Single pin slider use?

[msalm]

So this year I ended up with a new V3 31, shooting 30” draw, 515gr RIP TKO’s at 286fps. I switched to a Black Gold single vertical pin slider and have it sighted in 20-60 yards with the proper tape.

Question is, what do you prefer for sight setting and do you hold over/under for certain distances and dial for anything further? What works for you?

I’ve tried both 20 and 30 yard setting and shooting from 20-45 yards with both and so far feel pretty comfortable with a 30 yard and holding the just a ‘bit’ low for 20 and high a ‘bit more’ for 40. Anything over it just feels better to dial exact distance.

I shot a 3D course last week and found leaving it set at 20 and just holding over was much simpler and very effective, then starting practicing at the 30 yard setting to minimize the 40 yard hold over.

This is for midwestern whitetail at the moment and western hunt next year. Really just curious what others use and the methods that work well for them. Thanks for any insight!

 

[Shadowcaster]

To be clear I dont use a single pin, or a slider for that matter. But i think if you're confident and practice a ton at holdovers you'll be okay. Dont just practice at 20, 30, 40 etc, mix it up at 26, 37, 32, etc. Beyond 40 I think I'd be dialing. I think I'm too OCD for holdovers and single pins, but some prefer them for the open scope. I'll be going with a 3 pin slider for that reason.

Another option is to put scratches on the sight post marking distances.

 

[bsnedeker]

I've got a 2-pin slider, but what I do is keep my top pin at 40 yards, second pin at 50, then I hold under for anything under 40. it's only a few inches low at 30 so that's easy enough, and at 20 I'm close enough to the target that holding under a few more inches doesn't matter to me.

If I was hunting out of a tree stand I might keep it set to 30.

 

[Bmoore]

I use a single pin slider and I noticed with my setup that if I set my pin at 25 and hold on my spot, I’m just about 2 inches high at 20 and 3 inches low at 30. That makes is so that for practical purposes hunting less than 30 I make little adjustments to aim point and can still be well within the kill zone on a whitetail. Anything past 30 I’d would be getting exact range and dialing.
I found that 25 set works well in practice for me. I aim lower section of what I want to hit at 20 and upper section at 30 and always see good results. Your mileage may very. I think the best thing you can do is set your pin to different distances and shoot 20-40 yards with a single aiming point and see what kind of dispersion you get. I think you’ll find a point somewhere in the mid 20s will get you within a very reasonable margin with the same aiming point and that will be a good place to set it for when your hunting.

 

[Billy Goat]

There's an article here on using a trick pin, might be worth reading it and giving it consideration.


What to do is really going to depend on you and your setup. Plenty of guys gap shoot with a stick bow with what will be more parabola than you are getting out of your compound, just a matter of how much you practice.


I'd likely be putting it at 37-40 yards, hold low inside that, hold high for another 10-15, considering an elk sized target.


If for instance treestand hunting, I'd set it no further than 30, with the elevation you need to hit lower on your perspective of the body anyways, plus with cutting yards a 40 yard hold is a lot of times a pretty long shot from a treestand.

 

[LostArra]

I would suggest reading Darin Cooper's article on Trick Pin. Most people skim thru the article and consider it too complicated or confusing but after trying it and practicing, I really like using it with my single pin. The Trick pin method put an elk in my freezer two years ago and a nice wt buck last year.

I think it's a little better for elk because of the size of the vitals. It also works well for me because I don't like "holding over" anything and I rarely slide my slider during elk season. (I don't shoot any game over 45 yds)

It's a lot like rifle hunters understanding Maximum Point Blank Distance. Working thru the process, it gives you a good understanding of your bows trajectory at different distances.

The "Trick-Pin" System

The Trick-Pin System – Quit Your Range-Finder Habit Darin Cooper – Rokslide Senior Editor This may be the coolest damn thing you never knew about your bow! We have all heard somebody say something ridiculous like, “This new bow is so fast you probably only need one pin out to 50 yards!” And to...

www.rokslide.com

 

[pharmdeez]

I shoot a double pin Fast Eddie and set the top pin to 25. With my halon and a 460 gr arrow it is very close out to 30 yards. My second pin is at 39 yards so I can effectively cover 0-45ish with the two pins.

 

[N2TRKYS]

The trick pin deal never made sense to me. I prefer to aim on target and have set my equipment up accordingly.

