Wilderlife
WKR
Hi all,
I've been experimenting with some arrows on a couple of bows lately and thought I'd post some observations, for no reason other than to generate some interesting discussion.
Most of us know that the arrow spine charts you find on the internet aren't real good when it comes to trying to decide on a tune for a trad bow, as there are many factors that are overlooked. They generally don't take into account how close or are from centre the shelf of the bow is, and they also fail to refer to enough point weight on the front (both for components and the point/broadhead itself).
A few years ago I had some PCH limbs that were marked 54# @ 28in. I'm not sure that I was pulling quite to 28in at the time, but I had full length 350s tune nicely off it (they weren't cut but they may have only been about 30in max), with a 200gn point, and what I believe was 55gn of insert and collar.
With this knowledge in mind, I started tuning up some new arrows for an ILF rig, that's a 19in riser with a springy rest, and 55# limbs. I started with a 350 spine arrow with 60gn of insert/collar and a 150gn point. Despite winding the limbs out a fair way to 51#, and winding the rest out a fair way, I still had to cut 2in off the carbon, so the arrows are 30in carbon-to-carbon now, and weigh 475gn total. They're doing about 171fps.
I'm continuing to work on my strength so I can shoot some of my other heavier bows, as they're too beautiful to be sitting on my shelf gathering dust. One of them is my Widow PCH with limbs that are marked 65# @ 28in, but they're actually pulling about 60# nowadays as they're about 15 years old. Since working on my strength, I can shoot this just fine.
Current trends from well-known trad hunters in Australia for water buffalo is an arrow between 550-600 grains, out of bows of similar poundage. One bloke has a Widow that's pulling 70# @ 30in, which is significantly more power than 60# @ 28in, but I digress. There's a small chance I'll want to shoot a buffalo with a trad bow soon, and a much higher chance I'll take a compound the first time, and maybe a trad bow after that, and likely end up with something heavier, such as new limbs for the Widow, or potentially building a heavy bow out of a Satori riser (either with heavy Hoyt limbs or the heaviest Uukha limbs I can find?).
So for my Widow here, I liked the idea of settling between 550-600gn anyway, as we mainly have our shots fairly close. I figured 300s would be a decent place to start, and borrowed a bareshaft off a friend. The shaft is 342in long, 9.5gpi, has 45gn of insert/collar on the front, and then I added a 200gn point - about 550gn with no fletches. It is showing slightly weak off the Widow. The arrows I choose to use will likely be a slightly heavier GPI and have 60gn of components on the front, rather than 45gn. I won't be chasing more weight necessarily; I just want to use different arrows.
For the sake of interest, I took this bareshaft and shot it off my ILF rig, but had the limbs wound all the way in to 55#. The arrow is significantly weaker off this bow. I've confirmed it all with slow motion footage of both bows that I've sent to mates and my releases are clean, and there isn't anything funny going on with false weaks because the arrows are behaving erratically or anything.
I get there is a lot to be said for things like tiller, brace height, and an arrow rest, when it comes to tuning bows. The arrow rest is still wound out a fair way. I've stayed away from my bows without the ability to change some of these features lately as I like being able to manipulate small things, or make up the difference if I change something slightly with my form to experiment and want the arrow to stay in tune.
I wouldn't have picked this as the result, but it's interesting to see how big of a difference some of these features can make, despite there being a 5# advantage to the Widow. It also leaves me with a few options.
1. I can get my new arrows, tune them to the Widow, and then tune the ILF rig to shoot the same arrow. I'd love to chronograph the speed difference and maybe make a video of this process as I'm sure it would be interesting.
2. Tune the arrows off the Widow and then see if I can manage to get them to shoot with a 150gn point rather than a 200gn point off the ILF rig. Ease of build would be xactly the same, but I'd essentially have a 55# rig and 60# rig, both shooting arrows around 10gpi.
So for the sake of discussion, has anyone seen similar things with arrows tuning very differently off bows of differing poundage? Keep in mind, you'd expect something more like this off high-end limbs like Uukha, Backwoods Composites, or Morrison, but not necessarily the Satori limbs?
Also, can anyone shed some light on this for me? Say I got some 50# Uukha limbs and put them on a 17in Satori riser to get up to 52# - could I expect them to shoot a 600gn arrow faster than my Widow pulling 60#? Would I be better off getting 65# Hoyt limbs and getting them to 67# on the 17in Satori riser? Would I be even better off getting a 15in or 13in VPA riser to get more poundage?
All of this stuff about a heavy recurve to shoot buffalo is pie in the sky at the moment, but I also haven't bought any new bow gear for a little while so I'm into the idea of buying some stuff to muck around with for 12 months before I potentially go on this hunt. My compound pulling 78# and an arrow around 560gn will have no problem on buffalo I imagine so I'm not contemplating endless possibilities in that space.
Over the next few months I'll be taking the ILF rig to New Zealand, with either the 475gn 350s or some slightly heavier 300s. That will depend more on how much hunting and arrow breaking/losing I do in the lead up than anything else. After that, I'll be trying my best to prepare to try and get a fallow buck in the rut with my recurve, and there should be plenty of pig and goat hunting between all of these opportunities.
Some pictures to say thanks if you made it this far through my dribble.
