new ABA rules on aluminium arrows?

[Stickbow Hunter]

I know of one particular archer who was shooting a DOG of a straight limbed longbow

aren't they all like that?

You might be surprised that no, they aren't all like that.

Jeff

[bstan86]

aren't they all like that?

You might be surprised that no, they aren't all like that.

Jeff[/quote]


I was just having a cheeky dig Jeff - I know they can perform when built right.

[Kendaric]

Terminology specific to Traditional Archery is just as important as the equipment. If one chooses to ignore this then regardless of whatever traditions they think they are preserving they are most certainly not preserving those of Traditional Archery. Jeff

I think the problem lies in that for many people nowadays, traditional means anything but a compound bow, and throw in timber arrows for good measure.

[Stickbow Hunter]

I was just having a cheeky dig Jeff - I know they can perform when built right.

I think the problem lies in that for many people nowadays, traditional means anything but a compound bow, and throw in timber arrows for good measure.

Sadly I think you are right there.

Jeff

[littlejohn59]

I read all this longbow recurve definition stuff and am amazed. Generally speaking we all know what a longbow looks like and is. We all know what a recurve looks like and is. If you shoot wooden arrows there really isn't much difference between the 2 style of bows, though in my opinion recurvers are a little more accurate. That's why there are more recurve archers than longbowers. Centreshot and pistol grip which is more accurate.
Due to modern living and inventions,glues carbons and stuff we can manufacture amazing stuff..eg. All carbon longbow..who would ever thought...........
If you have a close look at the bows of the Mary Rose their longbows have curved tips. So strictly not a longbow by definition but not a recurve either.
Dilemmas huh?
So I thinks shoot timber Arrows and you are traditional regardless of shape. Shoot aluminiums and carbon you are modern. Of course there are the archers that want to push the boundaries, want the results and want to introduce the newer bows and are looking for that edge. Ilf and the likes. I say let them but they are modern. Don't you just love archery. I am just stating the obvious.....this is only one man's opinion...mine..lol

[greybeard]

...........If you have a close look at the bows of the Mary Rose their longbows have curved tips. So strictly not a longbow by definition but not a recurve either.......

By whose definition?

Curved tips or natural reflex? and remember they spent over four hundred years at the bottom of the Solent.

Mary Rose Bows.jpg (95.63 KiB) Viewed 7104 times

Daryl.

[Roadie]

Ay Matt, Have you got your answer Yet. Cheers Roadie.

[GrahameA]

Morning All.

Traditional? What is Traditional? (And this topic has been addressed before....)

For some people Traditional means whatever rules an assocition puts forward. For others it it is more related to 'stuff' made/used at some stage in the past.

I have no issue getting more opportunities to shoot older style Bows/Arrows in a competitive enviroment than I am able/willing to attend. I equally have opportunties to shoot/make/play with Bows/Arrows that are Modern/Historical/Traditional/whatever.

IMO There is more interest in pre 1900 Bows than there has been for some time and there has been a drop off in interest in immediate pre/post WWII equipment. Traditional Archery has never been stronger and equally the threat to losing it has never been stronger. (Just keep on having more rules and more divisions.)

[BowmanBjorn]

agreed,

maintaining a history and working knowledge of terms is important and i can understand the challenges with types of bows being renamed over time.

for me its all about the shooting, and i don't believe the "traditionally" shooting community needs to be as fractured as it already is.

ELB
Horse bow
Warbow
Bhutanese longbow
semi recurve
hill style flat bow
recurve
static recurve
bent stick with twine etc

we all shoot them for 1 common reason...... wait for it......

WE LOVE SHOOTING THIS STUFF and thats what it all boils down to.

so why enforce additional rules and regulations and create so many devisions just so every body has a "fair" chance (reality is everybody at an average trad shoot would end up with a trophy!)

in a perfect competition for me you'd have:

- jnr any "Trad" bow any arrow
- Open "Trad" any 1pce or 2pce bow, wood arrows
- open "mod" any bow,ILF, takedowns etc any arrow

general rules:
- no stabilisers
- no sighting aids
- no mechanical release aids, clickers, draw checkers etc
- no compound bows
- no ranging aids or binoculars

[Kendaric]

the threat to losing it has never been stronger. (Just keep on having more rules and more divisions.)

Ok, fair enough, then put modern longbows, that are semi-recurves in the division where they belong - recurve.

Jeffs right about definitions within the Traditional archery scene. Part of the mandate of Traditional Archery and TAA I believe was to promote traditional archery. This is generally regarded as equipment that was used pre-compound.

In those days, a modern longbow WAS NOT considered a Longbow. It was considered a semi-recurve, which for the most part fell out of favor. Most people didn't want a semi-recurve as it implies a 'lesser' recurve.

