Kviljos second hornbow "M. Balka"

Hi Kviljo! I also work on M. Balka bow. how wide and thick wood core will be before sinewing?

I had to narrow it in a little because of the horn laminates I use. It is about 1,5" wide for most of the length of the horn. I was hoping for a bit more, to preserve some stability, but the horn didn't allow for it.

The horn did also set the thickness of the core, as they became pretty thin. At the inner parts of the limbs the horn is about 3,5mm, tapering to about 1mm at the kasan eye. I think I will leave the core 4mm just out of the fades by the grip, and then put on a slightly heavy layer of sinew.

I'm just aming at getting as many pounds draw weight out of the materials as I can - while the horn laminates are the restrictive parts.


What kind of setup are you going for?

Kviljo my projects similar to yours :D :D . work plan of Andrew Holl. Balka bow with a horn will be approximately 4 - 4.5 millimeters. wooden core - 3.5 millimeters. [external image]

Kviljo; What you have laid out is a modern Mongolian bow. Pazuzu yours is half way to the MB bow.

The MB bow core should be made of two pieces bent at the ears and joined at the grip. The horn probably made the bend at the ear and either continued to the tip or tapered out and another horn piece was laid over this continuing to the tip. A sort of ear riser was added between the core and belly to fill out the depth of the ear. The bend was smooth and sleek.

The grip would be long to accommodate a long splice. Of course bone plates covered the layering at the ears and the grip. I do not think I have seen evidence for V-splicing of core elements in this period nor for deep Turkic type grooving.

We should assume that this bow, being a predecessor of Turkic types, were somewhat inferior. If you want to know how the original performed, it should not be loaded with later improvements.

Now do carry on and make any type bow which is pleasing to you. I just make these comments for historical accuracy.

Jack, again you?re right......

The construction is much more a Mongolian bow than a MB- bow.
It is very important to define very clearly how a certain type of historical bow is made, otherwise we will finally loose the rare exactly knowledge of the bowyers of the past.
For not to talk of modern fakes of historical bows like Scythian1, Scythian2, Scythian3..........etc...............

But I think Kviljos main interest is to check out hornbows for their flight- shooting capablities. I appreciate him to be one of the world?s best bowyers of wooden flight bows.

Michael

I agree vith Jack . Guys, do you see clearly Moschevaya Balka bow in pics ?

Guys, I do agree. As an archaeologist, I should have stated in the first post that this is only an attempt at making a working hornbow, not making an exact replica. (which perhaps is obvious, since it is my second attempt at making hornbows :) )

I'm also working with Andrew Hall's "approximate plans for M.B. bow". - a drawing which I believe was made for us new hornbowyers as a suggestion on how to make a "standard" hornbow. I have only seen the original in three pictures, which obviously is not enough to make something close to the original.

But it seems that there is some information on the bow avaliable somewhere. What is your source, Jack? I would love to make an attempt at a replica some day, when I've acuired more skills with these materials.

Andrew should respond; it is his baby, one of the most published bows of antiquity.

Nice bow Kviljo,

I cant wait to see end result. Its about time somebody made a true mongolian bow.

Pazuzu:
Brilliant project :wink:
Did you glue the handle on the same way I did? Mine did delaminate a bit when I was binding the horn on to the core. I think I managed to fill the joint with glue though. I hope it holds. I think I have seen Adam K. at least partly do the same. But I must say I'm not certain it will hold without some sinew wrappings.


I glued the horn to it last saturday. Had some problems that I learned a lot from. Think I had to give it three tries before I was happy with it. What a mess! Looking forward to checking out how it looks when I take the binding of next weekend. I hope to see no voids this time...

As you can see on the last picture, I bound in a rope along the middle of the horn to even out the pressure a little. It was perhaps a mistake (it was, hehe) to just tie it in on one limb, but then if it fails on one side I will find out if it was a good idea or not... :)

You said it looks more like a mongolian or a modern mongolian bow - what does that mean? It is perhaps a stupid question, but I won't learn if I don't ask: is there a continous tradition on making composite bows in mongolia up till today? - and that my bow looks most like perhaps a 19.-20.th century bow? Are there any older finds of mongolian bows that this one might look like?


ahh... in the end, there's nothing like the sweet smell of hide glue :lol:

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Kviljo
The handle is unlikely to delaminate once it is covered with the sinew backing, and is even less likely once bound at the ends of the grip. If you have any gaps, just fill with glue and let it dry before shaping. I have never had any problems with core construction falling apart, most of my difficulties have been in keeping the horn attached. Make sure that the handle and siyahs are reduced in size before you sinew (allow for the sinew thickness). If you are attaching siyah and grip side plates, do so before sinewing.

