"Alternative" bow wood: own one?

[Basschair]

Hi all,

I'm curious to know if any of you own/use a bow that has a stick made from wood other than Brazilwood (including pernambuco) or snakewood...and please remember that carbon fiber is not wood . If you do, let me know what type of wood and what you think about it.

[KSB - Ken Smith]

Originally Posted by Basschair

Hi all,

I'm curious to know if any of you own/use a bow that has a stick made from wood other than Brazilwood (including pernambuco) or snakewood...and please remember that carbon fiber is not wood . If you do, let me know what type of wood and what you think about it.

I have a nice old Bazin (late 19th century) and the Wood always puzzled me. Then while it was out on trial with a copy of the Raffin Cert, he had the appraisal translated and said some kind or Brazilwood but I didn't understand what it meant. Then I looked at the wood carefully and decided that it was Ipe. Ipe was another wood coming out of Brazil that was used for various uses and was relatively cheaper than Pernambuco. The wood is strong and the weight is similar. The Bow is slightly shorter and weighs in at 136 grams. If it was an inch or so longer, it would be closer to the 140 gr range.

I wonder if Bow makers today are looking into using Ipe aka Pau d'Arco. The bark of the Ipe tree is used to make herbal tea. It also tastes like wood when you drink it!

[JimGullen]

Originally Posted by KSB - Ken Smith

I wonder if Bow makers today are looking into using Ipe aka Pau d'Arco.

Greetings!

One of the bows that I roughed out this past summer while working with Lynn Hannings is Ipe. It's still very rough, but it had hair put on it to begin the fine tuning of it's playability. It pulls a very nice, focused sound. It's still too heavy to determine whether it will bounce nicely, but so far I'm optimistic. I believe that Ipe has been used historically.

In addition to finishing the roughing out of my Ipe and Pernambucco sticks, I have two big hunks of Bloodwood to rough into bows for next year. Those are still being planed so I have no idea how they'll play, I've gotta get about 300 grams off of them first! :-)

Lynn says the sticks will make very nice bass bows. I'll have no excuse if it turns out differently...."It's the poor archetier that blames his wood!" :-)

Best regards!

Jim

[stedtale]

hmmm...I'm not sure, but I'm pretty sure my Cliff Johnson is Pernambuco, which is not alternative.

[Basschair]

Originally Posted by KSB - Ken Smith

I have a nice old Bazin (late 19th century) and the Wood always puzzled me. Then while it was out on trial with a copy of the Raffin Cert, he had the appraisal translated and said some kind or Brazilwood but I didn't understand what it meant. Then I looked at the wood carefully and decided that it was Ipe. Ipe was another wood coming out of Brazil that was used for various uses and was relatively cheaper than Pernambuco. The wood is strong and the weight is similar. The Bow is slightly shorter and weighs in at 136 grams. If it was an inch or so longer, it would be closer to the 140 gr range.

I wonder if Bow makers today are looking into using Ipe aka Pau d'Arco. The bark of the Ipe tree is used to make herbal tea. It also tastes like wood when you drink it!

Hey Ken,

Yup, Ipe is one I would have expected. I haven't been able to find it locally to try it out in my little endeavors, but am always on the lookout. It's great to hear you've got a Bazin made of one!

Originally Posted by JimGullen

Greetings!

One of the bows that I roughed out this past summer while working with Lynn Hannings is Ipe. It's still very rough, but it had hair put on it to begin the fine tuning of it's playability. It pulls a very nice, focused sound. It's still too heavy to determine whether it will bounce nicely, but so far I'm optimistic. I believe that Ipe has been used historically.

In addition to finishing the roughing out of my Ipe and Pernambucco sticks, I have two big hunks of Bloodwood to rough into bows for next year. Those are still being planed so I have no idea how they'll play, I've gotta get about 300 grams off of them first! :-)

Lynn says the sticks will make very nice bass bows. I'll have no excuse if it turns out differently...."It's the poor archetier that blames his wood!" :-)

Best regards!