 

[msalm]

Well my background is solidly a rifle shooter and understand trajectories fairly intimately. For western hunts I don’t dial for anything under 500 with a flat shooting rifle and have had very good results. For my stands here at home, the most likely shots are right around that 30 yards, hence the setting. Thanks for the link to the trick pin, for me that would be a more likely scenario on elk and I’ll definitely keep that in mind.

I KNOW without a doubt I don’t want to dial a yardage inside 35 and likely 40 yards as it really is pretty easy to judge that drop on a deer IMO.

I appreciate the insights and will likely play around with it some more to see what is the most intuitive for me and go from there.

 

[journeyman713]

25 yards works well for me. I compensate for distance by, aiming at bottom of vitals or top of vitals from there. Long distance shots would require moving pin, but are just not taken.

 

[brimow]

I have shot a single pin for years now. I walk around the mountain set at 30. This puts me inside a 4-5" circle from 10 - 40 yards while holding my pin where I want to hit. This is with my setup of course but has served me well. I am ranging anything I feel is over 30 in the woods now because sometimes your field judgement can get messed up depending on size of critter and terrain. I misjudged the distance on a bull several years ago figured 40 ish and he ended up being 47. Arrow dropped much further than the 5" circle and I only took some hair off of his brisket. Should have ranged and dialed for that one. Won't make that mistake again!

 

[nphunter]

I personally have seen a buddy miss several opportunities at elk with one pin. The bulls were coming in and out of the timber and he didn't have time to adjust and blew it.

I personally like a multi-pin with a slider for longer shots, if you are confident with it and feel you can set it at 30 and shoot anything to 40 then I guess that works. My issue with guys being OK with missing high or low is that if you know you are already possibly high at 40 and you actually pull the shot or miss slightly high then now you might be missing by a larger margin and wounding animals.

Holdovers work great on targets but not on animals that can be very huge big times in size. There is a huge difference between a 2 or 3-year-old bull and a 6-8-year-old bull. Same for deer, what seems like a 4" holdover on one animal might be a 6"+ holdover on the next.

I prefer to put the pin exactly where I want to hit and can easily do that with a multiple pin sight, I've never felt that I was at a disadvantage using multiple pins.

Here's a good example of two different age animals standing side by side.

 

[msalm]

I personally have seen a buddy miss several opportunities at elk with one pin. The bulls were coming in and out of the timber and he didn't have time to adjust and blew it.

I personally like a multi-pin with a slider for longer shots, if you are confident with it and feel you can set it at 30 and shoot anything to 40 then I guess that works. My issue with guys being OK with missing high or low is that if you know you are already possibly high at 40 and you actually pull the shot or miss slightly high then now you might be missing by a larger margin and wounding animals.

Holdovers work great on targets but not on animals that can be very huge big times in size. There is a huge difference between a 2 or 3-year-old bull and a 6-8-year-old bull. Same for deer, what seems like a 4" holdover on one animal might be a 6"+ holdover on the next.

I prefer to put the pin exactly where I want to hit and can easily do that with a multiple pin sight, I've never felt that I was at a disadvantage using multiple pins.

IMO, that’s exactly why I’d rather not dink around dialing inside of 40. Maybe a double pin would be better but I’ll just have to see how shooting goes. I got the bow tuned and shooting only 1 1/2 weeks ago so am working that out now. As mentioned I shot a 30 target 3D course last week and left my sight set at 20. I had no difficulty getting 8 and 10’s (mostly 10’s) out to 40 after I stopped dinking with my sight. I actually found it humorous (and aggravating) as one friend had to stop and re-adjust every target and I was soured immediately at the amount of time it took. Especially when I caught myself at full draw dialed to 43 yards on a 28 yard target…. After that (early on in the course) I left it at 20 and drilled them. The only poor shots after that (2 shots) were all my form or release which I am working on every evening shooting a few dozen arrows at various distances. Really I’m just trying to dial in the most intuitive (for me) distance to leave it set at hence the question on other people’s methods. This V3 shooting 286fps with the 515gr arrow is still incredible to me and the trajectory is a fair bit flatter than I’m used to with one older Hoyt and a handful of recurves I’ve used in the past…kind of a whole new game to me.

thanks for your insight, and I promise you this, when I’m out west next time any elk within 40 (that I want to shoot of course) won’t have to stand around for me deciding on where to hold. It should be immediate and instinctive, just like the recurve. As to the size of target, being that the hold over will be no more than 6-8”, I don’t see the relative size of the animal mattering much at all. I have killed 10 elk now I believe, and have participated in packing out another dozen or more (I’m sure not a lot to many here), but I have been close to quite a few of them and been hunting by all legal means for 38+ years.

thanks again for all the feedback, I’m going to try 30 for the next week and see how that 40 yard trajectory works at that setting. I may very well end up at 25 or 33, not sure yet but I have a better idea now than I did this morning!
Best regards,
Matt

 

[MattB]

Single pins are great for shooting targets.