I have not experimented with very thin horn to see how little you can get away with. The 3.5mm thickness at the inner limb is fine, and 1mm should be enough under the siyah splice. My worry would be the thickness in the outer limb if you have an even taper. Others may have made more experiments and know more.

A note on construction. The MB bows did not use splices between core and siyahs, although this will make little difference to how the bow looks or shoots once complete. The descriptions do not mention any joints at the siyah base, so they were either heat/steam bent (not easy with thick sharp bends) or they picked a couple of naturally bent branches. I would guess the latter as the originals are slightly asymmetric.

I suspect that V splices were in use at this time in Asia, associated with the loss of bone siyah plates on some of the Ancient Turkic bows (Jack disagrees and thinks they came in later). Some 8th C siyah finds from Xinjiang (Mazah-Tagh) are solid wood without bone plates, so could have used splices, but the earliest definite evidence is later.

I don't think these bows can be described as Mongolian, even if made with later joints. They are an Alan/Khazar development of the Ancient Turkic bows used across Asia, which in turn were developed from the Hunnic bows. The medieval Mongolian bows seem to have developed from other varieties of the Ancient Turkic types.

Andrew

Pheww... :D Good to hear that the grip probably isn't a problem.

The horn thickness is probably worse though, because there is a quite even taper from 3,5 to 1mm. Perhaps I should leave the core even thickness to compensate, and just tiller it to stress the inner parts of the limbs the most. That would perhaps bring some stability too?

How stable are these bows, by the way? Are they difficult to stabilize, compared to the turkish ones? I would perhaps think so, because of the rather long siyahs.

I was hoping to fit some ultra-thin rib bones to the sides of the grip. Will do before sinewing. If I find some suitable material, I will add plates to the siyahs too. What is the purpose of these plates, anyway? I would guess bone or antler is quite stiff for it's weight, so that would probably be one good reason to put in the extra effort.

Great project! I would worry however about the bond between the horn and wood in the bow. The windings of your rope do not look too convincing. I suggest to use clamps, unless one is better skilled with this method.

As Andrew said I do not think 3.5mm horn is too thin. Depending on the desired draw weight, the core can be kept thicker. As to the tiller, the bows with grip-reflex usually have the bending sections almost even thickness (as a whole), so the bending does not take place too high up the limbs. I mean almost even thickness, but still a little thicker close to the fadeouts, but not as much as in the Turkish bows.

Adam

Andrew Hall wrote:

Kviljo

I don't think these bows can be described as Mongolian, even if made with later joints. They are an Alan/Khazar development of the Ancient Turkic bows used across Asia, which in turn were developed from the Hunnic bows. The medieval Mongolian bows seem to have developed from other varieties of the Ancient Turkic types.

Andrew

Well it does have the same stiff ears, so I think would seljuk be more accurate. Also I dont understand, in tirendaz.com it talks about the history of persian and turkish archery. It also talks about how turkish archers transversed from having stiff eared East Turkmenistan bows, to having siyas on short recurve bows. The stiff ears was to make longer draws smoother, so why get rid of the ears and change the bow to the ottoman bow?

I really wasn't too happy with the glueing of the horn. I had to do it several times before I called it a day. The glue did also gell a bit before it was tied. I tried clamps, but the horn was too thin towards the tips for them to work with just clamps. Perhaps I should make myself one of those strips of felt with wooden blocks on it. I'm looking forward to taking of the rope and assessing wether or not to do redo it. I guess I will just give it a try as it is if it doesn't look too bad. It's all a learning process :)

Thanks for the advice on the core thickness.
It's really great to have all the expertise here :) Can't wait to carry on and start a new one. The next will be a more reflexed turkish one with much thicker horns. 8)

Perhaps I should make myself one of those strips of felt with wooden blocks on it.

Kviljo, I liked this method. It really works for me. Try it!

Good stuff. Will do! How do you prevent the felt from getting glued to the bow? - or is it like a disposable solution with the felt?

• I am very careful to work neatly and take care not to stain the horn with glue. Besides I used a wooden shape placed under the core.

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Ahh, nice! That's tidy. I really need to try this.

Or this.

Andrew and all; Having taken several days to gather my thoughts, let me restate my thinking on Turkic period bows.

Though the Mazah-Tagh siyah finds seem almost certainly to be from spliced in ears, their provenience from an ancient garbage dump ("tip") is not so clean. (sorry) It however would be natural that another bow with V-spliced core with excellent provenience from before the Mongol invasion period will be found.

