I salvaged a straight 8' length of maple from my brother-in- law's woodpile. Have no idea what variety. It had been laying there in the gravel driveway for probably a month. I cut the ends off, painted them, and have about 79" long left. Am I wasting my time to split into staves for selfbow attempts? I'm hoping I have a "good variety" and that I didn't wait to long to get it under roof.

Maple has been used for self bows. The ones I have seen were wide flatbed designs. Perhaps Jawge will see this thread. He has a wonderful website, and offers great advice when he comes on here. TLM

Oops should read " Flatbow." ! TLM

Get the bark off of it. Bugs love the bark and will eat up the outer layers.

Split it and start roughing out bows. There's absolutely no reason to leave Maple sit. You can work it right now.

For your first Maple bow, make the limbs 2" wide from the fade for 2/3's of the limb length, taper the last 1/3 down to 1/2 " nocks, and you will have a fine bow.

When I still lived in Ohio I usd to build flatbows out of 2" green Maple saplings all the time. They shoot wonderfully.

Thanks for the advice. Glad to know there's some potential here. Any guesses as to what type of maple this would be?

Steve, looks like Norway maple, a soft maple.

Its not good bow maple. And after a month of sitting on the ground it has already started to decay. Not good either.

Hard to tell quality of whole log by photo but even if it's not good bow wood it's still better than no bow wood! Get after it right away. Split into staves and take bark off. Then you will find out if any of it is good. Practice with what you have. A poor performing self bow is better than no bow! As your skills and wood selection improve, so will your bows. Have fun!

Bad bow wood is NEVER better than no bow wood. Bad bow wood is a waste of time. Its been proven over and over again. If its not sugar maple, and it isn't, its junk bvow wood and needs no more trials and experimenting. If you hankering to build a self bow, get good wood and give yourself a chance at success rather than failing miserably with junk wood and walking away from the hobby.

You don't teach kids how to winter drive on bald tires for good reasons.

I got a nice hickory stave (which I've started working down) and also a good hophornbeam stave (next victim) from Dale in PA. Anxious to get some other staves in the rafters for years to come. Thanks again for the advice!

Both of those make wonderful, lasting bows when cooked right.

Thanks, TLM.

Most whitewoods don't do well when left outside after cutting after that amount of time.

Hickory is awesome bow wood. Love it.

Hop hornbeam is very good too.

Have fun.

Here's my site.

http://traditionalarchery101.com/

Jawge

So... this 7' chunk of maple probably better for firewood than bowwood? Love your site Jawge. The boy and I made piles of rose shoot arrows from referencing your build- along. Steve

Thanks, Zonic. Jawge

The barn on that stave looks like pig but hickory. I've never seen bark like that on a maple.

Lol, this new phone is great to type on

Pignut has more heartwood versus maple. Looks like maple to me.

Here's a hard maple log.

Pignut.

Maybe your right I guess I'm used to looking at big sugar maple bark.

We have a mountain farm full of both Phil, and we just had some selective timbering done so I had a recent look. 8^). Jay Massey really liked Pignut Hickory for his bows...sinew backed.

Just fyi, I've cut smooth bark hickories showing over twice as much sapwood as in George's picture.

Maple is diffuse porous. Hickory is ring porous. If you're familiar with the difference, it would be easy to discern between them, and perhaps others, by studying a smooth end cut.

Even if it ends up being a decent bow wood, I'm with Pearl Drums, I wouldn't use it unless I was certain it was on the ground less than a couple weeks.

Just so you know, this 'standard of care' is for 'whitewoods', which are woods of which the sapwood is used, as they can degrade rapidly in many instances. Others, whose sapwood is removed, like osage or locust can be used after being down or standing dead for quite some time... even years... although there are other reasons to take care of them asap as well.

I can recognize all of the shagbark hickorys around here, but I don't know how to identify the pignuts - which i understand is preferred by some.

Jeff - thanks for that explaination. This log was on the ground approx 3-4 weeks, but not on earth, on a gravel driveway if that makes any difference.

Ha! Pearl Drums I have to whole heartedly agree with you except for one important point. The first most important thing about making self bows can be learned from horrible bad wood. In my case, I climbed a big mountain in the Cascades, found a tall straight yew. I spent a long time cutting in with my hand saw. It was so heavy I had to cut it in billet lengths even to be able to carry it back to the road. I lovingly waxed the ends and put it away in my garage. Later I drive 7 hours to my friends house who would teach me how to make my first self bow. One look at it and my friend basically said saw it up for firewood. Why? Huge dramatic propeller twist in the wood. I had no idea what I was looking for in good bow wood. I spent hundreds of dollars in gas, lots of sweat equity, and tons of my time to learn that I needed to learn what I was looking for in good bow wood BEFORE I went back out in the woods. This is what is so important that can be learned from bad bow wood! I learned the same thing I learned digging ditches one summer in southern Arizona. It pays to get an education! So the original poster had a great opportunity to learn not only basics of self bow making if his wood turns out to be only marginal, but more importantly if he dissects that log and finds out it is terrible bow wood, he will have gotten an education on what to/not to look for in bow wood, and it won't have cost him very much since he already has the log in the driveway. Hmmmm? Certainly you are right- start with the best bow wood possible for greatest chance of success. But don't despise small beginnings and failures. It is what has made most of the great people in this world great. Maybe Zonic has the makings to become a great bower! Blessings to you Zonic no matter what you do with that log.

You guys are missing a weather issue. If the log was on the ground for the month of December, no bugs will have touched it and it's unlikely that any rot will have started. Being on the gravel driveway helps too.

Also, while maple of any kind is not my choice of bow wood, the bald tires on snow are not a good parallel here. A wood shop teacher is going to have students making bird houses out of cedar before letting them try building a coffee table out of figured hardwood.

More is learned by not having to worry about the value of a first stave than by taking a month or a year timidly scraping away at a piece of good Osage, sweating over every scrape. Start with good staves of cheap wood (such as an oak board or a maple stave) and make chips and shavings.

Another pic.

Bark

Well If you guys would not have said that was maple, my first guess would be pig nut hickory or oak from the looks of the bark.

There can be quite a contrast in bark of the various hickories, from near smooth to very ridge like.

"The bald tires is a great comparison. The cedar bird house/hardwood coffee table not so much. "

IMO, when we are starting out, we learn much faster from mistakes than successes. So start with a low value piece of wood and fly at it.

If we don't get a bow the first time, so what. Few us are quitters who would give up at that point.

Either way - I think I need to see inside... I have one steel wedge and 3 small wedge- shaped pieces of hickory from a selfbow I started.

Maple sure splits easier than hickory.

I probably shoulda only tried to get 3 staves.

Probably just junk anyway. But I'm still going to peel the bark and see what's under there.

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