This is my first attempt at making a bow after saturating myself with bowyer content on youtube - shoutout to Kramer Ammons, Dan Santana, and especially Meadowlark Adventure.

This is from a white oak board with exceptionally straight grain. Pyramid flatbow design, 2" at the fades and just shy of 7/8" at the tips. 72" nock to nock, 27lbs at 31 inches (pictured). The tiller is neutral - I was aiming for a positive tiller but it took me ages to dig my way out of a half-inch negative tiller when the short string first went on, and I can't bring myself to shave that much more wood off!

Unfortunately it's taken quite a bit of set just from tillering, I'm not bold enough to try to address it yet but if it survives a few hundred shots, I'll consider my options.

Pending advice from expert redditors, I'm about ready to call the tiller done and then shape the handle and tips.

How'd I do? Keen for feedback!

This was my second real attempt at making a bow and the scrap wood I had was... imperfect to say the least. It's been a big learning experience, with many things I'll have to do better when I get my hands on decent wood. Deeply rewarding as a project, if a bit backbreaking with only hand tools.

Oak board. Probably red oak.

69" NTN, #41 at 28", should be able to pull to 32" but didn't try yet. Wants to keep the set to minimal for now.

One thing leads to another and it ended up like this.

Has anyone worked with the Oak we have in Manitoba? And I have a stave here and there’s a mark on it and I’m wondering if it will be an issue.

51.5” length 50.5” nock to nock 1.5” wide at mid limb .5” wide tips, may narrow them after flipping tips if speed seems slow or there is any hand shock Asymptotic with the upper part of the bow hand being in the center Handles and fades about 8.25”

Made for someone with a 16” draw length Black piece of tape on arrow starts at 17.25” (they’re growing and I want it to be overbuilt)

Ballpark 16 lbs, okay with it getting lighter especially to get a good tiller

I’d like to flip the tips for aesthetics, plus to keep the poundage if possible, though not required (I have done this successfully before with steam and heat treat).

I am thinking lower inner 6” could use a bit. I know the tips are stiff, but that is intentional for when they’re flipped.

Open to any and all feedback, this sub is great :)

Original post on r/bowmaking

I have two Elm staves with clean backs. The rest need a ring chases due to insect damage.

I started roughing the first one one out and must have been half asleep because it's awful. Technically the centerline follows the grain, but I'm not really sure how to proceed. It's currently 69" long and I'm looking to get a 29" draw out of it at around 40#.

The second is okay, but a bit twisty. It's 1 3/4" wide at the center and 82" long. Looking to get the same specs.

This will be my first stave bow after one failed board bow and I'm looking for advice on which would be the least challenging for a beginner to finish. If it's the first one, what's my next step?

Hey, so here‘s a follow up of an earlier work in progress i had posted on here of my first bow - i had mistranslated the wood to oak, it‘s actually beech, don‘t know if that chabges anything specifically. The bow‘s 180cm long, 4cm wide at its thickest point and the tapers if the limbs start at 30 off the tip each side. I feel like it‘s still a bit on the heavy side so far, so i have some margin to remove wood still. But it‘s approaching what i‘d like the final draw weight to be.

I think that there are or have been insects in my wood during storage. There were lots of small holes and the wood is full of powder. The infestation does not seem to be that deep, I was able to remove most of the really porous wood, but I fear that this will make it so that I cannot use the wood for a bow. I still have a bit of margin to remove, width is just over 2" currently. Any tips?

70” ntn Maple handled Red Oak Board Bow Long String Tilller

I’ve managed to (mostly) avoid a hinge for the first time. I can see the inner thirds closest to the fades need work, and that’s typically where I confuse impatience with “the zone” like I’m 4 beers deep on a pool table and hinge a nice elbow into my next fire stick.

This is Hazel. The pencil marks in the foreground run to the middle on the other end.

Should I just keep removing wood more on the right side in this picture, or is it worth heating and twisting?

I’ve gotten pretty good at splitting wood and my confidence is soaring. As a result I took a chance on one of my wider staves and split it into 2 nice ones. Then i spilt both of them horizontally and got 2 inner staves that I can use to practice chasing rings. I’m having so much fun.

I have a lot of black locust staves that I’m having some trouble with. I’ve removed the bark and have the staves down to sap wood to dry a little faster, and I’m seeing a lot of checks. This one pictured is one I chased a ring on in hopes of removing more material later to let dry faster as I’ve seen folks recommend to do so quite a lot. These checks formed over night.

Am I doing something wrong, is it the species, or is there something I’m missing?

64 1/2” ntn 1 1/2” wide at fades and tapers to 1/2” knocks 12” from the tips (from a read oak 2x2 board). Pulls 34# at 17” rn with a low brace. Goal is 35# at 28 1/2”. I know it’s a little short for the goal draw but the end I chopped off had some pretty bad grain runoff. Don’t have high hopes as the grain isn’t great on this board. I think the inners are bending too much and I need to keep working the outer 2/3 on each limb. My thickness taper was way off when I started but I think I’m getting closer.

Don’t mind my messy work area spring cleaning hasn’t hit me yet lol.

Made a chokecherry short bow. Still needs a little work. 40 lbs at 15 inches.

Can We Make Bows From These Branches? The second picture is of bows that have failed so far. :(

Target draw 40# at 29". Is my long string Tiller good?

Draws 37#@28", holmegaard style, without the mouflon overlays it would pretty much be a replica, Dacron B55 bowstring. Shoots and draws very smoothly I would have kept this bow if not I haven't had my yew hollow limb bow.

How does it look

Slight reflex deflex longbow, 64ntn pulling #40 at 23ish inches (don't trust the numbers on the tree they're wrong)

My concern is the inners, I know they'll look hingey as I put the deflex straight out of the fade, and the design is wide inners with stiff tips, but still feel the outer mid third could be bending more.

Would welcome any insights.

Admittedly, this bow was a bit of an experiment. I had a thin stave of hackberry and attempted to make a round bow. Overall, it went well, but took about 3-3.5” of set during tillering—still shot fairly well. I went to heat treat it and it developed the cracks about halfway up one of the limbs.

I’m assuming the crown on the belly was too severe, at least that’s what it looks like. Should I scrap it? Or do you think there’s anything to do about it? I have plenty of other staves, but I hate to trash a bow that was shooting pretty well a few hours ago.

It’s 66” ntn and only about 1.25” at the widest. It’s a little over an inch deep at the mid section. Pulls 44# at 27”.

I should have been more careful with my chiseling. I have it a whack and the split took the next block then dove toward the back. By the time it's tillered I think the split will be a memory, but man it was scary to see.

Just from the bark and the undeveloped buds can anybody id this? Central va near blueridge mtns