However a preliminary analysis of Mongol bows demonstrates that the technique was not used until late in the Yuan. So this technique commonly used thereafter puts the Turkic period of bowmaking after the Mongol.

Therefore V-spliced cores are two technologies removed from the MB bows.

This is just a handy way to group my ideas, Jack

There are many illustrations of MB bow construction and even more of previously posted reproductions of the bow in the Image Album (above).

Good stuff :)


Is this how the grip was spliced on the MB bow?






More pictures of the clean-up after the glueing is coming tonight. I think it is looking pretty good.

I think the glue-up went well. I haven't noticed any voids as I did on the turkish one. I believe there was enough pressure too, hehe, just look at the picture of the horn and core having been crushed :roll: Anyway, I'm crossing my fingers that the horn won't pop off when I string it

It's got matching grooves at the handle, by the way :P

The core plus the horn is now from 9mm to 8mm thick. With just 3,5mm horn, it might be a bit much core? I think I will sinew it tonight, so it will have to do.


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You might see this splice on the grip of a Hunnic bow but the stronger version would be the same joint with a vertical orientation. There are others much weaker even a pitiful mortoise and tennon joint with through dowel. Some Hunnic bows feature bone belly plates but the strength is in the large side plates.

Remember that the grip is narrowed while it deepens and the plates are often long to support the core joinery.

As the glue dries, a little water applied to the joint with a brush and some heat will reactivate the glue.

I am thinking that is Andrew's reproduction. -j-

Just to clarify things for those who may have missed some of the earlier discussions, the site of Moshcheveya Balka is in the Northern Caucasus on a ledge over a river. For those who want to look it up on Google Earth, it is at 43?55'30"N, 40?57'53"E. There are two intact bows from the site and a number of fragments with wood surviving (and arrows, quivers, bowcases, clothing, wooden tools ?). It was in the territory of the Alans in the Khazar empire at the time.

The larger of the two bows is in the St Petersburg Hermitage museum (catalogue number Kz 6730). It has unusual double nocks and siyah plates of a unique design. It has been written up in E. A. Milovanov and A. A. Ierusalimskaja ?Bow from Moshchevaya Balka [Luk iz Moshchevoj Balki]?, Communication of The State Hermitage [Soobshchenija Gosudarstvennogo Ermitazha], XLI, 1976, pp. 40-43. This contains a description of the bow and a not terribly accurate drawing. It is also covered more briefly in Anna A. Ierusalimskaja The Graves of Moshcheveya Balka [Die Gr?ber der Moscevaja Balka], Editio Maris, Munich, 1996. This contains several photographs of the bow and mentions several fragments (but not the other intact find).

There is no mention of the construction of this bow, but most of the horn has been eaten away from the belly and no splices or other joints are visible at the siyah base in the photo.

The smaller of the two bows is more Magyar-like in siyah shape (though note that both bows have bone plates on the siyah belly which are not present in Magyar finds). This is in the Krasnodar collection (5241) and a photo can be found here (http://www.tgorod.ru/index.php?contentid=252).
I have not found an archaeological report on this bow, but it is covered by V. N. Kaminsky ?On the Construction of the Bows and Arrows of the North-Caucasian Alans [O konstrukcii luka i stel' severokavkazskich alanov]?, Brief Communications of the Institute of Archaeology of the AS USSR (Moscow) [Kratkie soobshchenija. Institut archeologii AN SSSR (Moskva)], Issue 170, 1982, pp. 48-51. There is also a drawing of the bow in V.N. Kaminsky ?Early Medieval Weapons in the North Caucasus - A Preliminary Review?, Oxford Journal of Archaeology, 15(1) 1996, pp 95-105 (I assume this is the source of the drawing in the Magyar section of ATARN).

The Kaminsky article on bow construction is the most useful, even though it does not explicitly mention which construction is found in each bow find. It can be found online here (http://asgard.tgorod.ru/libri.php?cont=_bows). The limbs generally overlap at the grip with a riser piece geld to the back. The other construction is from the Gogops bow. No mention is made of siyah/limb construction. I would assume they picked a suitably bent branch.

Kviljo posted some photos of my approximation of another bow found near the River Gogops (about 67 miles west of MB). This was found in the 19th C and has been lost since. All that remains is a full-size drawing which was published in A.M. Savin and A.I. Seminov ?Medieval bow from findings on r. Gogops (based on materials of M. P. Gryaznova's archive) [Srednevekovyj luk iz nachodki na r. Gogops (po materialam archiva M. P. Grjaznova)]?, North Eurasia from the Antiquity to Medieval. Theses of Conference to the 90- Anniversary from the Birthday of Michaila Petrovich Gryaznova [Severnaja Evrazija ot drevnosti do srednevekov'ja. Tezisy konferencii k 90-letiju so dnja rozhdenija Michaila Petrovi?a Grjaznova], Editor V. M. Masson. (= Archeological searches [Archeologi?eskie izyskanija], 2). Saint Petersburg 1992, pp. 201-205.

