St Judes Bamboo Backed Yew Buildalong

Every year the TradGang at tradgang.com has a little auction to raise money for St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital. There are always lots of bows. here is a special one made as a team effort. Get out your checkbooks in June and be prepared for mor than a couple zeros. All parts and labor were donated.

The goal for the bow is a Bamboo backed, osage or yew, right and left handed, R/D, 50 #s, 64", exotic handle, power lam and underlays.

Here's the order of donation/work

1) Yew board - Mike Byrge/Tim Clark
2) glue up with Tonkin Bamboo Back - Mike "Wingnut" Westvang
3) tiller to 40s flat belly - JD Jones "Genesis Selfbows"
4) Add horn belly,snakewood underlay and final tiller - John Sturtevant
5) horn tips with string keeper - Tom Leemenas
6) Leather L/R arrow rest - Dave Bulla
7) Timo - carp skins - Tim Ott
8) finish work - Curtis Kellar
9) Bow sock and string - Dan "Dano" Gren
10) Self nock arrows - Chuck "Skinny Little Runt" Denofrio

Mike Westvang from Dryad Bows is first up.

With the line drawn we can free hand it on the bandsaw and get it ready for the drum sander and the taper board.

My drum sander is in the shop so they will have to wait til I can go up to Mark Hornes and use his.

In the mean time we need a bamboo back.

We lay out the outline using the pattern on the selected piece.

Now cut outside the line 1/16 or so with the bandsaw.

rip the bamboo to thin it a bit. (BE CAREFUL!!)

Now off to the big sander for some reduction. first square to the handle lines

Then the limb taper

Now thin to about 1/32"

Now that the board is ripped and the bamboo done, we need to get the taper on the board exact. I took it to Mark Hornes shop because my drum sander is being repaired. Forgot my camera. .Sorry.

Anyway now we need to do the "Z" splice.

We taped the slats together so that the tapered sides were mated in the center and measured and marked the 4" line for the splice.

Using the calipers we marked the center of the board at the end and the 4" line and drew a line.

We then mark the angles from center to edge and from point to center.

It should look like this:

Now we have to cut the waste pieces out. notice the "x" showing the waste.

On the center line you want to cut the center out of it.

The angle cuts stay on the waste side for a good fit.

WHen your done it looks like this:

Mix a little Urac 185 and get a good coat on all mated edges.

I use a board to clamp too that is 1/8" narrower then the board and use plastic wrap to keep glue from getting all over.

The first clamp fastens one end to our board. tap the second piece gently into place and use a second clamp to hold it down. Wrap the plastic wrap over and the board and use your fingers to make sure the splice is down and in place.

Add 3 or more clamps to hold from the sides.

In the hot box and it's done in a couple of hours.

After the hotbox, we remove the clamps and plastic wrap and we have this:

A little cleanup on the big sander

And it looks like this

Here is the slat, bamboo and powerlam (I know I forget to show building the powerlam) ready for glue up.

Ok, glues mixed and time to make a bow.

First get slat laid out center and straight on the jig. Then apply an even layer of Urac 185 with the handy dandy paint brush.

Do the same for the power lam

And bamboo, then set the pwer lam and bamboo center on the slat.

Tape it in place at the contact points. Put a clamp every two inches or so with a pressure plate. It looks like this:

Then in the box it goes

Here we go again:

Pulled it out of the jig, here is what it looks like:

the profile:

clean up the glue bulbs

running the snakewood on the handle jig

working on the pattern sander

ready for more glue

Well I don't follow instructions well. Actually I had to take the limbs down to about 1/8 outside the bamboo to use the handle jig on the pattern sander. I also went ahead and put the fade slope in flat so it will receive the horn. You can do your thing now.

Mike

Page 2 - Tillering by JD Jones