>>933517I have only built one bow from scratch. It was what they call a board bow, meaning you go to your local hardware store and buy a board, something like pecan, and you tiller it down until it bends like a bow. These break often because you are not following a growth ring in the wood, which makes it much stronger.
Still this is a good place to begin as it is cheap when the learning curve is steep. I killed a couple of pigs with mine.
I don't think you can dry wood over a fire, as it tends to split and check. They normally cut the wood, Osage, Yew, or whatever and let it dry naturally for something like a year. You can buy wood already dried.
Here is the first of a set of books that are very good to learn from.