This bow had the horribly scary tongue and groove with peg construction between the limbs mentioned by Jack. It would never have held together without the bone plates. The belly of the grip looks quite flat so I assume it had a bone plate (unlike the MB finds). Because of this and the significant asymmetry, I had assumed it was somewhat earlier in date. With the recreation of the Magyarhomorog 23 from Hungary that has been posted on ATARN (which has similar siyah plates but no grip belly plate), It is possible that the bow may be contemporary with the MB finds.

Moving across Asia to the Mazah-Tagh site. This was a Tibetan frontier fort some 100 miles down the Khotan river in the middle of the Taklamakan desert (38?27'0.46"N, 80?51'44.82"E). Three siyahs were found in a rubbish tip near the fort. They were fairly securely dated (as well as they can be by early 20th archaeological techniques under unpleasant field conditions) by documents and other finds. It is not known if they used splices or just used branches with natural bends, but the siyahs are solid wood with no visible joints. Two of the three finds looks quite similar to the 1000 year later Omnogov bow and one of the medieval Shiluustei sum Mogolian bows. (The other siyah has almost no limb/siyah reflex angle and a slight bulge around the nock).

During the later half of the first millennium, bone siyah plates started to disappear from the Ancient Turkic bow designs used across Central Asia.
I suspect that is is related to a change in the siyah core construction - the introduction of V-spliced siyahs on some of the bows seems likely but is entirely unproven at present.

The grip construction illustrated by Kviljo is only known to me from one example from Xinjiang (the weird Yinpan M30 bow).

I hope this rather long post is helpful.

Andrew

Very precise post Andrew. I want to turn your attention at mi founds from "Russian sites" here in Atarn. I was post here good pics from MOSHEVAYA BALKA bow.

/ All is in Russian sites :lol: /

:D Brilliant! Thank you, Andrew! I will definitely try to get hold of these publications you refer to. These bows are so intriguing. It's too bad my russian is non existant... There seems to be so much bow-related litterature that is out of reach.


I hesitated a bit with the grip plates, so I put on the first sinew layer today. I will most likely put on the plates tomorrow. They're just 1mm thin pieces of rib bone, but I guess it will look okay and it will secure the glue better.

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Added some bone grip plates a few days ago. They're only rib-bones from deer, so they are quite flimsy. I guess the original plates would be more like 2-4mm thick?

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I guess that doing the junction of the siyah to the core without a V splice is good archaeology; but I'd be scared stiff of it. I can confirm that I have a number of grip splices of that era with the oblique overlap done like that.

Brilliant :D

I'm out of hide glue, so these projects are on hold a few days now. This "MB lookalike" needs one or two more layers of sinew. To say the least, I'm really starting to get afraid of all the reflex this one has gained. I'm so used to what bends wood can do, so bending this one will be mind-blowing!

I put on a little more sinew tonight. As I've started to fear all the reflex, I decided to put on some extra sinew on the sides and on the sides of the belly. The handle became a little too squarish. Not sure if I will do something about it, but I might build it up a little on the sides with sinew and then wrap the whole bow in birch bark. - if it survives beeing shot.


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Kviljo, why such a reflex in the limbs? I stayed with the impression that MB bow reflex is in the corner handle and limbs, and the limbs themselves is negligible . they are almost straight? maybe I doing wrong? :roll: :roll:

The reflex in the limbs is only due to the sinew shrinking. They were straight before I started sinewing. I guess most of the reflex in the limbs will disappear when it has been shot a little. Just tie the limbs together while the sinew shrink, and it will gain a couple of inches for each layer.

:D Pazuzu, reflex is good. Maybe litlle smal for me , :lol:

I made two new oak tepeliks tonight and put them on the "MB"-bow. It needs a few adjustments, as well as some twist-correction, but it is still alive :D

I haven't been counting the days, but I believe there's not more than two weeks since it got the last layer of sinew, hehe.


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Alright, bad idea :lol:

It gained quite a bit of stringfollow. I heated it to take away some twist, and during that process most of the stringfollow was gone, however. Now, after a few hours it is closing in on the pre-bent reflex. Anyway, it was an useful experiment, as I now can tiller it by adding some more sinew to where it gained most of the stringfollow. I hope to stress it a bit more evenly before I put a string on it.

