2024 What did you do today

[Crooked Stic]

That perzactly what my 14 in. JET looks like

[Burnsie]

Found a couple more promising Osage logs on some land being cleared by the County Park District. Not the time of year I would typically harvest logs/staves, but the Park District already had them cut down and if I don't snag them, they just end up in a large burn pile. Good exercise wheeling these suckers about a mile + out of the woods through the trails.
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[Pat B]

Nice haul. Looks like good stuff. 

[Kirkll]

https://youtu.be/cOuB9_kYs_E?si=A3QLrjkIPpWlZm4m

[B-JS]

Yesterday, i found a Knife blank laying around in my Shop and had a small piece of Bocote left over from a Riser.

So my daughter got a new cooking Knife.

[Pat B]

Very nice knife. I'm sure your daughter will love it. 

[chefrvitale]

Trying to decide what to build, I cut some veneers out of Patagonia rosewood.
The local woodcraft had it 50% off, I had never heard of it.
It's ridiculously hard and seems to be excellent bow wood.

[chefrvitale]

That bacote looks great on your knife!

[Kirkll]

Trying to decide what to build, I cut some veneers out of Patagonia rosewood.
The local woodcraft had it 50% off, I had never heard of it.
It's ridiculously hard and seems to be excellent bow wood.

Some of those dark hardwoods are heart breakers under clear glass, and should be avoided. I remember the first time I tried Macassar ebony under clear glass. I just about cried over that one. It had some very cool looking contrasting grain with light and dark colors, and it came out pretty much black, and showed every tiny imperfection in the clear glass. I built it for my wife, and still have that bow. After about 7 years you could see every little micro crack in the clear glass.

The bow still shoots fine, and there is nothing wrong with the structural integrity, but I might as well of just used black glass with ebony overlays and not wasted my time milling ebony veneers.     

Btw.... I've had some cool looking Bocote do the same thing and turned almost black as it darkened up with age.

Food for thought....  Kirk

[chefrvitale]

That's good to know,  thanks Kirk!

[Bryan Adolphe]

This ones a gift for a friend, iam still looking for a better grain filler, this piece of wenge was alot of work. Many coats of laq and high gloss auto clear, sprayed matte finish last night ended up with unacceptable blemish just above shelf .... Will sand it down for the 6 th time and respray. 😊
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[Kirkll]

Wenge is terrible for filling gain using just lacquer sanding sealer because it shrinks so much. Brandon Stahl used to use a polyester material for filling those grand canyon type slots, but i've never used it myself, or really know what to recommend for that stuff, but it might be worth researching it.  What i do with that stuff is avoid using it as much as possible, but when i'm stuck with it i start with lacquer, then do a several wet coats using the auto clear coating. then i let it set a day, touch sand and do another wet coat. something about letting it cure for a day before sanding and recoating gives me a better build up....

It's the nature of the beast Bryan. That stuff is just a bear cat to fill.. It just takes more material, and you want to use a high gloss material with good solids for grain filling to ensure it doesn't shrink.that's why you wait a day for it to cure ... I'd look into the polyester material for a sanding sealer if you plan on using more of this Wenge....

btw ...Paduke is the same class, as well as Red Oak. Of course not many bowyers use red oak for risers.

[Bryan Adolphe]

Couple of finished pics , boo with birds eye maple veneers/ wenge & blk walnut riser.
And dreamin up a recurve template.
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[Kirkll]

A little finish sanding on some sister bows.

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[Bryan Adolphe]

Sweet looking bows there Kirk!

[Kirkll]

Couple of finished pics , boo with birds eye maple veneers/ wenge & blk walnut riser.
And dreamin up a recurve template.
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Great looking bow Bryan!  Cant wait to see what comes out of that RC form...

[dbeaver]

Been a while guys recently moved.
Here we are mixing old and new.  D/R osage selfbow. Got this heat bent and made some tip alignment adjustments, still likely a few heat adjustments but a very short brace is tracking right down the center of handle.

This was made possibly by a fellow tradgang member who sent me a few staves to work.  Love the bowyers bench truly.  Thanks for all who post
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[Burnsie]

Dylan,
Do you have a picture of the caul you used to make those bends?  That thing looks slick!
Heat gun or steam?

[dbeaver]

heat gun, did the middle as seen in the photo and then slowly worked outwards, had some spring back on the deeper part of the reflex after the first treatment so i went one limb at a time from the tip back towards the center, heat corrected one tip for better alignment and that got me good enough to start getting her bending and a long string on it.

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[Pat B]

Cool looking bow. Will you post a pic of the back profile?