A Good Week for New Toys!

[robtattoo]

It's been a good bow-week, all in all. Two Morrison Cheyennes arrive, a day apart & this morning the polyeurathane has finished drying on my John Scifres recurve!

John went over & above the call of duty on this blank for me. I was looking for a short 56-60" selfbow to compete in our Primitive class over here. I already have one stunning longbow by Shawn Webb but, well, you can't have too many toys now, can you!  :D

My trouble with selfbows, especially short selfbows, is that I have gorilla arms & a 30" draw. "No problemo" says John. He's recurved the bow & backed it with Elk leg Sinew & it draws sweeeeet & smooth out to 30" No ominous creaks, groans or untoward goings on here!

It was sent to me as a tillered but unfinished blank. I was told from the outset that I may haveto tweek the tiller slightly, but to be honest I've never attempted anything like that before. I sanded, smoothed & polished until I was happy & strung 'er up for a shot or two. Well, I could see that the tiller wasn't 100% but after 100 arrows she shot sweet & shock free, so being the lazy incompetent that I am, I figured that it was near enough!

I applied some scraps of Bocote as tip overlays & then sat & stared & stared until I was cross-eyed, nervous as heck about gluing on the B-E-A-yootiful Bullsnake skin. I studied Ferret's instructions, pored over all 3 volumes of The Bowyer's Bible, sweated, fretted & finally caved to my own self-imposed pressure......

Don't know what all the fuss is about! It's easy!

I glued it all up with TBIII, cleaned & de-scaled & then had an agonising 24hrs wait for e glue to set up before I could start applying the finish.

Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap........

A brief wipe-down with acetone later, 4 coats of gloss PU spray laquer were thrown on & left to dry.

Fast forward to this morning & a sprint (well, hung-over crawl) to The Workcave & we're done!
Shootable, pretty, smooth, sweet & sexy! For my firstest attempt at anything bowyer-ey I couldn't be happier!
Many, many thanks must go to John for doing all the actual work & also a huge thanks to a man who's name completely eludes me (Sorry!!) for the donation of the perfect, 70" bullsnake skin.

On with the pics, I suppose!

[robtattoo]

[Osagetree]

One good looking selfbow!

[jesse cales]

beautiful!!you did a great job!

[sticshooter]

awesome bow Rob. Your yard looks saweeet!<><

[adkmountainken]

WOW! sweeeeeeeet looking bow! gorrila arms, more like T-Rex arms, got to love a beautiful selfbow!

[tradtusker]

wow its a great looking bow! nice job on the snake skin mate  

[Jack Denbow]

WOW that looks great.

[wislnwings]

Nice work.  If it shoots as good as it looks its a keeper.

[frassettor]

Nice bow  

[LEOPARD]

Very nice looking bow there, Rob! Enjoy and good luck with it!    

[Jedimaster]

Excellent job! ... for a knife-maker  

[vermonster13]

Sweet!

[BUFF]

outstanding.... you have real skills

[Chris Surtees]

Very nice Rob!

[JAG]

I'm jealous!  Love them Selfbows....gonna try to recurve one....If I ever get the courage...hate to mess up a good peice of wood.
Beautiful Bow!!!!!!

[Widowbender]

Since you have such a backlog of bows to shoot, just send that one to me and I'll break her in for you!!   :D    :D    :D    

David

[LAR43]

Niiiice!
What a sweet looking bow! Well done!

Larry

[John Scifres]

Rob,

Great job on the bow.  The finish is superb and the overlays are sweet.  It was Darren "Hackbow" Shue who provided the skin.  It looks great on that bow.  I hope she serves you well at the shoots.

John