Any advise is very welcome :)


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You are not proceeding exactly by the book and it seems that you are not the patient type. Reminds me of my first attempts. ;) It'll get better when you have the first one working, takes out the self-imposed pressure.

I understood that set is any permanent deviation from the original unbraced shape, while string follow is the time-dependent one that goes away with time after unbracing (permanent in the sense that it won't go away with time. I am not sure about the heat, but I think that won't help either).

I experienced similar deformation after unbracing on my bow with setback grip. I did not like it but I suppose that is normal. It should be even on both limbs when they are balanced.

Daniel

I sinewed all three tonight. A little on both the turkish ones, and one layer on the bending sections of the MB/mongolian bow. I hope to use that final layer to tiller the bow.

The stringfollow that the bow has just after unstringing, is what counts in my mind. That's what affects the bows performance. But I believe it is normal to say that set is the permanent deformation, while string follow may be the amount of total deflex the limbs has gained while being bent. In wood bowyery the terms seems to get mixed a lot. Anyways, it seems that with horn bows, stringfollow or set is quite variable, even for the same bow :)


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I strung this bow today (the bottom one hanging from the antlers). The angles seem to be a bit hefty as the limbs will get a huge amount of bend at full draw. But I hope to make a few adjustments and make it shoot a few arrows, even if they will have to be rather short.


The main problem the bow seems to be that one horn has gotten quite a few compression-marks even before it has been bent much further than brace. The problem-horn has a dry feel, while the other which has a more see-through and wet/compact look is fine. Is this something that you can relate to, and that one can expect from horns that look dry?

Flatter bending limb cross-sections allow for greater reflex without the bow failing. Within limits, greater reflex allows for more efficient use of the horn and sinew components of the limbs. However, the conditions of burial rarely reflect how the bow was during manufacture.

During use the reflex in a bow is reduced. It can be restored to some degree, but would you do that for a bow you were going to bury with its owner? Most likely, buried bows were put in the tomb in an as-is condition. Probably they had been left strung for a long period, either in the ground or beforehand. Therefore, the degree of reflex in the buried bows tells us more about the conditions of their burial than it does about the way they were manufactured.

Definitely, or perhaps like this: thinner limbs allow for greater reflex, while more rectangular cross sections allow for greater energy storage with the same limb thickness.

The cross section of these limbs are near rectangular, with only a slightly convex belly.


Basically, what you are saying is that perhaps the reflex of my bow is not too bad after all? Perhaps I'll manage to post some pictures of it strung tomorrow.

If the gluing is successful, based on Adam's discussion of assuring a good bond in his book, then you may be lucky. I hope so. If there is a problem, you should be able to analyse where it originated and correct it in the next attempt.

Even horn could chrysal if it is worked to thin or somehow "hurted"( by growing, crack inside).
I check every hornstrip by bending it extremely before using them for a bow.
Michael

The glue line doesn't seem to be a problem, but one horn seems to collapse/chrysal more easily than the other. I didn't have that problem with my turkish bow which must stress the horn much more than this one. I might have used a too thick core with too thin horn for the draw weight though.

Anyway, I guess the quality of the horn may vary just as the elasticity of wood varies a lot? - and perhaps one can predict this somehow before glue up, to avoid combining one very elastic horn with one which is not as elastic?

Bending each horn laminate before glue-up will make sure there are no flaws in the horn, but it will perhaps not tell as much about the elasitcity of the horn (compared to the other horn laminate)?

So it made many sense to take horns from cattle of a same region, like the elders have done it.
Horn is composed mainly of ceratin, proteins are very sensitive to the food an animal is eating. There are definitely different qualities of horn.
But if you haven?t to much access to horns, you are dependent from your supplier. So we?ve to teach them very well.
It should be possible to test the horn- slats for their elasticity too, before using them, but that implies slats of same dimensions. I would always prefer the heavier horn, same with bow- staves of the same species.
Michael

I think the materials must careful to choose.some horns is weak some strong,zhe strength is different even in one piece of sinew. some glue absorb moisture easy and some not. texture of wood must straight,if not zhe bow will distortly .

I've put my first over-angeled bow on hold for a while, and started a new one which is more moderate.

I'm thinking of fitting some bone plates to its tips, and have roughed out one from an elk leg bone. It is perhaps a little oversized still.

I am not quite sure how these were fitted to the tips. For those of you who have seen similar original plates - are they usually totally flat on the glue side, or are they perhaps convex to fit on a concave wood core?

