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Totally unrelated to bodybuilding but....
I build bows (archery) as a hobby. I have been trying to build a composit horn bow for about 3 years now. These bows are like the ones used in asia by various cultures in the past 3000 years. The mongols (Gengis Khan) used these types of bows. So did people from China, Korea, India and Turkey. Each culture used slightly different designs but all of them had horn (usually water buffalo) on the belly, a wood core, and sinew on the back reinforcing the wood. Getting all these materials to work together in harmony is much harder than you might expect and tillering is a BITCH. Tillering is when you train the limbs to bend evenly and equally; no hinges or stiff spots, etc. With wooden bows, you just shave wood off the belly in the right places to get the limb to bend correctly but with horn bows, you can't shave anything off the belly. You have to tiller the limbs with heat.
The first two I made didn't even make it past the tillering stage. The first one delaminated during the tillering process. The wood core of the second one actually cracked during tillering. The third time was the charm. I finished it this past weekend and I got it tillered and strung up. I even shot it a few times. :dancingne I will shoot the hell out of it for a month or two to really break it in before putting the finishing touches on it.
These bows are so freaking cool. They are short extreme recurves that are under a lot of strain. My bow at 56" long is much longer than a normal Turkish bow (I made the Turkish variant), Most Turkish bows are anywhere from 44" to 52". I made it longer on purpose so it would be a little more stable. A 52" turkish bow can handle a 36" draw length without stacking! I have drawn mine to around 30" so far. The draw is incredibly smooth from start to finish and it is virtually silent when shot. I haven't measured the draw weight or arrow speed yet. It did turn out a bit lighter than I was wanting but I am still happy with it. I would guess at the draw weight as around 45 lb pull. I will put an extra layer of sinew on the next one to get the draw weight up around 70 lbs.
I am so psyched up now. I sawed another set of buffalo horns this past weekend too. A very large set (36" long) gave me three sets of strips. I plan to make a really long Chinese bow and then a shorter Turkish or Mongolian bow. The 3rd set of strips is pretty short but I think I can make a very short (38" to 40") Turkish flight bow (called a crab bow) with them. All of that was from the back of the horns. The sides of the horns I may be able to use for some plains indian style flat bows. The solid horn tips I will use for tip overlays.
I build bows (archery) as a hobby. I have been trying to build a composit horn bow for about 3 years now. These bows are like the ones used in asia by various cultures in the past 3000 years. The mongols (Gengis Khan) used these types of bows. So did people from China, Korea, India and Turkey. Each culture used slightly different designs but all of them had horn (usually water buffalo) on the belly, a wood core, and sinew on the back reinforcing the wood. Getting all these materials to work together in harmony is much harder than you might expect and tillering is a BITCH. Tillering is when you train the limbs to bend evenly and equally; no hinges or stiff spots, etc. With wooden bows, you just shave wood off the belly in the right places to get the limb to bend correctly but with horn bows, you can't shave anything off the belly. You have to tiller the limbs with heat.
The first two I made didn't even make it past the tillering stage. The first one delaminated during the tillering process. The wood core of the second one actually cracked during tillering. The third time was the charm. I finished it this past weekend and I got it tillered and strung up. I even shot it a few times. :dancingne I will shoot the hell out of it for a month or two to really break it in before putting the finishing touches on it.
These bows are so freaking cool. They are short extreme recurves that are under a lot of strain. My bow at 56" long is much longer than a normal Turkish bow (I made the Turkish variant), Most Turkish bows are anywhere from 44" to 52". I made it longer on purpose so it would be a little more stable. A 52" turkish bow can handle a 36" draw length without stacking! I have drawn mine to around 30" so far. The draw is incredibly smooth from start to finish and it is virtually silent when shot. I haven't measured the draw weight or arrow speed yet. It did turn out a bit lighter than I was wanting but I am still happy with it. I would guess at the draw weight as around 45 lb pull. I will put an extra layer of sinew on the next one to get the draw weight up around 70 lbs.
I am so psyched up now. I sawed another set of buffalo horns this past weekend too. A very large set (36" long) gave me three sets of strips. I plan to make a really long Chinese bow and then a shorter Turkish or Mongolian bow. The 3rd set of strips is pretty short but I think I can make a very short (38" to 40") Turkish flight bow (called a crab bow) with them. All of that was from the back of the horns. The sides of the horns I may be able to use for some plains indian style flat bows. The solid horn tips I will use for tip overlays.
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