Spotted gum for an ELB

[just longbows]

Hi guys ive got a spotted gum sapling 2-3in thick and i really want to make a english longbowwould this work.

Justin

[Hamish]

Depends what your definition of an ELB is. I haven't seen one made from s'gum that is narrow and deep with a truely rounded belly. I have seen plenty made from boards, that are wider, bend through the handle, and are much flatter across the belly, yet still slightly rounded. More like American Indian bows.
To most people they look like elb's and are used a lot by medieval re enactors, but they probaBly wouldn't meet the British longbow societies technical definition.
Many of the s'gum bows I have seen had chrysals, despite showing no hinges or obviously poor tillering.
Definitely will make bows, just keep them long, at least 72" for a bend through the handle bow, for 28" bow. Start of with 76" long staves if you can.
Hamish.

[Dennis La Varenne]

Justin,

Hamish is right. For a correctly spec-built ELB, the British Longbow Society (BLS) mandates an 5 : 8 thickness to width ratio minimum (the thickness is 62.5% of the width) and must remain so for the length of the limb, but most I have built and seen have a much greater stack in the region of 80% of width. This makes them very highly stressed bows, and unless the wood is very good quality with a high Modulus of Rupture and Elastic Limit, the bow can be prone to fretting very early, even before it leaves the tiller.

As Hamish advises, keep it very long - plus a bit more. Personally, with a new wood I have not used previously, I would even go for a minimum of 78 inches or a bit longer. It can always be piked to something more practical when it shows that it is standing up to the belly compression. Also, try to keep the tips as fine as will hold a string nock and NO MORE. These bows definitely benefit from low mass tips.

Keeping the stave as long as possible will allow you to also have it a bit wider. My recommendation would be to start with a handle width of 1 1/4 inches. I have attached a schematic of the layout I used for these bows. It is based on the mechanical properties of American Ash, but would still apply to good heavy quarter-sawn Spotted Gum. Remember also that for the BLS standard, no part of the bow is allowed to be wider or thicker than the handle. I allow the centre one quarter of the bow's length to be parallel which is a great help in keeping this design from wanting to twist rotationally or bend laterally.

The two quarters of the overall length on either side of this parallel middle handle section (the mid-limb) taper in width to 3/4 of the handle width. That leaves 1/8 of the length of the bow at each end as the tip which tapers from 3/4 of handle width to enough only to hold a string.

Overall, the plan view of this layout is somewhat leaf-shaped and very close to that of the plan view of the Mary Rose bows, pictures of which are very obviously whip-ended as I have just described. Whip ending a bow is to put a greater amount of taper in the outer limbs to cause this normally stiff area to bend a bit more. It also reduces outer limb mass, which in turn, helps to keep up limb speed.

100lb Ash ELB x 84 in long_small.jpg (104.01 KiB) Viewed 755 times