Tuning season, advice needed

[Dave0317]

A little intro info:
My traditional bow experience is fairly limited, got a Galaxy Scorch about a year ago which is a 54 inch recurve, and about 30 pounds at my 26.5 draw length. My shooting education is largely from The Push podcast and Jake Kaminski’s YouTube videos. This has got me shooting a fairly consistent 6 inch group at 20 yards. Actually shooting a deer with a bow like this finally felt like an attainable goal. Big thanks to the Trad Kill yearly threads here for inspiration as well.

So, bought a 19 inch EXE Scream/F261 with Trad Tech Blackmax limbs, 50 pounds. I figure when you account for my shorter draw length, that gets me a 45-48 on the fingers weight.

I used the 3 Rivers Spine calculator to come up with an arrow recipe of 400 spine GT Hunter shaft at 31 inches, 100 grain insert, and 125 grain point, for a TAW of right under 500 grains.


When I get them, I make a fletched arrow and a bare shaft, excited to be tuning my new bow.

The fletched shaft hits right of the bullseye maybe 4-6 inches at 10 yards. The bare shaft hits 10-12 inches to the right. Crazy weak flight characteristics. Very surprised, because many forum posts led me to believe the 3 rivers calculator tended to push people towards arrows that are too stiff.

I got an arrow cut a whole inch shorter, still reads weak. I figured it could be my form causing it, so I grabbed one of my compound arrows bare shafts. A 27 inch 300 spine arrow with 125 grain point, and 33 grain insert. This one read fairly stiff. Nock to the right and point about 3-4 inches left of bullseye at 10 yards. That’s got me thinking it’s a spine issue and not just my form.

So the question for the group is:
Should I consider the 12 400 spine shafts a waste of money and order some 340s(maybe even full length 300s)? Or Do I maybe cut the 400s down more and use a lighter insert in the remaining shafts? Still some trial and error (and a gamble of it would even be enough change in stiffness), but definitely cheaper. Unfortunately also would result in a much lighter arrow, farther “point on”, and bigger gaps when aiming at hunting distances.

Goal for the arrow is to
1. Tune well
2. TAW of around 10 GPP or 450-500 grains.
3. A short-ish “point on” so I aim with fixed crawl and easy gaps.
3. Well suited to kill deer and Elk.

 

[nevadabugle]

A little intro info:
My traditional bow experience is fairly limited, got a Galaxy Scorch about a year ago which is a 54 inch recurve, and about 30 pounds at my 26.5 draw length. My shooting education is largely from The Push podcast and Jake Kaminski’s YouTube videos. This has got me shooting a fairly consistent 6 inch group at 20 yards. Actually shooting a deer with a bow like this finally felt like an attainable goal. Big thanks to the Trad Kill yearly threads here for inspiration as well.

So, bought a 19 inch EXE Scream/F261 with Trad Tech Blackmax limbs, 50 pounds. I figure when you account for my shorter draw length, that gets me a 45-48 on the fingers weight.

I used the 3 Rivers Spine calculator to come up with an arrow recipe of 400 spine GT Hunter shaft at 31 inches, 100 grain insert, and 125 grain point, for a TAW of right under 500 grains.


When I get them, I make a fletched arrow and a bare shaft, excited to be tuning my new bow.

The fletched shaft hits right of the bullseye maybe 4-6 inches at 10 yards. The bare shaft hits 10-12 inches to the right. Crazy weak flight characteristics. Very surprised, because many forum posts led me to believe the 3 rivers calculator tended to push people towards arrows that are too stiff.

I got an arrow cut a whole inch shorter, still reads weak. I figured it could be my form causing it, so I grabbed one of my compound arrows bare shafts. A 27 inch 300 spine arrow with 125 grain point, and 33 grain insert. This one read fairly stiff. Nock to the right and point about 3-4 inches left of bullseye at 10 yards. That’s got me thinking it’s a spine issue and not just my form.

So the question for the group is:
Should I consider the 12 400 spine shafts a waste of money and order some 340s(maybe even full length 300s)? Or Do I maybe cut the 400s down more and use a lighter insert in the remaining shafts? Still some trial and error (and a gamble of it would even be enough change in stiffness), but definitely cheaper. Unfortunately also would result in a much lighter arrow, farther “point on”, and bigger gaps when aiming at hunting distances.

Goal for the arrow is to
1. Tune well
2. TAW of around 10 GPP or 450-500 grains.
3. A short-ish “point on” so I aim with fixed crawl and easy gaps.
3. Well suited to kill deer and Elk.

Hmmm...I would agree that I would expect that arrow set up to be a bit stiff, not weak.

Couple things to check. What is your center shot set at? If your strike plate or plunger is too far right that could cause some weird results.

What's your nock height. I've had issues with too low of a nock height causing arrows to catapult off the shelf giving strange results.

Report back with both those settings and we can go from there.

 

[Dave0317]

The shelf attachment it comes with claims to put the shelf at exact center shot. When I got weak readings I put on a felt furniture pad piece that’s about 1/8 inch thick, maybe a little more. Bare shaft still flying weak. A second pad layered on that one still showed a weak shaft flight.

Nock point is 5/8. I feel like the bare shaft tails actually hit pretty parallel (in the vertical plane) to launch angle and fletched arrows. So I felt like Nick height was pretty solid.

 

[nevadabugle]

The shelf attachment it comes with claims to put the shelf at exact center shot. When I got weak readings I put on a felt furniture pad piece that’s about 1/8 inch thick, maybe a little more. Bare shaft still flying weak. A second pad layered on that one still showed a weak shaft flight.

