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Simple, easy to make, good margins, confidence building? What about sawn disk animals and snowmen for the next few weeks, turned Christmas trees, etc. Chopping boards and bread boards can do well, I'm told.Put them on Facebook and Instagram

For me, its not the making that's important, its the selling that's the important bit. It's the reason I am a teacher, not a professional maker, I am an awful businessman. I can work hard, work quickly and produce work to a high standard, can't market, can't negotiate, can't close a sale...

Anyone remember the article that suggested fixing jam jars full of nails/bolts/screws to roof joists or walls by their lids. It was going to change my life til a mate who tried it pointed out what happens when a row of glass jars filled with shrapnel and just above head height meets a 4x2 being...

Well , I too am an adict and a hoarder, I have a single garage and never throw anything out. My workbench is half a ledge and brace door. The other half is stacked with tools. I have enough room to stand next to it before the stuff begins. There is floor to roof stack of racking for carving...

On my to-do list is to make a wood-frame bike as it looks like the parking outside work might be put over to parking meter and I may need to park up and cycle in the last mile or so, so a small wheel bike that fits in the back of the car might be a good idea. I think I've worked out most of the...

Wow Mark, just wow! I don't actually shoot very much any more, I am focussing on my building skills now, my skills with horn and antler are coming along reasonably well, my sinew work is ok too, my son is an archaeology student looking to specialise in Persia and the eastern Mediterranean so a...

Thanks Doug, I'll check it out

Umm, the trite reply is as much as I can get. I currently have a lightweight yew/sinew crossbow in-build which needs the equivalent of 6 leg tendons and 1 backstrap. Over the next 2 years, probably, I have started a horn composite I will probably sinew next summer that will need 5 to 10 times...

My preferred bowstring material is linen, though sinew does make an excellent string, its really really really difficult to come by in the UK as most butchers use prejointed cuts rather than butchering carcasses, so, any I get hold of I keep for backings

Thanks Keith, much appreciated. Suffolkboy, beef and deer sinew were commonly used, tendon from ankles and silverskin from the ribs, but most useful is the backstrap along the spine. In tendons, length is the most important factor

Yeah, sorry about that I try to avoid technical terms as much as possible but there's no short way of saying paring away the wood so that the bow will bend in a sweet curve without damaging it

Me too, am really fed up with inadequate reproductions and poorly informed academics' and novelists' speculations leading to wild statements both positive and negative about these weapons . Hopefully I can build something using the original's measurements and materials and get some decent data

Thanks Tony! I haven't been up to Whitney for years, will give them a bell. Switch twisty grain out for interlocking grain and he's correct, yew sapwood is often too thick and needs reducing to 2 or 3 mm, not difficult but a few hours of potching about you don't have to spend on elm

Cheers Tom, Wentwood was my first call, then Interesting Timbers but neither have anything suitable at the moment

Also, there can be issues with diseased timber, beetle damage means the wood is useless but fungal damage can be difficult to spot and you only know the elasticity or compression strength is compromised when the bow breaks. I lost 2 apple bows while I was tillering them for no reason and all I...

Am in South Wales, its really uncommon here, if I do spot any I will certainly ask if I can cut it.

Coppiced elm at 4 to 6" diameter at centre would have been perfect for my needs.

Crossbows did use steel from the later middle ages , but not really til the 16th century, nowadays its all carbon fibre, but my interest is in really early crossbows from the 11th to 15th century, that is bows of wood, wood and sinew, and horn and sinew composites

Yew is the best, unequivocally, a magical bow-wood, except perhaps for osage orange but wytch elm (wytch actually means bendy) was the bow wood of choice before yew replaced it, and it continued to be in use until fire arms replaced archery, I believe the Mary Rose inventory included elm war bows.

Branches are tricky to use as they have compression and tension wood and are often very knotty but on a huge tree with primitive tools can be the only option. If you know what you are doing, they can be superior as branches are more flexible than mature stems. The original 11th century bow I...