Bow Build
Recently my son and I went to a free event put on by the local parks and rec department that taught the basics of archery and fishing to kids. After that my son was hooked and wanted his own bow, so we went to the big sporting goods store and got him a youth bow. Nothing special, it said 10 lb draw weight and he was able to shoot it. After only a couple of times to the local range, did the bow begin to disappoint. Arrows were barely making it to the closest target and definitely not sticking.
I looked briefly at getting a nicer youth bow for him but he asked if I could make him one… how could I turn down that request?
The free event at the "top of the rabbit hole".
So where to begin?
I have the set of 4 books of the Traditional Bowyers Bibles [Amazon Link] but I didn’t feel like reading all of it. However, Volume 4 has a good section on how to select wood from the lumber aisle that will work for bow making.
What I did find though is a great YouTube channel, Krammor Ammons. He also has a short blog post that has a rough template on handle design that I used.
Hickory bow blank with a walnut block being glued on for the handle.
I went down to my local woodworking store and checked out their stock of Hickory. Using that knowledge from Vol4 on lumber selection as a guide (chapter 1), I found a decent piece that cost me around $20 that I could get two bows from.
Router template (version 1.2) ready to go to the router table. The template is stuck on with that "glue and tape trick".
Bow blank two ready for the handle pattern. The Whiteside combination bit is my favorite in my collection (and sadly, the most expensive -- I paid over $200 for it at the green wood working store). Similar pattern bit on [Amazon].
I used the measurements from that template Kramer had on his blog post for the handle (as well as the limbs) and used the CNC to create a simple router template for the handle.
Bow shaped stick.
Tillering
This part of the process takes the longest. Kramer mentions to start by taking more material, then take less and less as you go. This is sound advice as I discovered taking just a couple thousandths of material off from the limbs made a bigger difference the thinner it got. I know, this might be a no brainer, but it will still surprise you how much a difference a little change makes late in the game.
Using the card scraper to dial it in.
I made reference marks along the side of the limbs both in distance from the tips and from the bow back. This helped with focusing on specific areas consistently.
44 lbs was a bit on the stiff side. The goal was 20, which was achieved after a few hours of careful work.
For the tillering string, I just used some old 550 paracord I had laying around. The tillering string is as long as the bow so it can go on without bending the limbs.
The tillering board was high tech. By that I mean it was a 2x4 with screws in it at every inch from 10-30 inches from the top*. The top is measured from the back of the bow. So in my case the handle was 1.5 inches thick, which was accounted for in those measurement marks.
To help with the dialing in process, I picked up a digital hanging scale [Amazon] that worked quite well. The bow started out at over 45 lbs. Since this is a youth bow for a 7 year old, 45 is a bit much, my full size recurve is only 40 lbs. The goal was to get it to 20 lbs, but also to get there with an even bend on both limbs.
The left side is bending less than the right side. The tillering process continued until it was balanced. (Note this is not the final tiller.)
Finishing
Once the tillering was done, limbs bending evenly at a 20 lb draw weight, it was time to hit the home stretch.
I added walnut overlays for the knocks to match the handle, and give it a little more strength on the tips.
Scrap walnut, oversized, glued on and then trimmed down with a block plane and rasp.
Rough shape to get it ready to test.
Before I took it to the finish room to seal it all up with lacquer, we took it to the range to make sure it would work for him.
For the string, I opted to buy a B55 string from Kramer’s company, Shatterproof Archery. (This is not sponsored, they just make good stuff.)
A pair of custom made B55 strings.
After his test session with it. He was pretty excited that the arrows stick to the target now. It made my day and all of the hours of work worth it.
When we were at the range he noted some spots on the handle that were uncomfortable. So we got out the rasp and did some shaping to that area to ease it and make it feel good in his hand. Then I put the final shape on the tips, making it more pointed instead of a block shape.
After all that, it was time to seal it up with lacquer so it stays nice for a long time (hopefully).
An odd but useful setup.
With some ingenuity, I strung it up in the finishing room of the shop to get it sprayed. I just used Watco Semi-Gloss Lacquer, and did 6 coats. Between each coat I flipped the bow around so there wasn’t a bare spot where the string was holding on to it.
I added a little message between coats 3 and 4...
He had a harder time keeping the arrow rested on his hand when shooting. So I got these cheap yet effective arrow rests [Amazon].
The best part by far is father and son range day.