r/Bowyer

The result of a perfect stave, a dream, and many hours of work after years of practice.

Indulge my story or skip to the bottom for stats.

Here’s the deal, I’ve got a dozen bows that can take down deer and I love them, but I want to take fair chase elk in the mountains. That’s harder to do every year with population fluctuation and increasing pressure. After a few compound bow hunts and a recent self bow hunt, I’ve realized that I need to be ready to make a clean shot up to 30yds and deliver an arrow with enough energy at that distance to get a pass through or at least serious penetration.

To make an accurate shot at that distance I need to draw and hold and aim, I just can’t snap shoot at that distance with consistency. I need to shoot like many fiberglass archers do. I’ve also only got a 26.5” draw length, and that’s being fully extended good back tension good form.

So i need a bow that can withstand a tremendous strain over thousands of shots and deliver on speed and be forgiving and accurate. So for that my only answer was a wide, relatively long, heavy draw, sinew backed, reflexed, recurved, Osage bow 😎 wide and long to resist set and provide a forgiving shot, reflexed and recurved for greater speed and smoothness of draw, heavy draw to punch through an elk, and sinew backed to hold that reflex and hopefully make this a bow of 10,000+ arrows. A bow of a lifetime.

64” ntn
58# at 26.5” (dropped a bit after shooting in, no I’m not redoing the decal)
2” wide at the fades
After breaking in, it’s shooting a 530 grain arrow 180fps (will post an update with heavier arrows soon)
Holding about 3.25” of reflex after shooting and 3.75” at rest (again after shoot in)
60 total grams of sinew on the back
Painted with modern acrylic

Hi, I'm new here. I've made a few solid bows when i was a kid but haven't made any in almost 20 years and i found this nice piece of yew and a child-like spark lit inside of me so I decided to revisit the hobby, but now i see that there are some small cracks caused by improper drying on what i hope will become the belly of the bow. Is this a huge problem, is it fixable or should I just toss it and go cry in the shower

I wanted to make an unbacked Spotted Gum board bow that wouldn't take too much set (hopefully). My other attempts have all had one problem or another, ending up with too much set, or breaking.

It's a rectangle cross section flatbow, and I went long. This guy is 71.5 inches NTN. 50mm wide at the fades, narrowing from the half way point of each limb.

It was my first attempt at a pistol grip. I went a bit too thin at the neck and popped the riser. Might have also been an issue with the epoxy I used... either way, I sanded back the pieces and re-glued using good old titebond 3. Seems to be solid! The handle looks a bit rough now though, due to the regluing process.

I heat treated just after floor tillering, and again when I got to about 20inches of draw.

Arrow pass has fox fur.

It pulls 35lbs at 28inches. TBH it's probably overbuilt, but hopefully this will last, and I can use it as a Baseline reference to start tweaking things and pushing limits.

28" bow
target draw length - 12"
maybe hazel, idk

First bow, I had broken all other tries before

Thanks for any advice in advance

Hi there, I’m attempting this 68” sycamore, it’s causing me a few headaches because one limb is somewhat reflex (on the right) and the other deflex (left).

It’s currently on a long string.

The reflexed limb is starting to be thinner than the deflex limb, is this normal given that it needs to bend back further?
the deflex limb does that need more material to equal the strength of the reflex limb?

Any advice is much appreciated!

70” NTN
60#@28”
There is a large semi-hollow knot in the bottom limb. The bow surprised me with its speed and timing balance of the limbs having no noticeable hand shock. I’m shooting 23/64 arrows 32” long between 570-605 grains total.

Just a few thoughts on arrow speed, and what causes a bow to be slower than you think it should be, plus some honest convos about the speed of some of my bows

Hello, I’d like to show you another bow I made, this time from a serviceberry sapling that was only 19 mm thick at the centre. I did not remove any wood from the handle section. The bow is 59 inches nock-to-nock and features stiff, slim, narrow-tipped levers.

Draw weight is 40 lbs at 30 inches, and the maximum recorded speed was 162 FPS (almost 50 m/s) with a 402-grain arrow.

The belly was heat treated — this type of wood responds very well to heat treatment, and it would honestly be a total waste not to do it.

The bow is finished with natural oils and shellac.

I’m gonna be cutting down a lot of trees in the next couple weeks and going to have more wood than I know what to do with. I know how hard it is to find wood especially at the start so if anyone wants some I’m willing to spare a few to other beginners. I’ve got a lot of white mulberry that will be ready soon just need to cut and split. Along with some black walnut, hackberry, and maybe ash, don’t know much much I’ll end up with here so I might not give much of these away. All of them will come with the bark stripped ends sealed with wood glue and backs sealed with shellac.

White mulberry is an exceptional bow wood. No need to chase a ring as I’ll be careful taking the bark off and the wood right under the bark is a perfect back for a bow. There will be minor pin nots and twist though I’ll try to make sure I give out the straighter more knot free pieces.

If you’re at all interested I’m in the Omaha/Lincoln area In Nebraska. Shoot me a message and I’ll let you know what I can do for you.

The log on the left is ~4’10 at the saw mark, I figure it’s a better piece but I wonder if the length is a problem as I’m brand new.

Hello, I've made one bow before and with some heavy help from a bowyer. Now it's been 4 years and i need some help.

I want to gain some experience doing a greenwood bow.

I cannot for the love of me understand how to lay out a simple bow design as i have never worked with inches.

Here's the result of my first fry following the bowyer's bible.

Pictures are from the soon to be belly side of the bow 1. Can this log become a bow ? 2 have i setup a correct stringline ? 3 the bow feels huge. 4 i have no clue about the dimensions i tried following the graph but honestly i do nnot understand.

Handle 1 and 1/8 of an inch Widest part after handle 2 inch.

I tried drawing the fades by hand ? Not sure if i should use a rulee since the wood is a bit bendy. Knocks are 1/7 inches wide.

I have made the handle

I’ve hit my intended draw weight of a nice comfortable 35# @28”, I have never properly made a recurve bow before so I don’t know what the optimum tillering shape would be, but I gave it my best shot.

Absolutely beautiful bow to use, it’s very smooth and fast for its weight.

Made from English yew

Apparently it’s 1 1/2 inches thick but it looks thinner? Is it worth the $220 he wants for them?

I have a piece of maple which is thicker than the usual boards I get from the lumber yard. it’s 1” x 1.5” x 6’ long. Hard to see from pics but grain runs straight on all sides except a little wave by the end.

I’m thinking either carve a small handle or just go full bend in the handle, neither of which I’ve done before. Or can I chase a ring here? Seems a little small for that but im open to ideas.

thanks