It seems normal that the two plates meet at the very tip, but I've seen one preserved tip (in M.C. Bishop (ed.) 1985 Roman archery equipment) that has it's bone plates set in a triangle cross section, where the plates meet all the way at the back down to the sinew a few inches up from the limb. The belly on the other hand is showing some wood or horn between the bone plates. The tip is referred to as the one from Belmesa (Egypt). The style of tip is slightly different than the type I am using, however.

Are there any evidence for how this style of bone plate were fitted to the tips? - and how thick should they be?

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What are going to do with that piece of rawhide. Bind the sinew?

(OOOPS, that is a bone tip right?)

Kviljo

I felt some difficulty in gluing to the flat siyah plates. when siyah cross section is a triangle, plates constantly want to escape at gluing :D

I was thinking similar thoughts after seeing the cross sections in Balfour's article (the Belmesa bow). The bone plates encased two sides of rectangle at the base of the ear, then two sides of a triangle at the middle of the ear and the tip of the ear was solid bone because the two bone plates were glued directly to each other.

I wrote "bone", but it could have been antler. They can be told apart in archaeological specimens by careful examination for blood vessels. In bone blood vessels pass through, but in antler they run along the surface.

It has always puzzled me why modern reconstructors (the commercial ones) use horn for the tips. Bone is much cheaper and you can make soup from the left overs.

Hehe, Jkekoni, that's a piece of non-peroxided moose leg bone :wink:
I suspect the peroxided ones are more brittle than the all natural ones, although they are not as white.

Pazuzu, don't you think it would be possible to do with fast gelling hide-glue? The pieces could simply be held in place with hands till the glue gelled, and then clamped? Did you find any evidence for how they originally were attached?

Bede, I think your description is quite correct. It seems the glue surfaces have been far from flat on the Belmesa tip. Hmm, I think I will need to experiment a little to get this right. Anyway, I think the triangular cross section both looks better and should save the tips from excessive weight.

My guess at why horn is regularly used is because it is much easier to process. Bone wears a lot on tools and takes a lot of time to shape with hand tools.

Kviljo

I do not know anything about the original methods of attachment. actually my information for MB bow is very scarce. I prefer to work with antler. maybe your idea is good, but there will be sufficient both hands? BTW what tree your work? I am tempted to try again with cornel

I think it should work quite okay as long as the fit is good and there is enough glue, just the same as the V-splices done with hide glue. The gelling is very practical.

This bow has a maple core from a kiln dried board, with standing growth rings. Not optimal, but I guess it will work well in this type of bow. As long as the bending part of the limbs are not reflexed when glueing the horn, the core is simply compressed between the sinew and horn, which does not set the highest demands for the core.

Hunn type bows of early or middle first millennium would seem to predate the use of triangular cross section knees/siyahs. I believe that round is the common cross section. This continues, mostly through early Mongol era.

Since the limb itself was bent up into a recurve, with the addition of extra layers, one would expect the bend to be sleek and not like a golf club.

Horn was very valuable and retained some flexibility, bone would have been cheap without bending , and antler maybe somewhere in between.

I recently got a copy of Thomas Deverney's making of the Korean hornbow. When it come to selecting the horn the man takes quite a while selecting horns with similar 'grain' (reduced horns). This made a lot of sene to me and if possible I would do the same - however I don't have hundreds of horns to sort through! :cry:

if you has more money, no any problem, you can buy a hill of horn, and for sure you will become a greet bowyer less 3000 years :)

That definitely does make sense, especially if one has some knowledge about what the different grades of elasticity look like. From my tiny experience it looks like one could divide them into at least two groups: the dry looking ones which are not as elastic as the wetter looking ones.

On the Belmesa tip which have partly triangular cross section, it was in 1897 written "Roman period". To me that translates into something like the first half of the first millenium. The tip might be younger, however.

Also, Andrew Hall has drawn the (8th cent.?) Moshcheveya Balka bow as having triangular tips.

Perhaps the cross section rather has a geographical rather than a cronological differentiation? Or perhaps more likely: both.

Kv; Mea culpa; your subject is the MB bow. My mind is stuck somewhere out in Central Asia. Have not seen a Belmesa text either. I wonder.

I guess many have noticed the similarity between Hunn bows and Manchurian (Qing).

I figured I had to make at least one MB-lookalike before making one with bone plates. I finished it a few weeks ago, and it seems to hold together quite well. Haven't had any problems with it, other than it's draw weight :lol: I bet it is no more than 30 pounds :lol:

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Very nice bow. You can learn much more from a shooting #30 bow than a heavy broken one. The experience will carry through to the next bow. So clean, good effort.

i love it man, this looks great!

