Pacific Yew Inc. Bow Workshop - Highly Recommended!
man_bites_dog
to shoot and enjoy my target compound bow. Through the ten years I've
practiced with my compound bow, the oft overlooked and always dusty recurve
and longbows that stood in the corners and layed on pegs above doorways in
archery stores caught my eye. I grew curious what the feeling would be to
break the "x" with one of these older bows. I decided to take the plunge
one day after many hours of fiddling with set screws, switching stabilizers,
questioning grain weight and second guessing my arrow rest adjustment and
sight alignment. The original simplicity of stick, sting and arrow lured me
to take a turn to the traditional, to return to the "analog" version of our
ancient sport.
I was recently lucky enough to travel to the State of Washington and take a
class from Jay St. Charles in his Pacific Yew Self Bow 2-day hands-on
workshop in Fall City, WA about a 40 minute trip from Seattle-Tacoma
Airport.
Two full days for sure! Starting from an expertly spliced and glued
two-piece Pacific Yew stave by Jay, he demonstrated, coached and assisted my
three other classmates and me in the finer points of bow construction from
roughing the stave to tillering, polishing, custom leather handle and final
oil finish. One of our classmates had built several bows with Jay in
previous classes, another fella was a bowyer from Holland who for his
personal hobby crafts his own machined risers for his manufactured limbs and
then I and the fourth fella had never built a bow before, let alone used
many of the tools.
If you are concerned that the tools are too difficult or the technique too
tedious, not to worry! I can assure you that each of us left with a bow we
ever imagined we'd be able to produce! Jay managed the various skilled and
novice abilities of our class with incredible ease. A wonderful teacher! I
had used several of the tools (block plane, wood rasp and sandpaper) for
previous jobs around the house and so they did not feel foreign. The
drawknives and cabinet scraper however, were completely new to me and a bit
daunting at first but, some easy-going coaching from Jay and LOTS of extra
width in the wood allowed me to recover from the digs and cuts of my
aggressive cuts and peels.
His shop is in a terrific wood barn in the rear of his property and was
fully equipped and available for our use. Jay is giving not only of his
knowledge but of patient and careful instruction and remarkably the use of
his own personal tools. Many of them are no longer made. How many of us
would let a complete stranger come to our home and use our expensive tools?
A wonderful, rare treat! The views from the barn are of the Cascade
Mountains and a lush valley of pastureland for his neighbors cows. Jay's
knowledge and his family's deep history in archery come through in the
casual discussion among the class.
If you have a passion or even a curious interest for the longbow, take a
weekend away from TV, errands and the like and I guarantee you'll walk out
of Jay's workshop with a piece of history, a wealth of understanding about
English archery and a bow you'll be tempted to try and save before your
prized tennis trophy or favorite sweater if the house ever catches fire!
Jay, a personal note.
You provided two great days of enjoyment and opened my eyes to some of the
origins of our sport! My bow arrived earlier today safe and sound. It was
not 5 minutes before I had it unpacked and showed it to my co-workers and
not ten minutes after I arrived home that I fired my first arrows into my
target. Thank you!
John Kristoff
Raleigh, NC
Links:
http://www.selfbow.com
Email for Jay St. Charles
in...@selfbow.com
Chris Kinata
upstairs at Northwest Archery. I was stunned at the end of the long
(then) single day, to have a bow that really worked and looked great.
Still my pride and joy. Also praise for Jay...it seems all too rare in this
world to find a person who freely shares their enthusiasm and
knowledge without reservation or counting the cost.
An unsolicited comment.
Rock on, archery dudes!
man_bites_dog wrote in message ...