The Modern Longbow semi-recurve has had a revival, mostly due to marketing as the NEW longbow, and allows makers a little more scope, but mostly because it can now be lumped into the longbow division. People are happier to shoot a D/R Longbow, or modern longbow because it implies a 'better' longbow, and not a 'lesser' recurve. There is a romance in the thought of shooting a 'longbow' (whatever it really is).

Whilst most of the archery bodies has the fore-though to make a new division for these bows, and separate them from what we consider the traditional longbow - they could do that because they where not re-bounded my the word modern, as Trad is.

The modern longbow has no place in Traditional Archery as a traditional longbow. It is a semi-recurve of that period.

So why so much resistance to putting a modern longbow in the recurve division - because these shooters see a lesser advantage to that.

I know that some say that scores are fairly equal between recurve and longbow division - I don't know what events you went to, but recurve scores, I have generally found, were much greater.

[GrahameA]

Morning.

... additional rules and regulations ...

in a perfect competition for me you'd have: ...

general rules:
- no stabilisers
- no sighting aids
- no mechanical release aids, clickers, draw checkers etc
- no compound bows
- no ranging aids or binoculars

The difficulty of having rules/guidelines/whatever is that:
a) you need to define them in such a manner that they are concise and not open to interpretation (not as easy as many consider),
b) they are a consensus agreed upon those (or at least a majority) who are going to attend/operate (a task requiring significant time, effort and negotiation),
c) they are enforced (it is always a poor choice to make laws/rules/etc., if you are not going to enforce them),
d) someone has to do the work (the number requesting something happen is significantly larger, by a couple of orders of magnitude, than the number with the skills/time/availability who line up to do the work).

[Kendaric]

The difficulty of having rules/guidelines/whatever is that:

True, but the work has already been done. The ABA guidelines work fine.

[Kendaric]

WE LOVE SHOOTING THIS STUFF and thats what it all boils down to.

True, but this has nothing to do with shooting what you like shooting.

It has to do with correctly naming it, as it is, for what it was, during the period we are taking about, and putting it in the division it belongs to, in the traditional sense. Trad events are competition events, regardless of pretenting they are otherwise, or whether you just go to hang out with like minded archers. If it were not the case, there would be no recurve and longbow division at all, and no place getters.

It is simply incorrect to call a modern longbow, hybrid, or D/R longbow a Longbow of that period.

We are also talking about the Australian context. It is traditional archery Australia, not America or England.

If you want to preserve traditional archery, then that goes in hand with using and recognising correct usage and terminology of that period, in the Australian context.

If you are not going to do that, then you are just shooting a non compound bare bow with timber arrows, and calling it traditional. If that floats your boat, then great, do that.

If we are going to promote traditional archery as it stands for, in all its forms, then you also need to also promote correct usage and terminology. Other wise, you are just a body calling a camel a horse, and pretending that that is ok, and not being true to the spirit of what your are trying to preserve.

[BowmanBjorn]

Kenderic maybe the way i wrote was misleading.

i'm not saying that the terminology is correct for Traditional archery with the use of D/R longbow, Hybrid etc. i agree that is very much what was called a semi recurve and i have no problems being put in a recurve devision (if there MUST be one) to shoot. i'll quite happily get my butt kicked (this would happen if i was shooting against a blind man with a bent stick anyway).

what i dont see the point of is making the devisions so complicated and excluding to a point where there is virtually no real winner. if we follow that logic we would have 100's of different divisions for every manner of variation in a traditional bow.

i've been to some small shoots and some very big shoots like the Hunter Valley Gathering. and the top 5 shooters all had vastly different bows.

for example top 5 at hunter last year was:

- all wood trilam flat bow
- Norseman straight end long bow
- Thunderstick semi recurve (D/R bow)
- Black widow recurve
- Norseman straight end longbow

it was a big shoot with over 150 competitors all shooting timbers and the scores were within 30 points i think between 1-5 place.

my belief is that all of these bows regardless of what we call them are by definition traditional bows. i agree the CORRECT names maybe different but a name doesn't change what it is.

call a ute a truck, or runners trainers, or a semi recurve a D/R bow. doesn't change what they are.

GrahamA your bang on, making rules is a huge challenge we are going through it now in North Queensland with our upcoming traditional invitational shoot next year. its the same with every sport and club lots of ideas but little man power. and thats exactly why the few of us that are running this thing are distilling the rules down to the essence of what really matters to us as traditional archers rather than worrying about minor variations on the Traditional theme.

so often in sports things are made more complex than what they need to be for no real reason.

i'd love to see traditional archery with a simple fun competition culture thats easy for a new archer to get involved with and not feel alienated.

i guess the reality is that the majority of clubs and competitions i shoot at don't give a rats ass about ABA, AA, TAA rules and recommendations but focus on the fun family oriented experience that develops a strong traditional community regardless of the breed of bow you shoot. and trust me things get plenty competitive amongst the recurve , semi recurve, longbow and horse shooters for everyone to have fun.