Nice work! How thick was your horn? Also how long are the bending sections, sorry if i've missed these dimensions earlier in the posts.

Ivar, that one looks great, I double Jack: better a light one than a broken one.
What about enforcing it with additional layers of sinew? Even if then the sinew:core/wood ratio makes the bow more unstable and springy?
Michael

Thanks guys. It's dimentions are close to what Andrew Hall suggested in his .pdf-document. The bending parts are about 25cm long. Horn is about 3mm to 2mm thick. Total limb thickness about 10mm.

I were considering giving it another layer of sinew, but concluded that I would rather spend the sinew on another bow.

Very nice. I love the longer siyah, short working limb bows. Bravo nice work!!!!

Beautiful even tiller. Many composites do most bending on small area after fades but this one bends about equally in all of the sal.

(Wether this is a good thing in performance wise i do not know, but at least it looks even with wood bows background. )

jkekoni wrote:

Beautiful even tiller. Many composites do most bending on small area after fades but this one bends about equally in all of the sal.

(Wether this is a good thing in performance wise i do not know, but at least it looks even with wood bows background. )

That's absolutely true, it has a perfect tiller - congratulation for your bow!
It has a nice shape and also well-propotioned parts!

Peter

Thanks again :) I was slightly lucky with the tiller, although I might make the next one bend more closer to the grip where the horn is thicker. As it is now it is probably stressed a little more from midlimb to siyah than from midlimb to handle.

Distributing the stress along the limbs is good for keeping reflex, or rather keeping string follow low. This one doesn't seem to bother being drawn very far at all, even though I didn't pull it into as much reflex as I probably should have.

Bend close to the grip will give a fatter draw force curve, storing more energy, but if there are un-used mass further out on the limbs, that will bring efficiency down. For wood bows, one usually says bend close to the grip will shoot heavy arrows well, while bend close to the tip (less limb mass in motion) is better for shooting light arrows fast. It might be the same for some horn bow designs.

I guess this does not fit exactly in this thread, but I didn't want to make a new one just to share some photos. This bow is somewhat inspired by the late mongolian bow - the Cagaan Chad, which was preserved with the string still on the bow. It is not a replica, although the general shape might be somewhat similar. It's resting with the tepeliks in place now, and I think it looks quite promising. More to come, when/if I manage to put a string on it. The siyahs are still a bit overbuilt.

great work

Woho! I'm calling this a success :) It seems to be very stable, though that is not too surprising with the low siyah angles and the wide limbs. Feels like about 50 pounds, so this is going to be my practise bow for the summer.

So now I will reduce the siyahs a little and hopefully cover it with leather when I find the time.

Your newest bow looks like great success.

And ... since you've got it done and are planning to practice with it this summer, I would gladly take that two year old, used, MB-lookalike 30# bow at the top of this page off your hands! 8) :lol:

Some of us Olde guys prefer light draw weight bows :) instead of (or because of) shoulder, back or elbow surgery. :cry:

Looks good! Interesting how the tiller is slightly off when braced and good when drawn.

Ken, hehe, I'm starting to understand the low-weight bows too now, and at the same time considering making a shooting machine for the heavier bows. :roll: I haven't been able to find the time to practise enough to be shooting the heavier bows.

Actually the 30-ish pound MB has been hanging in a museum exhibition for the last years, as a representative of one of the horn bow types. Maybe not the best representative, but fair for the non-expert.

Arry, yeah, one limb is a bit stiffer than the other. I kept having to put my knee against the weaker limb to balance it, but it seems to be alright. That's the cool thing about making the bows symmetrical, so it is possible to flip it around to let the weaker limb point up. I guess the effect is more pronounced with a three finger draw than a thum draw though.

By the way, as you may see from one of the pictures, I have used a horn strip that is quite a bit narrower than the wood core in the limbs close to the grip. Like in the crab bows, I filled in the gaps on both sides of the horn with sinew. I used rabbit skin glue there, as I thought it would cope better with the compression then, and it seems to have worked nicely. For the back I used a mixture of hide and bladder glue.

10mm horn + core and 3mm sinew on the bending sections close to the handle.

Congratulation! Very fine bows!

Peter

Kviljo, do I understand correctly: Your horn strip has a thickness of 10mm in the bending section?

Thanks, Peter :)

Arry, the horn and wood core is 10mm together, with an overall thickness of 13mm. Not sure, but I think the horn alone was 5,5mm at the bending section close to the handle.

Ha, all right, thanks!

"shooting machine"?? Some of us call that a crossbow prod :roll: Mount it on a tripod!

