MAKING A RECURVE HICKORY BOW! Traditional Archery! Bow making!

Let's make a hickory bow. So first thing we had to cut to length Possibly the most time-consuming part was reducing the actual mass of that stave down to a more workable size Now here we're just continuing to use a draw knife reducing the limbs further and doing a little cleanup work It's time to start working on our handle we're gonna use a dinner plate to approximate some good fades Then we're gonna continue shaping our handle start on the chisel work continue the chisel work and Then just kind of finish that off with the farrier's rasp Getting there. We need to thin it out a little bit more so then we can get the floor tiller done And then after it's floor tillered, that's when we're gonna bend in the recurves So because the angles that we hit this with with the farrier's rasp over here first and then there now we have this central ridge It's now the last step to get to that final thickness or relatively final thickness Hopefully for floor tillering is by using that farrier's rasp and just kind of flattening out this Ridge So things to watch out for at this point We want to make sure that this part right here doesn't become a hinge where we are with the floor tiller now Allows us to move on to heat bending So we're gonna go in the kitchen and heat up a pot of water and we're gonna steam bend our form set up right here And I'm gonna show you what's going on inside Walk in got a big thing of water boiling And we got our stave sitting. It's closer to a bow than a stave now Well, we've got that just running across the top and they cover it in aluminum foil You let it steam for minimum 20 minutes maximum 45 minutes You All right, so we've got the first side in there and this is why you leave a little bit of extra thickness Especially if you have a knot which I almost always do towards the end Sometimes it'll crack right where that knot is But we're still gonna have enough thickness there that after we shave down past where that crack went. We'll be alright So we're gonna do that same thing to the other side We've bent it and you can see this the far side away from us is actually doing pretty well It's kind of right in line With the handle this closer side. It's a bit off So we need to rotate this and even it up So if you've already put your recurves in and you want to heat bend make sure Even the part that's covered inside the pot. You're always gonna have a couple inches To the outside of that, but you want to make sure that those couple doesn't bleed into your recurve because it'll undo the bend that you've put in there and if you can't find your form to Get out the propeller twist you can always just use like a pipe wrench or a crescent wrench. They both work great Just put a towel over the limb so you don't damage it You can see that down at the end. We need to kind of alter this all of that Outside that that line it's gonna be removed So all this stuff right here This is the reason it's a good idea to wait to do your final limb tips like the thickness until after you're done with the recurves Looking pretty pretty decent just kind of roughly shaped at this point a Little more on this side and then we'll put a string on You Coming along pretty good the handle section roughed out cut the sight window in there. It's a long So the hickory bow turned out awesome, I really like it I love the way she shoots I love the way she looks beautiful beautiful bow. I mean just I'm really happy with the way this one came together, but It's all I got for you today. Always remember live with your love