Thursday, February 16, 2006

Skill: Firebow

I finished my firebow. To finish it up I smoothed the surface by scraping it with a knife and sanding it. After that I wood burned a freehand bear design near the handle and also added detail to the carved bear head tip. I then stained the whole piece. The last step was to wrap the handle in some leather strips.

Here is the finished piece.


In a short term survival situation, you're probably not going to take the time to make one like this. You would just grab a sturdy stick nearby. You might, however, make one like this if you are in a long term survival situation. There are a couple nice things about this stick. First, the cord length can be quickly changed without having to tie a knot. In fact, you don't ever need to tie a knot. This is handy since it can easily adjust to different spindle diameters. Second, it has a comfortable handle which is good to have when cranking away at a coal.

Here is the detail of the bear. I first sketched the design with pencil based on a picture I found and then burned over it. I like how it blends in with the grain as if the tree grew that way naturally. Also you can see the hole where you can feed or take up slack on the string.


Here is the tip after wood burning and stain.


I can't wait to bust a coal with this thing!

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Slick!
I thought the bear head was on the handle end, but it looks real nice on the nock end.

Powerful nice faint woodburning. Makes "Lil' Bruder" look like a steaming pile of doo doo.

Anonymous said...

Awesome design, Sass. The carving/burning is beautiful, and the knotless adjustability is brilliant.

Anonymous said...

Sassmouth, I liked your adjustable bowstring so much, I decided to use a similar design on my first bowdrill.

Anonymous said...

Does anyone else see the wolf image within the wood grain on the second picture?

Anonymous said...

Does anyone else see the wolf imahe within the grain of the wood on the second picture?