Hehe, yes, I guess it will be sort of ballista-ish :)


I was a little off with my estimation of the draw weight of the bow, by the way. It's 70 pounds at 28 inches, and not 50 as I thought 8)

The string is 49 inches long.

I've been shooting some 30 arrows from it tonight, and must admit I'm a little impressed by the performance. After the shooting I did some measuring and plotted a graph of the draw weight. I think it looks fairly alright, with "let off" quite early in the draw.

Great work, did you put any bone plates on this bow?

Todd

Thanks - no bone on this one, except for the "celik" butted inbetween the horns in the grip. Siyahs are ash with natural grown angle at the tips, while the limbs are maple, and a small piece of oak for the grip. Don't think there's any bone in the original either.

Yesterday I shot three arrows for distance yesterday with the mongolian bow, and got these distances when drawn my maximum drawlength (30"?) with three fingers:

* English "Standard" arrow made of ash, weighing 55 grams = 189 meters
* 1/2" English "Livery" war arrow made of ash, weighing 82 gram = 137 meters
* 11/32" Parallell pine shaft with bodkin and 2,5" long parabola fletchings = 208 meter

very nice bow ! and thank you for data.
:wink:

I strung and tillered the hungarian today. After being strung for half a day, it settled to a little over 80 pounds at 28 inches. It does stack more than the mongolian, but it has very little hand shock. - the mongolian on the other hand has more hand shock, but is very smooth to draw.

I'm wondering if this could be expected due to the angles of the bows. Much of the movement on the hungarian is outwards due to the high grip and siyah angle, while the limbs on the mongolian move more forwards-backwards when drawn and shot. Similar experiences?

The tips still need some final adjustments, and the bow need to be covered.

Kviljo wrote:

I strung and tillered the hungarian today. After being strung for half a day, it settled to a little over 80 pounds at 28 inches. It does stack more than the mongolian, but it has very little hand shock. - the mongolian on the other hand has more hand shock, but is very smooth to draw.

I'm wondering if this could be expected due to the angles of the bows. Much of the movement on the hungarian is outwards due to the high grip and siyah angle, while the limbs on the mongolian move more forwards-backwards when drawn and shot. Similar experiences?

The tips still need some final adjustments, and the bow need to be covered.

Congratulations for your bow!
Should I give you an advice the tips would have triangular cross-sections and possible finalized with antler applications like these type of bows from that era.

Examples of triangular cross-sections (Magyarhomorog, grave 103 reconstruction):
https://www.dropbox.com/s/6dq3qqf4z0vf44o/AB7.JPG
https://www.dropbox.com/s/hejjx3v17mfi90p/AB8.JPG

Congratulations, great work !

Thanks guys! Botondbow, those are some very-very fine tips. Pretty sexy stuff. I think I will have to experiment with this for the next hungarian - I've got a core glued up already. These bone plates must go on the tips before sinewing, I guess?

What I have a little trouble with is determining the minimum width and thickness for the tips on these bows. I don't want to risk taking off to much and have them break, but of course want them as light as possible.

Kviljo wrote:

..... These bone plates must go on the tips before sinewing, I guess?

What I have a little trouble with is determining the minimum width and thickness for the tips on these bows. I don't want to risk taking off to much and have them break, but of course want them as light as possible.

You're right, in this case antler plates were applied before sinewing (antler/tip core gaps were filled with sinew only), however "header" type of plates can be applied after sinewing 'cause the throat part of tips is open.

"Closed type" magyar antler plate:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/nzanif067zjtv ... .56.09.jpg

"Header type" of magyar plate:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/azztvltlzu68hn1/DSC05601.JPG

All above mentioned tip characteristics (thickness and width) enough up to 100 lb bows.

Nice bows again, Kviljo!
Botondbow, thanks for posting the photos! Real nice, and a help with new projects.

A while ago I covered the mongolian bow with leather. I simply wrapped the limbs with two pieces, diagonally butted against eachother in the grip. The back and sides are fine, but the about 1cm of leather that is wrapped onto the belly wants to wrinkle up a little too much for my taste. I concluded that this is probably the reason why there seems to be no historical composite that has got leather on the belly. Is this true? - or is it in fact possible to cover the belly or sides of the belly with leather without too much wrinkles?

I used 0,8mm goat leather. The solution for my bow is probably to sand away the wrinkled leather and paint the bow directly.

You could skive the edges of the leather before gluing it on.

Try pre stretched leather.
Veg taned leather have lots of stretch while wet . Dry it under
tension and glue on unstrung bow.
Hope ththis helps.
Zack