Nock point is 5/8. I feel like the bare shaft tails actually hit pretty parallel (in the vertical plane) to launch angle and fletched arrows. So I felt like Nick height was pretty solid.

Just for shits and giggles, raise that nock too high. See if it changes anything.

 

[Blackcow]

Check for false stiff. If you can, move your centershot in, throw more point weight on it.

 

[Blackcow]

Yes, I meant false weak, ha!

 

[ScottinPA]

My initial thought was you should be too stiff but the shaft length had me guessing. Ran your set up in Stu Millers calc, sure enough, too weak.
I shortened the shaft to 30" and swapped the 100gr insert for 50gr and got 465 total arrow weight, 10.2gpp, 15.9% FOC, 184 fps. Spine is within 2lb, arrow to bow requirement. To me, this is a good combination of speed, weight, and FOC. Adding string silencers will decrease speed and change the bow spine required but should be close. Maybe leave the arrows at 30.5 (makes arrows 2lb weak) and bareshaft with silencers on string. You can always cut a little more off but darn hard to put it back on.

 

[Wrench]

Have you videoed your shot yet?

Pushing the plate out 1/4" should have been fairly dramatic. Before you waste any arrows....get some slow motion video to make sure a form issue isn't it.

I agree with raising the nock height. Take it up to 3/4" high and see what happens.

Are you shooting feathers and what does a 30 yard bare shaft do in flight and where does it impact?

 

[Dave0317]

Haven’t got a video at the moment, and got rain coming in so it may be a couple days before I can.
I really think my form can’t be too bad though. I am always concerned about my release, I feel like that is the biggest different thing to learn coming from actively pulling a trigger on a gun or compound bow release. If it was my release, I feel like shots would be more erratic. But I can make good shots with my lighter recurve, and when I shoot this new one, it’s consistently off the same way. Not occasionally good and sometimes way off. Consistent bare shafts to the right.

In the meantime, I did order 50 grain inserts and some cool melt, so I can swap inserts again if needed. I’ll cut at least a couple down when I have a chance to go by the shop. Don’t have my own arrow cutter yet.
If I mess too many of these up, it’s not a complete loss, they can be recycled as youth arrows for my sons compound. Compounds seem to be way more forgiving and tuneable to a range of spines.

 

[Wrench]

Are you running a draw check/clicker? You could be having a slight collapse and not noticing. Most right/left misses are draw length.

 

[Dave0317]

No clicker. Definitely have considered it though. I may look into that as well.

 

[Dave0317]

It’s been rainy here, so haven’t been able to get outside and experiment much.

This will definitely be a process and not just a simple change one thing and call it good kind of deal.
Based on responses here and some thoughts of my own, here is the next couple steps I’ll take. I figure documenting this process here may be useful for someone that is doing the same things or having similar issues.

1. Check form via video. Also going to install a clicker to verify consistent draw length.

2. Shoot some bare shafts after raising nock height. Will also remove the included shelf piece and experiment with putting the arrow past center shot to rule out possibility of false weak reading. If it is indeed a false weak, I’ll add even more point weight and see if that improves it also.

2. Ordered some various weights of field points, to experiment with changing tip weight.

3. Based on results from above, go to a lighter point or trim arrows, or both to achieve good tune. If the 400s have to be trimmed shorter than about 30”, then I may go up to 340s. I want to keep the arrows pretty long so that my point on is fairly close. Hoping to find a combo of point on and fixed crawl that allows me to use the tip of the arrow to aim at 20-25 yards, and aim just under a deer at 10-20 yards.

Once I make some progress, I’ll post an update here. In the meantime, if anyone else has any tuning stuff they are doing in the off season, I’d love to read about others projects as well.

 

[bisblue]

Maybe try walk back tuning before bare shafting. I often find if I have anything going on with my form bare shafting can be more of a method of self torture than tuning.

Walk back tuning should have the most forgiving results based on form. Try going from one extreme to another say a 200 grain field points then a 100 grain field points. I jot down my results in a notebook so my ADHD brain doesn't jump to the next thing, and I can pick out patterns over time better. Also only try changing one thing at a time while tuning, another one I have to watch myself on constantly.

If you can film your arrow flight in slo motion from behind that is also great.

 

[Beendare]

IMO, The whole key to dialing in the correct spine is having a point weight kit with about a 300g swing.

I would think with a 26.5" DL you could shoot a much shorter arrow. Cut a couple of the 400's as short as possible- then start playing with point weight.

I do find the ILF setups I have tend to like heavier arrow spine...but I have a long draw.

 

[BWSmith]

Warning,following suggestion may cause some folks to jump the gun....

Try shooting through paper. No,this isn't a typical paper tune BS post. With whatever your setup is,weak,stiff,high low.... don't matter. What matters is;

Can you shoot,say a line of 5 shots across the paper and have them all exhibit the same pattern? If not,then your release(or form) is showing inconsistencies.

Slo mo vid mentioned above is good,but it's not like the "MRI" print out that paper shows.... would still do a vid if possible.

Another,is have someone closely watch the arrows "coming off the bow". If your hanging a release due to a problem tab,glove,whatever... your nock can be hitting the rest and giving false reading.

Some folks just plain have a cleaner/softer release. They will always "get away with" a softer spine. Don't get too bothered by it. The faster,jacked up the bow(fast a$$ limbs,short risers,carbon,light arrows,etc).... the more your release "touch" is gonna matter. Slow,long length risers/limbs... and heavy arrows damp out pluckety releases.