[Ansteorra-archery] Board bow update

[Sylvrfalcn at aol.com]

Greetings Fellow Archers,
  First, and most importantly, I'd like to congratulate HL Fearghus on his
well deserved award of the Arcus Majoris. Honorable Lord Fearghus, I know
that you've faced many tough challenges over the past months, and I pray that
what this year holds in store for you is nothing less than good health, good
cheer, and good shooting.
  My excitement over my first attempt at bowmaking has not diminished in the
slightest.  I've been "durability testing" the long bow, which now has put
more than 500 arrows down range with no sign of a problem.  I recently made
another bow for one of our new archers (I love it, they're so cheap to make
you can give the bloody things away!).  This one's a real nifty Native
American style flat bow,  48" long and drawing around 20 lbs. at her draw
length of 22" (she's petite).  I "girlified" it with a soft doeskin grip wrap
and fuzzy bunny fur string silencers on the hand twisted sinew bowstring
(artificial sinew, it looks real but lasts better).  She absolutely loves it,
as does everybody she shows it to, so I'll probably wind up making a few more
soon (woe is me, whittle, whittle, whittle).
  Now granted my friends, bows made out of boards have definite limitations.
But consider this, a "cheap" bowstave of one of the white woods like ash or
hickory sells for around 35 bucks.  For that much moolah I can make 5 or 6
board bows.  The knowledge and experience I gain in the process is priceless,
and goes far to insure that I'll have a much better understanding of what to
do when I do carve one from a stave (coming to an A&S competition near you,
grin).
  There's a full chapter on making bows from boards in volume two of the
"Traditional Bowyer's Bible".  Give it a read, then go out and give it a try,
I can attest it's jolly good fun.  And don't be afraid of "messing up"
because you're not some "high muckety muck master craftsman". There's a huge
bloody difference between not failing and succeeding.  The only way to never
fail is to never try. The only way to succeed at a thing is to try it and
keep on trying.  Ask those in the Ansteorran archery community, who have
worked for many years now to bring about the much heralded grant level award
of the "Arcus Majoris".  We owe them a huge debt of gratitude because they
kept..........on...........TRYING ;-)

Cheers All,
Lord Robert of Yorkshire
Archer, Knifemaker, and Fiendish whittler of deadly wooden thing-a-ma-bobs
(to call myself a bowyer at this point would be disrespectful to those who
are)