I just bought an old Earl Mead longbow, probably made in the late 1920's early 30's. I believe it is one of the earliest laminated bows made, it appears to be all wood without and glass backing. It has about 3 inches of set, when measuring for a string should I measure tip to tip in a straight line or follow the bend in the bow? Safe to string? I don't see and cracks
Measure from string groove to string groove on the back of the bow. As far as bracing it.. I don't know. Bows with that much string follow aren't under a lot of tension at brace height, so probably okay to brace it really really low and slowly exercise it a few inches at a time. I think the danger of a laminated bow like that would be delamination when you shoot it. Are you a gambler?
Thanks, it measured 64 inches. I had a 60 inch string from one of my other bows so I put that on and worked the limbs and got it back to full draw with no weird noises or anything, I didn't try shooting it yet. The 60 inch string gave me 5.5 inch brace height so I am thinking I might need a shorter string
You didn't say what type of string- endless loop or flemish twist but either way you can just twist the string about 5 times and check the brace height again. Do that until you get the brace height you want. I still think I'd shoot it at half draw a dozen times before I tried a full draw release. It would be nice to know what kind of glue he laminated it with.
I have a d97 Fleishman twist on it, I am not sure what brace height to adjust it to. My st patrick lake longbow I shoot at 6 and 3/8.
I shot five shots so far at about 25 inch draw. If it survives a a few shoots at full draw is it probably OK to shoot longterm or is it still likely to fail? It would be cool to shoot it at ETAR next year. It is 40 at 28