Wiley

Wiley represents my foray into the world of fiberglass recurve bows after having spent so much time and energy making all-wood bows.  While I personally would rather make and shoot wooden-limbed bows, there is a certain utility in fiberglass limbs, not to mention a market.  I have to admit, I very much missed the time and attention that goes into tillering the limbs of a wooden bow.  The hours spent making sure the limbs bend just so and and just the right draw weight lend themselves to a feeling of connection to and ownership of the bow.  It isn't to say that feeling isn't there with a fiberglass bow--the time I would have spent manually shaving off minuscule amounts of wood and then checking the tiller and repeating until the job is done was rather spent prepping with great precision all the parts that go into a recurve glue-up.  And there is something magical about a glue-up done right, as the bow comes out of the form perfectly tillered (at hopefully close to the weight for which you were aiming).  Luckily, my favorite part of bowyering, sculpting the wooden riser, is unchanged with fiberglass bows.  There's certainly no less work in a recurve, however it's more work of the mind rather than muscle.  I wonder if I'll ever get used to the feeling of completing a bow without sore muscles.