know that a lot of people here are proponents of the bushcraft knife and Axe. No fault there, just my experience has been that the big knife gives me more utility than other tools.
The top knife has actually been used to make a bamboo sleeping platform in the Philippines, and cut snow blocks for an Igloo in the same year. And all of the knives except for the bottom one have made bows.
A knife works just fine with the edge for a bow scraper with out trying to use the back of the blade and griping over the actual cutting edge. That just seams like a bad accident waiting to happen, but I'm clumsy and I know it.:o
The link that plainsman put up seams like a handy tool and I mite add something like that to my bowyer kit. How ever if I'm just out for a day of stump-shooting and I find a sapling that is begging to be made in to a bow its more likely I'd just have my bolo with me, so I'd whack it down and rough it out with the knife. If however it was a really big tree I'd go home and come back with a chainsaw and my full kit.:D
A well made bow and its arrows is a big investment in time. It is something that cant be rushed and do it well. you spend a great deal of time looking for a good stave then waiting for the wood to dry and straighting the shafts. and on and on. Rush one step and its all for not. I can tell you that jimping on a scraper hasn't worked out to well for me when I tried it.

Christoff Your a knife maker That means your a tool guy. I know your thinking of making 'the' tool, but in reality your just making one more tool to add your addiction.:rolleyes::) Welcome to the club.:D
 
Plainsman- the BArrow tool has most of the components, but I'm not sure why the draw knife edge comes so far out?

Bikemikearchery- Oh, it's not THE tool, it's "just another" minimalist shop-in-a-bag tool :D
 
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