Yesterday we held the first day of our first longbow making course at Anchor.
6 willing volunteers braved the workshop with the intention of making a bow each in just 2 days.
After a couple of hours of instruction, rasping, sanding, scraping and filing the bows were ready to teach how to bend.
a careful eye for the developing curve of the limbs and precision pencil marking leads to even more scraping and sanding…
at each stage we exercised the bows to test the bend and ‘teach’ them where we want them to go, exposing any stiff or weak spots in the limbs and racking up plenty of steps for those with step counters.
The only problem all day was persuading the team to put down the tools long enough to get some lunch! No one seemed to want to stop.
But eventually by early afternoon we were all fed and the bows were developing a nice even bend.
By the end of the day the nocks were glued in place and the process of shaping started, (much to the disgust of those with any sense of smell). We even had a few smiles on the end of day group photo.
Bow making part 2 …. coming next week
