starting a 1400's replica

First topic message reminder :

after lots of evenings of reading have decide that the "crossbow of Matthias Corvinus 1489" will be the design that I will be using as a model. 30" tiller, 24-26" bow, 2 axis lock,, well documented and even an X-ray of the lock.. drawing up plans and gather materials.. calculated the nut size and enlarged the x-ray photo to match, gives me a good pattern of the lock.. wanting to test my new tools with antler, made an arbor and turned a nut blank on the lathe,, set up the boring head in the bench mill and milled a section for the forward nut bearing.. new tools are great!! my holly logs that have been dry for 5 years are spalted and worthless for crossbow needs (they were cut at the worst time) looking at locating a hornbeam billet.. 

had good results with my big ferrier's rasp and 4 in 1 rasp,, scrapers cleaned things up well, the 10" rikon deluxe model (bigger motor, better table and resaw fence) I picked up over 2 years back is a little beast, I trimmed the hornbeam billets down with the resaw fence.. 4" and it cut it like pine,, hopefully I'll get 2 nice plates from each bone top, with still more bone to get more sections.. I do plan to add an adjustable fence to my spindle sander so it can work as a thickness sander..
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You probably should check out this thread http://www.primitivearcher.com/smf/index.php/topic,68057.0.html

Horn crossbow build, don't know if its along the lines you're thinking of for the bow but its an interesting build all the same.

thinking about wood removal for the inlay sections, I have some dremel router attachments that should work fine in the flat sections, but the convex and concave would give problems, turned and milled a small adjustable dremel attachment for the hand piece unit,, should now be able to make a sets of depth holes in the region that need to be removed and clear the rest away with carving tools..
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I found fitting the side inlays was less challenging to do than I anticipated. I expected it to be really difficult but it actually wasn't too hard.  Pre-forming the inlays to match the curves of the stock helps a lot, as it makes it far easier to trace their outline onto it, as does knifing in the outlines to give a crisp edge.  Take your time and have fun with it.

well the band saw did not want to cut the bone straight, test pieces of oak fine, bone no. guess I'll be using hand saws at my shop at work (it's cold in garage for the next few days) forgot that in my tool stash that there is an actual butchers hand saw.. after 9 days the 2day shipping box arrived, at the same time the standard mail package I ordered on thursday (from the west coast) arrived. the "ivory" stock look and feel great,, the aftermarket precise dremel router attactment looks like a very nice addition to the tool stash..
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When I used a bandsaw for bone it left sticky white residue all over the blade, pretty much trashed it, hand tools are very effective, I used a hard point saw to good effect

the butcher's saw did a good job,  hot glued a wood block to one side, vised it up and big rasp to level the back side.. a little time on course sandpaper on the tablesaw top,, remove block and hot glue the flat side down onto a flat board,, rasp,course sandpaper, check thickness and repeat.. several nice plates ready for use.. found that 80g sandpaper seemed to work the best for overall work, courser and the bone did not bite in, finer and it clogged, 
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Nice work!

Nice

thanks all, thinking that the final shaping of the tiller is about where it should be and time to start laying out the inlay work..  sawed and shaped a couple more bone plates to add to the stock..
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started the inlay layout,, will do a little wood shaping to remove some of the more curved  sections where needed.. also found a flat headed screw/bolt, recessed the top and bottom to fit..
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figured the next step would be to inset the cranequin lugs (for lack of a better term) to make the stock for them I had to use a section of antler I had been saving for a nut in the future, but it had the best matching color.. mostly creamy white like the alt ivory. 
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sawed, rasped, sanded and filed the antler blanks close to final shape, recessed the tiller for them, the dremel router base worked great in getting this job done, some small sharp chisels to clean-up the edges during the make to fit work.. back side of the blanks were roughed up to give some tooth for the epoxy. added a drop of yellow tint to improve the epoxy color match. now for the over night cure..
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precision swiss cheese.. started making all the depth control holes.. now to re-sharpen my carving tools and commence wood removal..
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this months purchases all arrived on the same day!! having a mix match of carving tools I bought a reasonable priced set, as long as the steel is "good" figuring the edges can be tuned in decent tools.. needed a little more of the 1/8" alt ivory the supplier has a min. order value so I added some other products fill the order. it looks great.. finally in the mountains of NC not that far away, is a sturgeon farm selling caviar and smoked fillets.. they also sell the air bladders!!!.. so it's tune up the tools this weekend and back to work..
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That is so lucky, I’m very jealous

cleaned up the carving tools, some oil soaked steel wool removed the shipping gunk well.. went after the edges with diamond hones , fine round hones and stropping.. the steel seems good and took very nice edges, the hornbeam will be a good test on how well they keep them..

Seems like things are really coming on.  If you’ve never used carving tools before then practice on some scrap first. Just in case you haven’t, knife in the outline then cut around the edge with the v-tool then work from the edge into the centre in layers; don’t dig down to your final depth in one go and don’t cut toward the edges unless it’s absolutely unavoidable. Once your happy with the depth tidy away the waste between the knifing and the v-tool cut. I’m sure you knew all that, like I said, it’s just in case. Have you used carving chisels? Tapping with a mallet is much better than using the push-pull two handed method.....oh, and start with fairly deep gouges then use medium curve then nearly flat to smooth out the cuts and to make sure you avoid digging in the corners of the gouge. Things go badly if you dig in the wings of a carving gouge....,

thanks, I've used carving tools before, but mainly have collection of odds and sods. one or two better ones that I bought, a couple older ones that came in box lot of antique tools, a small set vieners, a few that I made from propane torch forging concrete nails and adding dogwood handles,,figured it was time to add to the mess, the package deal averaged about 2 dollars a tool so not to much ventured.. kind of wonder what quality of tools the makers in the 1400's had..

I figure that if a blacksmith could make it, then  master carvers would order it. Metallurgy was pretty advanced, steel crossbows were beginning to come in, they understood hardening and armour and edged weapon techniques were very sophisticated. Pretty sure a toolmaking guild (cutlers/blacksmiths) would have no difficulty supplying high quality carving tools. Do a quick image search for Tillman Reimenschneider, he was roughly contemporary, working 1460 to 1530. He definitely did not have poor quality tools

hornbeam does not care if you have high-end or cheap carving tools,, the stuff is just tough with a capital T... my new tools held their edges well along with the several costlier tools I have, it was just slow going anything over 3/8"ths wide is about useless.. the depth hole system worked well and the main inlay area has had a 1/8" th layer of the rock-like wood removed.. a little more clean-up and pattern making will start..
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These super-hard woods are best worked while they are green. Wetting them can make a huge difference. Looking really nice by the way