longbowmenscoice

"Longbowman's Choice"

A Special Howard Hill Bow for Members of the Howard Hill Longbowmen

In late April of 2007, discussion on the Howard Hill Longbowmen's email list raised the question of whether Craig might be willing to produce a special or limited edition bow that would be available only to members of the group. Craig said that he would. There was discussion on the list about the possible characteristics of such a bow. Once ideas and possible choices were presented, votes were taken on what was preferred. After several such votes, it developed that the majority of the group that was interested in a special bow preferred a natural or traditional look, i.e. a natural wood appearance as opposed to colored glass and some features were wanted that would make the bow unique. There were a few points at which no clear preference was exhibited, and the idea came up of having a basic bow design, but with some choices left for each person to make when ordering. This, basically, was how the "Longbowman's Choice" came to be.

Here are the characteristics of the bow as they were finalized:

The "Longbowman's Choice" is a 5 lam bow. The outer lams are either osage orange or yew, buyer's choice. There are two inner lams of bamboo, plus a contrasting center lam, which can be of the same wood as the outer lams (osage or yew) or of cocobolo. Some will prefer to have the center lam match the outside lams, others may prefer the darker contrast of the cocobolo. A carbon lam can be specified if the buyer chooses, but involves an extra cost of $75. . The carbon lam would be placed behind the first osage or yew lam. (The carbon makes a fine dark line when viewed from the side and the cocobolo center lam makes a nice dark matching stripe with the carbon). The riser wood and tip overlays will be either Texas Ebony, a rare ebony that grows in the US, or cocobolo. The Texas Ebony would involve an extra cost of $35. The bow will have a silver inlay which will be a copy of a Howard Hill broadhead. (Note: This inlay was developed specifically for this bow and we're kind of proud of that). Finish may be either matte or, at an extra cost of $25, glossy. Grip shape (straight, dished, or locator) can be specified by the buyer. Grip wrap will be laced Elk. Bows will be signed "Custom Series by Craig Ekin" and will be available only to members of the Howard Hill Longbowmen. Cost would run from a low $625 with the matte finish and cocobolo to $685 sigh gloss finish and ebony, but without carbon or $760 full bore with carbon, plus $20 shipping in the US. Shippiing outside the US will vary. (Take down is also available at $125 additional).

(Note: These prices are at the time of posting and would obviously be subject to change based on changes in pricing at Howard HIll Archery, which, like any business, is faced with changing supply and labor costs, etc. Purchasers will make their own final arrangements with the company, including assurance that they are members of the Howard Hill Longbowmen email list. )

As to "membership" status, we're going to assume that most people are good folks, and simply ask that when placing an order, you tell Craig that you're a member. This bow is very meaningful to active members of the group, but would obviously be less so to non-members. The truth is, there is no charge for being a member of the Howard Hill Longbowmen's email list. Enthusiasm for Howard Hill bows and participation are the only requirements. If someone who wasn't a member really wanted to get the bow in spite of the fact that it would mean little to them as a non-member, they could just sign up, order the bow, and unsubscribe. I'm not real sure why someone would be motivated to go that route, but I supose it could happen. Meantime, all of the guys who are really enjoying the list can get something special and it really will mean something to them, because of its origin from within the group and as a reminder of the fellowship and information exchange we are all enjoying. Yes, I'm an optimist... next week, world peace....

Order the bow by contacting Craig Ekin at Howard Hill Archery direct: (406) 363-1359 or hhill@montana.com (Email contact is preferred... the phone interupts Craig when he's building our bows!)

At this posting, the final details have just been worked out and the first two bows have been ordered. Pictures will be posted (extensively!) as soon as we see some bows. Check back on this space approx. the end of June.

Dick Wightman

Captain Dick

First Longbowman's Choice

Osage

June 23, 2007

the first bow is here! My Osage Longbowman's Choice arrived via FedEx just as I was leaving for a doctor's appointment... darn it! I opened the box and looked, and was wowed, but I couldn't do any more than that till late this afternoon. I have now examined it thoroughly, photographed it and, of course shot it.

