"THE PROCESS"

Many people have been inquiring about how my bows are made.  Not so much as in the material used, but more about the actual process.  Here is an overall description of the process in making Custom Longbows... NOTE: These pictures contain a lot of detail and may take a few minutes to load with low bandwidth connections.

Arrange laminates and wax up the bow form.

Test fit riser to insure perfect glue up.

Saran wrap the form to keep everything nice and neat.

After applying epoxy to both sides of all the laminates and
placing them in the desired order along with the riser.  The
Saran Wrap is folded up, pressure strips are laid down on top
and small wooden blocks and "C" clamps are used to very
carefully compress everything together.

With all clamps in place the form is placed inside an oven for 5
hours and then left to cool back to room temperature overnight.

The next day, the form is removed from the oven, the clamps
are removed and the bow taken off.

The Saran wrap and masking tape is removed, and the bow is
taken to the sander to remove the overflow of glue so that the
sides and face are relatively square.  This makes it easier to
measure and scribe the overall limb shapes.

The limb shapes are carefully scribed and then rough cut on the
band saw before they are hand sanded to their final thickness.

The limbs are at their finished shape and thickness.

The limb tips are taped to prevent tear out and marked for
initial nock groove placement.  The grooves are cut slightly
in order to  hold the string in place so the bow can be strung.

The bow is strung and drawn to 18" in order to determine the
top and bottom limbs.

Once the top limb is known the bow window can be cut out.

The overlays for the riser and the limb tips are now  glued on.

The riser and the limb tips are shaped to their finished state and
the nock grooves are cut.

Finished limb tip.

Riser shaped and finished with 8 to 10 layers of Linseed/Poly
blend finish, hand rubbed and waxed.  Completely weatherproof

There you go... a general idea of how I make my bows.  I wish it was that quick, fortunately I love making them!

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