I am working on an osage stave given to me by Hackbow and have a few questions, it has been taken down to one ring on the back and some wood has been taken off of the belly, but one limb tapers to the tip, where as the other limb barely tapers at all, so before I start floor tillering, can I cut one of the limbs down on the sides so that it looks even?, also, it has some bending in the limbs(not snake), it is not side to side but more backwards and fowards, should this be taken out before I start?, can they be left in?
You need to have your bow completely shaped before you start floor tillering. Start about a foot from the tips and taper both limbs to 1/2".
I do what I call "sighting in a bow stave". As I do the final shaping. I put my cheek on the fade opposite the limb from the one I am shaping and sight down the limb like I would a gun barrel. I look for a tip wandering off to one side and remove wood to make the tip line up with the handle. I also look for bulges in the sides of the limb and remove wood to get both sides of the limb even to the tips.
This little sighting in process will really help you keep the string centered on the bow when you go to the short string.
We call the kind of bend you have in your stave "roller coaster". Some staves will bend like rubber and let you take the roller coaster out, other will crack on the belly so deep it will ruin a stave. I have encountered many more staves that crack than let me correct them. Tricky business for sure.
so what should I do with the roller caoster?
also, can I remove wood from the back, or leave it alone?
You can correct the roller coaster using a heatgun and caul like this: Heat Bending Osage (http://residents.bowhunting.net/sticknstring/danfbow.html)
Or you can leave it. It can make tiller a little tougher to read.
Leave the back once you get a ring.
should I file the nocks once I'm done shaping the profile, then floor tiller, then final tiller?
Ian: It would be a lot easier, and you would have a greater chance for success if you read about how to build a selfbow before starting or going too far. Pick up a copy of Hunting the Osage Bow by Dean Torges, or Bows & Arrows of the Native Americans by Jim Ham, or The Bent Stick by Paul Comstock, or Billets to Bow by Glenn St. Charles, or any one of the four volumes of Traditional Bowyers Bible. No. 1 is the best to start with. Any of those books will give you a good overview as well as step-by-step instruction and answer about 90% of the hundreds of questions you will have. Good luck.
Hunting the osage bow is the best of the lot if you are working with osage. Pretty much covers it all.
You can save yourself a lot of grief during the tillering process if you make yourself a tillering gizmo.
http://tradgang.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=1;t=033419
thanks, gonna get some reading material