Just got my R/D Lostcreek longbow from Chad Francis yesterday.  I ordered a 58" bow, 47# @ 28".  It came in, according to my scale 47# @28".  The bow is beautiful.  Osage belly 3/8' stripe of hardrock maple and walnut back.  The limbs are bamboo stained to a carmel color.  The bow shoots fast, draws smooth and has no hand shock.  Seems to shoot a variety of arrow weights well.  I have been a recurve shooter for over 20 years.  About that time I tried to go from compound to a longbow. I couldn't believe the hand shock!  Gave up on that idea, until now.  I wish I could show pictures but probably won't be able to figure it out.

I did shoot the bow through a chronograph today and here are some interesting results.

400 grn carbon arrow (399.6).  The same arrow was used in both bows.

Graybark recurve  57#@ 28".  Speed 199 fps
Lostcreek longbow 47#@ 28".  Speed 185 fps

Graybark  3.49 fps per lb of pull weight
Lostcreek 3.93 fps per lb of pull weight

My experiment would indicate the r/d longbow is more efficient than  a recurve with this particular weight of arrow.  At least this is my finding.  You folks may already know that, but this is my first longbow.

Thanks again Chad for a great job, listening to my requests and calling with your suggestions.

Emmett

Chad makes a great bow!!! and is a good guy good luck with your bow!! chad is one of the best kept secrets in the trad world.

QuoteOriginally posted by 8Charles:
My experiment would indicate the r/d longbow is more efficient than  a recurve with this particular weight of arrow.  At least this is my finding.  You folks may already know that, but this is my first longbow.

You're shooting that recurve at about 7gpp and the longbow at 8.5.  The comparison is a little unfair on the recurve.

Please explain 7 and 8.5 gpp.  Is that grains per pound?  If so, the recurve would be burdened with less weight per pound than the longbow.  I did shoot a 500 grain arrow in the recurve (8.77 gpp?) and had speeds in the mid 170's.  Anyway, Ijust thought it was interesting information.  As a beginner to long bows, I would of assumed they were less efficient in casting speed than the more modern recurves.  I

Thanks for your input FreeFeet

To start with lets get the apples to apples type of comparison. The bow tests in TBM are all done at 9 grains per lb of bow weight. A 400 grain arrow, even out of your 47 pounder is light.A 423 grain arrow would make some difference, the same needs to take place with the recurve,57#@28"=513gr. I do a lot of testing of my hybrid longbows,apples to apples, I wont go into whose big name recurves wont shoot with my longbows!

QuoteOriginally posted by 8Charles:
Please explain 7 and 8.5 gpp.  Is that grains per pound?  If so, the recurve would be burdened with less weight per pound than the longbow.

The lighter the arrow, the less efficient the bow is.  More energy gets put into the limbs than the arrow as you go lighter, eventually, if you make the arrow too light, far too much energy will go into the limbs that you'll hurt your bow and the limbs will fail.

I would not shoot any of my bows at 7gpp.