Comments:

My choices were for Osage with just about all the extra's short of take down. The bow is absolutely beautiful. The Texas Ebony is a soft dark brown with quite a nice visible grain, and heavy enought to add to the substantial feel of the bow. The elk grip is nice and soft. I violated my past practice and opted for a straight grip for the first time on a bow I ordered new. I told Craig not to make it too deep... he knows I have small hands... and he didn't. It's a very nice feel in my hand. The length is 66"... also a variance from my norm. Past bows I've ordered new have been 60" to 64". However, I wanted to try a bit longer in my own draw length, and had also recently traded for a Cheetah bow that was 45# @ 25" and 66" long and for some strange reason I kind of like to have bows in pairs. Anyway, here is the first delivered Longbowman's Choice:


Here's a closer shot of the Howard Hill broadhead inlay. Not the serial designation "LC". I guess it could either be for "Longbowman's Choice", or, more likely given Craig's usual practice, the L is for the bow, and the C is for Craig, indicating that it's a Longbowman's Choice made by Craig. Same convention as with the use of "BC" for the Big Fives. Of course, the 66 is for the bow length and the 5606 the serial number.	This shot and the previous one do a nice job of showing the soft brown color and grain of the Texas Ebony, and the lam construction... osage, carbon, bamboo, cocobolo as an accent stripe, bamboo, and osage. Clear glass over, of course.
Only bows ordered by members of this group will get this inscription.	Here's a nice shot showing the lovely grain in the Osage
I think the way the colors show in the tip is especially neat.	Texas Ebony tip overlay
elk lace grip	So, it's pretty.... but does it shoot? For me, right at this moment, the question is even more, "Does it shoot reasonably close to the same as my 48# Black Wolf, using the same arrows. This is of special interest because I'm only few days away from leaving for Calgary for the 2007 North American Longbow Safari, and I want to take two bows. My arrows are spined for me shooting 48#, i.e. 50 - 55# spine on a 28" shaft with a 25" draw. Don't ask me all the physics of that, but it has worked well for me for over a year now. So, string the bow up and check it out... indoor target first...
Here you have the results at my usual 13 + - range, shooting from the driveway into the garage... That's just about where my 48# bows group with the same arrows... a little low. So, what about the target bags in the back yard?	Bow looks good... we won't talk about the archer...
This is my 20 yard target on the 5 bag back yard range. One flyer, darn it...	OK... so I shot the flyer over! This is at 20 yards, and really is about the best i can do at that distance. I know I keep reading about the guys who can put this group into a Copenhagen can at this distance, but I can't say I've walked around a 3D course with one yet.

I hereby pronounce the Longbowman's Choice a great success. Working with the group to plan it was a great experience, and has resulted in a beautiful bow that performs well. With the special inlay and the contrast stripe in the lams, I'd say it's as good looking as my Special Edition numbered bows. As soon as one of you get a Yew model, send me pix and I will add them.

Captain Dick

Some Observations on Shooting

I was real interested in doing some shooting comparisons of the several very similar bows I now have. My interest was in finding out to what degree, if any, I could sense or feel the differences resulting from bow length, carbon vs. non-carbon, and the 3# difference in the bows I was concerned with. I was also interested in learning whether I could see a difference in them resulting from arrow spine vs. bow weight.

The bows involved were:

Longbowman's Choice... 66" and 45# @ 25" draw... this bow has a carbon lam inside

Black Wolf ... 64" and 48# @ 25" draw... this bow is basically a Big Five with a carbon back

Tembo take-down... 60" and 48# @ 25" draw... no carbon

Cheetah... 66" and 45# @ 25" draw... no carbon

The arrows used were all wood, cut to 28" with 125 gr. points. This means 3" of arrow beyond the draw length. Early on I found this worked for me and have stuck with it. One batch of arrows was Sitka Spuce spined at 50 - 55#. This was the one used for all but one experiment. The other was a batch of POC, footed with purpleheart, spined according to the seller at 40 - 45#, but measuring just over 50# on my spine tester. I suspect they were lighter in spine before they got footed, but I don't know enough to say.

Part of the reason, beyond curiousity, for my tests was that I am about to leave for the NALS in Calgary, and hadn't yet decided for sure which bows were going. I wanted to take two. I pretty much new that the Black Wolf, which has become my "go to" bow, would be one, but I also wanted to take the LC, but only if I knew that my arrows wouldn't shoot too differently in it vs. the Wolf.

The first effort was to shoot three groups... one with the Choice, one with the Cheetah and one with the Wolf. I shot four arrows, pulled any flyers (Yes, I still get flyers) and reshot them, then did the same with the other two bows. I felt this gave me a good reading on how they shot, with a minimum of confusing the whole thing with my errors. I pretty much know when I make a good shot or a bad one by feel, and I couldn't see any point in trying to make decisions or observations based on my own poorest shooting.

