Due to production levels and current order pace the leadtime for bow orders is 12 months from reciept of deposit.

Traditional Bows made for Hunters by a Hunter

Black Canyon bows are unique and truly custom made.  I control all steps of the process from start to finish. Every step from the selection of the raw materials, the grinding of the laminations, the glue up and shaping of the bow are all done in house to my exacting requirements. The result of all this effort is a true custom made traditional bow that will satisfy the most demanding archer.  Longbows and Recurve  bows in both 1 piece and take down configurations are available.

Black Canyon Longbows: These bows are a product of years of research and experimentation. The result of this time and effort is what I believe to be the finest shooting straight limb bows available.

My current design evolved from a variation of a straight handle classic style longbow. My first designs employed a straight riser section paired with a highly reflexed limb design. The bow basically inverted itself when unstrung and exhibited over 4 inches of reflex in the limbs in the unstrung state. This bow shot well, with much higher performance than the common straight handle long bow but it had a few undesirable characteristics common to the classic longbow design. Through several years of  experimentation with riser shape as well as the placement and amount of pre stress in the limb my current design evolved. This bow is not what many purists consider a traditional longbow. While I appreciate the lines of a classic longbow, continuing with that style of bow was not my intent. This bow is an evolution of the classic longbow driven by experimental data to provide superior performance without losing the desirable qualities of the classic longbow.

This bow design is where the data leads, delivering the arrow speed of the fastest recurves with the durability and silence of a classic longbow. It represents the best of both worlds. This is a hunting weapon, designed from a hunter’s perspective. Stability, accuracy, high arrow speed and shock free silent shooting are the characteristics I was after. These attributes are present in the Black Canyon Longbow.

Black Canyon Recurve bows: After many years working on the design of my longbow I turned my attentions to developing a recurve bow that I would be satisfied with. This recurve design started, to a great degree, from the promptings of a close friend who desired a recurve that shot as well as the longbows I had built for him. The voice of the customer in action!

I feel that the main advantages of the recurve bow are shorter length and faster arrow speed. I also like the pleasing appearance of a graceful recurve bow. My objective was to develop a recurve bow that had many of the characteristics of my longbows while adding the advantages of the recurve design.

The first challenge I faced was to make a recurve that was actually faster through the chronograph than my longbows were. This was not an easy challenge to overcome. A well designed straight limb bow is very efficient. Mediocre recurve bows often have lower performance characteristics than a well designed straight limb bow.  I learned early on that a recurve bow may show high stored energy on paper but not recover that stored energy and deliver it in arrow speed and performance. The recurve portion of the limb can actually decrease the bow’s efficiency and slow the arrow speed even though on paper the bow shows a high amount of stored energy. Noise can be another undesirable characteristic of the typical recurve design. In many cases the faster the bows get the louder they get.

It took some real effort to get a bow with the arrow speed I wanted and also shot quietly and has the stable shooting characteristics I was looking for.  The Black Canyon Recurve bow represents the evolution of my efforts to develop a superior recurve bow.

Which ever Black Canyon bow model is chosen I feel confident that total customer satisfaction will be the result.