I've been experimenting with some arrows on a couple of bows lately and thought I'd post some observations, for no reason other than to generate some interesting discussion.
Most of us know that the arrow spine charts you find on the internet aren't real good when it comes to trying to decide on a tune for a trad bow, as there are many factors that are overlooked. They generally don't take into account how close or are from centre the shelf of the bow is, and they also fail to refer to enough point weight on the front (both for components and the point/broadhead itself).
A few years ago I had some PCH limbs that were marked 54# @ 28in. I'm not sure that I was pulling quite to 28in at the time, but I had full length 350s tune nicely off it (they weren't cut but they may have only been about 30in max), with a 200gn point, and what I believe was 55gn of insert and collar.
With this knowledge in mind, I started tuning up some new arrows for an ILF rig, that's a 19in riser with a springy rest, and 55# limbs. I started with a 350 spine arrow with 60gn of insert/collar and a 150gn point. Despite winding the limbs out a fair way to 51#, and winding the rest out a fair way, I still had to cut 2in off the carbon, so the arrows are 30in carbon-to-carbon now, and weigh 475gn total. They're doing about 171fps.
I'm continuing to work on my strength so I can shoot some of my other heavier bows, as they're too beautiful to be sitting on my shelf gathering dust. One of them is my Widow PCH with limbs that are marked 65# @ 28in, but they're actually pulling about 60# nowadays as they're about 15 years old. Since working on my strength, I can shoot this just fine.
Current trends from well-known trad hunters in Australia for water buffalo is an arrow between 550-600 grains, out of bows of similar poundage. One bloke has a Widow that's pulling 70# @ 30in, which is significantly more power than 60# @ 28in, but I digress. There's a small chance I'll want to shoot a buffalo with a trad bow soon, and a much higher chance I'll take a compound the first time, and maybe a trad bow after that, and likely end up with something heavier, such as new limbs for the Widow, or potentially building a heavy bow out of a Satori riser (either with heavy Hoyt limbs or the heaviest Uukha limbs I can find?).
So for my Widow here, I liked the idea of settling between 550-600gn anyway, as we mainly have our shots fairly close. I figured 300s would be a decent place to start, and borrowed a bareshaft off a friend. The shaft is 342in long, 9.5gpi, has 45gn of insert/collar on the front, and then I added a 200gn point - about 550gn with no fletches. It is showing slightly weak off the Widow. The arrows I choose to use will likely be a slightly heavier GPI and have 60gn of components on the front, rather than 45gn. I won't be chasing more weight necessarily; I just want to use different arrows.
For the sake of interest, I took this bareshaft and shot it off my ILF rig, but had the limbs wound all the way in to 55#. The arrow is significantly weaker off this bow. I've confirmed it all with slow motion footage of both bows that I've sent to mates and my releases are clean, and there isn't anything funny going on with false weaks because the arrows are behaving erratically or anything.
I get there is a lot to be said for things like tiller, brace height, and an arrow rest, when it comes to tuning bows. The arrow rest is still wound out a fair way. I've stayed away from my bows without the ability to change some of these features lately as I like being able to manipulate small things, or make up the difference if I change something slightly with my form to experiment and want the arrow to stay in tune.
I wouldn't have picked this as the result, but it's interesting to see how big of a difference some of these features can make, despite there being a 5# advantage to the Widow. It also leaves me with a few options.
1. I can get my new arrows, tune them to the Widow, and then tune the ILF rig to shoot the same arrow. I'd love to chronograph the speed difference and maybe make a video of this process as I'm sure it would be interesting.
2. Tune the arrows off the Widow and then see if I can manage to get them to shoot with a 150gn point rather than a 200gn point off the ILF rig. Ease of build would be xactly the same, but I'd essentially have a 55# rig and 60# rig, both shooting arrows around 10gpi.
So for the sake of discussion, has anyone seen similar things with arrows tuning very differently off bows of differing poundage? Keep in mind, you'd expect something more like this off high-end limbs like Uukha, Backwoods Composites, or Morrison, but not necessarily the Satori limbs?
Also, can anyone shed some light on this for me? Say I got some 50# Uukha limbs and put them on a 17in Satori riser to get up to 52# - could I expect them to shoot a 600gn arrow faster than my Widow pulling 60#? Would I be better off getting 65# Hoyt limbs and getting them to 67# on the 17in Satori riser? Would I be even better off getting a 15in or 13in VPA riser to get more poundage?
All of this stuff about a heavy recurve to shoot buffalo is pie in the sky at the moment, but I also haven't bought any new bow gear for a little while so I'm into the idea of buying some stuff to muck around with for 12 months before I potentially go on this hunt. My compound pulling 78# and an arrow around 560gn will have no problem on buffalo I imagine so I'm not contemplating endless possibilities in that space.
Over the next few months I'll be taking the ILF rig to New Zealand, with either the 475gn 350s or some slightly heavier 300s. That will depend more on how much hunting and arrow breaking/losing I do in the lead up than anything else. After that, I'll be trying my best to prepare to try and get a fallow buck in the rut with my recurve, and there should be plenty of pig and goat hunting between all of these opportunities.
Some pictures to say thanks if you made it this far through my dribble.