 

[Desk Jockey]

I went from a five pin fixed to a single pin. I bungled dialing three shots on deer in the first few weeks of season (user error) and swapped to a 3 pin slider. I added 2 more pins after season. I have now rocked that 5 pin the last few years. Best of both worlds IMO. I have pins for 20,30,40,50&60 yards and can dial for anything longer. Practically speaking I am covered out to and beyond any distance at which I would take a hunting shot and I can dial for long range practice.

 

[msalm]

I can see me going to a double pin, maybe even three, but I really wanted to go with the vertical pin vs horizontal, so I’ll be using this for the season an possibly looking at one of the two pin vertical after season I think. If that puts me at 25 and 40 or 20 and 35ish with the slider for further I think that could be my huckleberry…. Thanks again for all the advice/observations.

 

[LostArra]

It's obvious just from this forum thread why there is such a wide range of bow sight configurations. When I started shooting a compound in my 60's I was overwhelmed by the sight options and coming from a sightless recurve/longbow is probably why I'm most comfortable and accurate with a single pin. It's good we have choices.

 

[Samdemarais]

IMO, that’s exactly why I’d rather not dink around dialing inside of 40. Maybe a double pin would be better but I’ll just have to see how shooting goes. I got the bow tuned and shooting only 1 1/2 weeks ago so am working that out now. As mentioned I shot a 30 target 3D course last week and left my sight set at 20. I had no difficulty getting 8 and 10’s (mostly 10’s) out to 40 after I stopped dinking with my sight. I actually found it humorous (and aggravating) as one friend had to stop and re-adjust every target and I was soured immediately at the amount of time it took. Especially when I caught myself at full draw dialed to 43 yards on a 28 yard target…. After that (early on in the course) I left it at 20 and drilled them. The only poor shots after that (2 shots) were all my form or release which I am working on every evening shooting a few dozen arrows at various distances. Really I’m just trying to dial in the most intuitive (for me) distance to leave it set at hence the question on other people’s methods. This V3 shooting 286fps with the 515gr arrow is still incredible to me and the trajectory is a fair bit flatter than I’m used to with one older Hoyt and a handful of recurves I’ve used in the past…kind of a whole new game to me.

thanks for your insight, and I promise you this, when I’m out west next time any elk within 40 (that I want to shoot of course) won’t have to stand around for me deciding on where to hold. It should be immediate and instinctive, just like the recurve. As to the size of target, being that the hold over will be no more than 6-8”, I don’t see the relative size of the animal mattering much at all. I have killed 10 elk now I believe, and have participated in packing out another dozen or more (I’m sure not a lot to many here), but I have been close to quite a few of them and been hunting by all legal means for 38+ years.

thanks again for all the feedback, I’m going to try 30 for the next week and see how that 40 yard trajectory works at that setting. I may very well end up at 25 or 33, not sure yet but I have a better idea now than I did this morning!
Best regards,
Matt

Another way to think about is setting your acceptable tolerance of deviation from the middle. So if you accept 4” radius as your tolerance than your set your pin for what ever yardage allows that for high and low. So set for 30 let’s say and if you hold on you still hit only 4” high at anything shorter. Then hold on and shoot out to 35 or so and if it’s 4” or less then then that’s within your acceptable range. I just shoot a 3 pin with 25 and 35, which gets me out to 40 comfortably and then bottom pin is rover set at 60 for anything from 41 to 100

 

[Gumbo]

My solution to the single-pin conundrum was to add four more pins so I have an aiming reference for 20, 30, 40, 50, and 60 yards without moving the sight. Simple, effective, and it eliminates all single-pin issues, except for pin "clutter".

 

[journeyman713]

My solution to the single-pin conundrum was to add four more pins so I have an aiming reference for 20, 30, 40, 50, and 60 yards without moving the sight. Simple, effective, and it eliminates all single-pin issues, except for pin "clutter".

Single pin slider is hardly a conundrum, especially for the whitetail hunter that almost never take a shot past 35 yards.
The multi-pin set-up with todays fast bows are becoming unnecessary, and clutter isn't the only issue. It's just a matter of time, when the heat of the moment presents itself, and for whatever reason, you lock in using the wrong pin.