Hello gcp1975
Ok, this wasn’t meant to be, but has turned out to be a bit long..... And it is still a work in progress.
But, I was using some PVC pipe for a small project and thought about your project and the last thing said.
I said.........
I was not actually making a bow but I have lots of pvc pipes, and stronger pipes would be useful, so might give the x2 pipe glue idea a try, simply to see if it works.
piglet
But I thought, why not have a go at making a bow and perhaps help you solve your own problem?
Anyway, I decided on a 4 and half foot length, (purely ‘cos that’s the length it was and I didn’t have any other use for it) of 25 mm outside diameter with a 21mm inner diameter pipe.
Then, after a few experiments with various smaller pipes,
(which didn’t end well), I plumped on a piece slightly longer with a 20mm outer diameter and 18 mm inner diameter. This gave me enough space, to add the glue between. Pipes too close in size, and the glue stripped when inserting the smaller into the larger.
So, I first coated the thinner of the 2 pipes with heat gun glue, by holding the glue stick over a paint stripper/heat gun and rubbed it onto the pipe as if it was a crayon.
(Took 2 glue sticks)
Then I left it outside to cool off.
The glue had gone on very unevenly and had lots of bumps, so I used the heat gun again to heat a pallet knife and used that to iron the glue smooth, first length ways and then around, by simply twisting the pipe in my fingers.
(I did this as the glue made it a tight fit and so I thought, screwing the inner into the outer would probably be the best way and this might help, if that makes sense?)
In my earlier experiment/test, I tried using the heat gun direct to the glue on the pipe but the pipe had a lower softening point than the glue and distorted)
Now, as I said earlier, the inner pipe was slightly longer than the outer and I made it this way in case the pipe started to get stuck whilst screwing it in....which it did at around three quarters of the way in.
(Excess to be trimmed off later)
I used cold water to act as lubricant and it helped a lot.
Anyway, I had to tap the last quarter of the pipe through gently, which worked fine without stripping any of the glue.
So now I have a pipe with an outer diameter of 25mm and an inner diameter of 18mm, so if my maths is good a wall thickness of 3.5 mm. Now I don’t remember if this is the same as schedule 40, but it does seem strong and I could not get more than about a 6 inch bend, from centre, at each end.
I guess that will change once flattened?
I don't know if any of this is any help to you, but it really wasn't that difficult, as it only took about 2 hours and that was whilst I was doing other little jobs at the same time.
All you need is to find pipe suitable for your needs.
So now all I need to do is make some kind of flattening jig and hopefully the 2 pipes will bond during this process.
Then, I will need to learn how to measure and make a bow string and find an arrow or three, from somewhere and see if it actually works.
And yes, I have realised that I don’t actually have a target capable of stopping and trapping an arrow affectively, when I do eventually test it, but I am already working on that.
(watch this space)
piglet
