Making A Bow
The most important part of crafting a bow is ensuring that the materials used are not strained beyond their breaking point. Due to the large amount of energy stored in a drawn bow, failures are often spectacular — often described as explosions because of the loud crack and flying debris. If a bow is being made from wood or a combination of natural materials (often called a primitive or traditional bow) careful attention must be paid to the selected materials. There are often natural twists, knots, bends or other variations that must be taken into account and worked with to ensure that the bow will not fracture at any point along its length. Serious injury can result from bow failure or if the bow string breaks. Due to this, traditional bows must be made individually.
Wood bow staves are often made from trees such as Osage Orange (Maclura pomifera), English Yew (Taxus baccata) and Siberian Elm (Ulmus pumila).
Read more about this topic: Bowyer
Famous quotes containing the words making a, making and/or bow:
““Pray my dear,” quoth my mother, “have you not forgot to wind up the clock?”M”Good G—!” cried my father, making an exclamation, but taking care to moderate his voice at the same time,—”Did ever woman, since the creation of the world, interrupt a man with such a silly question?””
—Laurence Sterne (1713–1768)
“some genius of the South
With blood-hot eyes and cane-lipped scented mouth,
Surprised in making folk-songs from soul sounds.”
—Jean Toomer (1894–1967)
“I never knowed how clothes could change a body before. Why, before, he looked like the orneriest old rip that ever was; but now, when he’d take off his new white beaver and make a bow and do a smile, he looked that grand and good and pious that you’d say he had walked right out of the ark, and maybe was old Leviticus himself.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)