Sunday 25 August 2013

Yew Boo Update

The bow has a better feel now it's shorter, it's more stable laterally and the draw weight is a bit over 50# now. I've got the brace height up to between 5 1/2 - 6" which is fine.
I've shot a few arrows using a spare string, it seems very punchy.
I was going to press on with horn nocks until I discovered I've run out of white Water buffalo horn. I did have two bits, but one got lost during the Tudor filming at the Weald & Downland Museum. I'll phone in an order to Highland Horn for some more on Tuesday.

Meanwhile I've been roughing out a Yew primitive for a farmer from up near Cambridge, He bought the stave of American Yew online. There are some fine cracks in it and some twist, but I think it will make a fine bow. It will be pretty much like my favourite field bow 'Twister' which was made of English Yew, it will be a chance to compare the two woods side by side. I'm calling it 'Twister 2' for now. Here are two pics of it roughed out.
It was tricky tying to lay it out taking note of the cracks and the twist. After I'd sawn it, I was worried that I should have done it differently, but I re-assembled the sawn bits to check, and there wasn't really any better way to do it. The piece of Yew was half a log of fairly small diameter with the centre offset towards the sapwood at one end.

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