Shooting was at 13 yds. Here is the result:

You can pretty much see that there are really two groups here... one high and one low. I don't think this is the result of velocity, but rather just nock placement between the bows. The groups are consistant and I know that I could shoot any one of these bows and, after a few rounds at the practice butts, mentally adjust my target computer to allow for their differences. The spine issue proved to be very minor... a slight tendency to the left for the Choice, indicating it would possibly do better with a lighter spine.

The next experiment was to pull four of the arrows and shoot them from the Tembo. There were two flyers out of four here. The bow has a different feel, being both short and takedown. These two were, as above, re-shot. Result below... basically, same group, maybe favoring the right a bit.

The next experiment was really interesting. I set the Choice, Cheetah and Wolf on a table and shot a 12 shot group (again, reshooting obviously bad shots I attributed to me). However, in this experiment, I shot one arrow from the Choice, then one from the Wolf, then one from the Cheetah, and repeataed until I had what I considerred to be12 reasonably competent shots. Obviously, the group opened up, but again, I think I could perform to my own level of cabability with any one of these bows.

As a final experiment, I tried the footed arrows that were supposed to be lighter... surprise... I got the best group of the day! It's clearly left, indicating these are still too stiff, but they sure shot consistently. There were no re-shoots in this group. Maybe I can get to where I can shoot a Copenhagen can...

Some Observations

I could not detect any difference in feel between the two 66" bows and the 64" bow. All were equally smooth. I did feel a bit of difference when shooting the 60" Tembo, and also felt that just maybe it was a bit less forgiving of form errors, but that could have been because the grip feel of the takedown was so different, too. While both bows weigh out correctly at 45#, I do find the Choice with carbon a bit harder to push/pull string. I think it's power curve starts a bit higher. However, it's also a brand new bow while the Cheetah is older.

Would anything I did change the way I order bows? Not really. I like my takedowns short... that's the whole point, and I'm happy with them at 60". For regular longbows, either 64" or 66" seems to work fine for me. I think I like the look of the 66" better, but I like the easier stringing of the 64", so it's a toss up.

I do feel that the 45# bows would benefit from lighter spined arrows, but I don't have time to make a batch before the NALS.

So, who's going to Calgary? The Wolf and the Choice.

Dick

First Yew Longbowman's Choice

Hi Dick,

Attached are photo's of my new Longbowmen's Choice. Texas Ebony riser and tips, yew lams belly and back, cocobola and a carbon lam between the bamboo lams. The bow is 64", 50#'s @ 28". I thought you might might want to post some of these pictures so the guys could see the difference between the osage and yew lams. This is a beautiful bow and and a great shooter. Thanks for all your help!

Craig Ambos

Tom Ireland's Left Handed LBC

We haves a goodly number of LBC's coming, and I'm not going to add pictures of every one to this page, but Tom Ireland just got the first leftie, and also the first I've seen with the arrow horizontal, which I really like and would do if I ordered another. Dick

Hi Dick.....
Attached are some pics of my LBMC that arrived this AM. I took about eight, and edited, cropped and resized most.
Put those that you deem appropriate on the site. The last pic is one of the uuper half of the bow strung.....I tried to resize it but that caused all the virtical lines to get zig-zagged. So i just cropped it. Maybe you can resize it without
distorting it......
Thanks.......looking forward to our Oct get-together!
Tom Ireland
Hagerstown, MD

(Comment: I have to agree with Tom. I think the Longbowman's Choice is flat out the prettiest Hill yet. Dick)

Captain Dick's New Osage Longbowman's Choice

Posted June 2008

During the winter of 2007/2008, I began to experience fairly severe shoulder problems and had to drastically drop the weight of the bows I was shooting. I had been shooting from roughly 45# to as high as 60#. New conditioins required that I shoot from 35# to 40#, and, in fact, I'm doing a good bit of my shooting now with 30# - 35#, and, (a secret pleasure) even doing some with recurves. I sold off most of my Hill collection when I realized I would simply never again shoot bows that heavy.

In spite of the problems, I still wanted to shoot Hills and so ordered a new Longbowman's Choice, specifying 36# - 38#. I may have been over confidant. The new bow came, at 38#, and I was concerned I might actually not be able to handle it. However, we are settling down together and I think I will get at least this summer and maybe next out of it. If the weight becomes a problem, I have two options: I can have Craig take some weight off or I can order another at 32#. Only time will tell...

Meantime, this one is, if anything, even more beautiful than the first one. The osage has some fantastic streaks of darker yellow shading into orange and even red streaks of countergrain running through it... absolutley gorgeous. The specs on the bow are 64" (a bit shorter hoping to get a bit more speed for the light arrows) and 38# @ 25".