Jim

I've actually got three bloodwood bows in various stages of the process, one of which has hair. It was my first bow build, got massively messed up in the process, but I kept at it. It's nothing to look at, but draws an amazing sound. I've got some amourette that I'm slowly roughing out, but man that stuff is hard work.

[toman]

Isn't ipe what they make hardwood flooring from? Or is it some other wood simply called ipe...

[bassist1962]

Originally Posted by toman

Isn't ipe what they make hardwood flooring from? Or is it some other wood simply called ipe...

I used to lay hardwood flooring, I never really paid attention, but I do remember hearing that word used a lot. I am going to check this out. Just one more thing that DB players have that doubles as something else in another context. Bows and Flooring, Gut strings and Chitlins....I'm leaving now.

[JimGullen]

Originally Posted by toman

Isn't ipe what they make hardwood flooring from? Or is it some other wood simply called ipe...

Greetings!

Yup. We were getting renovations done to our kitchen and the contractor was putting down a piece of wood trim between the kitchen tile and the dining room carpet. The conversation went like this:

"That's a nice looking piece of wood."

"It's a fairly exotic wood called Ipe."

"I didn't know Ipe was used for trim....it makes very nice bows for stringed instruments."

"Yeah, well, it makes an even better deck!"

:-)

Best regards!

Jim

[Basschair]

Just remember, when it's used for flooring, it's pronounced like "eye" with a p at the end.

When it's for a bow, it's pronounced "E-pay."

No joke

[Aleph5]

There was an HGTV show about ipe for flooring and they pronounced it "e-pay." It's an awesome wood, but the certification experts on the show said they've never been able to determine that ipe is sustainable.

[Basshole]

I thought I might point out (not that I know anything about bows, but because I'm Brazilian), that Pau d'Arco means quite literally "wood of bows".

[KSB - Ken Smith]

Originally Posted by Basshole

I thought I might point out (not that I know anything about bows, but because I'm Brazilian), that Pau d'Arco means quite literally "wood of bows".

I knew that!

[Silversorcerer]

It appears that next week some time I will have a very nice new Osage Orange German bow with black horse hair. I ordered it about a year ago, so I have been patiently waiting.

More when it arrives ....

[Basschair]

Originally Posted by Silversorcerer

It appears that next week some time I will have a very nice new Osage Orange German bow with black horse hair. I ordered it about a year ago, so I have been patiently waiting.

More when it arrives ....

If you wouldn't mind, I'd be interested in hearing not just about how it sounds and feels, but who made it as well.

[Silversorcerer]

Oh, you know me. When I have it in hand, I'll write a book....

[Damon Rondeau]

It's used more for outdoor decking than it is for interior hardwood floors. It's pretty much your standard high end wood product for that use these days, I would think. The idea is it's like a teak regarding wear and weather resistance.

[Silversorcerer]

I thought it best to present this bow in a new thread because for me Osage Orange was the wood of first choice, so I really didn't consider it "alternative". "Alternative" now means the better of my two brazilwood bows, one of which I think I might be selling soon.

[LouisF]

I just picked up a $100 ipe wood bow made in China (to use as backup prop on stage). I was really surprised at a) how light it is; and b) how loud it is; The workmanship isn't great, but it beat the $99 Brazilwood bows by a mile.

Maybe more bows should be made of it???

Louis

[Dr Rod]

I have won all of my auditions with a purpleheart bow.


Massarandouba a.k.a. bulletwood is also incredible, cheap, has straight dense grain, wonderful elasticity. It is used for decks and apparently it can stand the weather untreated for many years.

All woods have resin, but apparently the bulletwood resin has certain desirable characteristics for bowmaking. Apparently after bending it cools to the new shape giving the bow certain structural advantages. I am paraphrasing something I heard from a Portugese tropical wood specialist.

Prochownik is now making many bulletwood bows, he told me that when he sends bows for trial he sends a mix of Massarandouba and traditional pernambuco. Apparently the bulletwood bows sell quicker.

[LouisF]

Dear Rod,

Thanks. This ipe bow had an amazing effect on the Swanson! Fascinating.

Louis