Friday 1 December 2017

Waggly Yew ELB

I've started on the English yew ELB, looking for 63# @28" it's rather waggly and first time on the tiller it looked just too weird with a deflex region looking like it was doing all the bending, a bit of an optical illusion I think. Anyhow I resolved to steam out some of the deflex to make it more manageable. The difference is quite subtle but if you click between the two pics you should be able to see it. In the bottom pic (after) the left tip is about an inch further up. Before the steam bending I could put the tips on the floor (back uppermost) and get two or three fingers under the grip, but now I can't.

I was thinking of a new camera for Cristmas, but I found one on E-bay, the same model as the one which I messed up only £40, that's the great advantage of buying the old models, you get good value for money and at that price if it gets full of Yew dust again it's not the end of the world.
I was chatting to my brother about the camera and we wondered how the dust gets in... then it dawned on us. As the lens telescopes outwards, it will be drawing in the surrounding air acting like a bellows as it comes in and out! If I have the same problem again I'll make up a jig to hold the centre section of the lens firmly so that I can replace the outer one without pushing the assembly back in on itself and screwing it up.

I'm also re-working one of my longbows, a Hickory backed Yew, it's the only one I have that's tillered out to 32" and it's a bit of a handful for a long days shooting in cold weather.
I'm hoping to go to the ILAA roving marks shoot in Windsor Great Park on Sunday, so I'm working the bow down from 60# at 28" to about 55# that should be more comfortable and if I warm up I can take it back to 32".
Most of the work is rounding the back some more and reducing the width. There are a couple of pinches on the belly so I'm leaving those areas alone. Hopefully with the narrowed tips it should still be pretty quick. Many backed bows have backs that are horribly flat and square cornered and a bit of rounding can improve the look and comfort in the hand greatly, without jeopardising the performance.


No comments:

Post a Comment