[bstan86]

BowmanBjorn I reckon you are spot-on and can't see one single thing I disagree with In your post.

[Kendaric]

i agree that is very much what was called a semi recurve and i have no problems being put in a recurve devision

That's great, but I think you would be in the minority who would be happy to do that.

if we follow that logic we would have 100's of different divisions for every manner of variation in a traditional bow.

That's just taking it to an unrealistic extreme to make an point that is not valid.

my belief is that all of these bows regardless of what we call them are by definition traditional bows. i agree the CORRECT names maybe different but a name doesn't change what it is.

No one is saying otherwise.

GrahamA your bang on, making rules is a huge challenge we are going through it now in North Queensland with our upcoming traditional invitational shoot next year. its the same with every sport and club lots of ideas but little man power. and thats exactly why the few of us that are running this thing are distilling the rules down to the essence of what really matters to us as traditional archers rather than worrying about minor variations on the Traditional theme.

It requires no effort - appropriate guidelines are already set.

i'd love to see traditional archery with a simple fun competition culture thats easy for a new archer to get involved with and not feel alienated.

Who's taking about alienating anyone?

i guess the reality is that the majority of clubs and competitions i shoot at don't give a rats ass about ABA, AA, TAA rules and recommendations but focus on the fun family oriented experience that develops a strong traditional community regardless of the breed of bow you shoot. and trust me things get plenty competitive amongst the recurve , semi recurve, longbow and horse shooters for everyone to have fun.

This has nothing to do with what we are debating.

[little arrows]

Hey Matt,

There is nothing in the minutes of the ABA National Meeting to say anything re new rules for aluminum arrows from ANY peg. Seems bow description / definition has taken over the post..... so carry on

cheers
sue

[Ian Turner]

Yes Susie I must agree i thought this thread was about aluminium arrows not longbow definitions!
Cheers

[BowmanBjorn]

i agree that is very much what was called a semi recurve and i have no problems being put in a recurve devision

That's great, but I think you would be in the minority who would be happy to do that.

I'm not so sure I've shot with hundreds of archers this year in traditonal invitationals and many of them couldn't give a hoot which devision they are in or who they are shooting with/against so I think you'd be surprised with the openness of many.

if we follow that logic we would have 100's of different divisions for every manner of variation in a traditional bow.

That's just taking it to an unrealistic extreme to make an point that is not valid.

That's what I'm saying there are already a crazy amount of catagories in the current ABA rules etc for such a small niche part of a small sport. Where do you draw the line? And how do we define if the line is appropriate. What about hill style longbows with foam cores and carbon limbs? Are they traditional or modern? Phenolic limb tips, shelf cut to center, past center. String material etc the list goes on of "modern" performance improvements that weren't strictly available before 1960 for example.

my belief is that all of these bows regardless of what we call them are by definition traditional bows. i agree the CORRECT names maybe different but a name doesn't change what it is.

No one is saying otherwise.

Sorry I miss understood you were commenting on the naming disparity for semi recurves and the class they should shoot in. My bad.

GrahamA your bang on, making rules is a huge challenge we are going through it now in North Queensland with our upcoming traditional invitational shoot next year. its the same with every sport and club lots of ideas but little man power. and thats exactly why the few of us that are running this thing are distilling the rules down to the essence of what really matters to us as traditional archers rather than worrying about minor variations on the Traditional theme.

It requires no effort - appropriate guidelines are already set.

The existing guidelines mustn't be appropriate as you'd like to change them to add additional catagories and rules? And I'm sure there are others out there that would significantly like to change these guidelines as well? Who is right and who is wrong thats the challenge I believe GrahamA and I are outlining

i'd love to see traditional archery with a simple fun competition culture thats easy for a new archer to get involved with and not feel alienated.

Who's taking about alienating anyone?

When I first decided to give trad archery ago (only very recently) I had thought it would be as simple as buying a bow I liked then going to some competitions and have fun. My 1st experience was an ABA shoot where I felt like I was getting categorised by the type of equipment i shot, thankfully I'm a bull headed pain in the butt and don't scare easily so i just didn't score and had fun. But they attempted to tell me off for shooting equipment that didn't strictly fit within the guidelines. I'm sure I'm not the 1st newbie to have that experience.

It would be nice if everybody just shot and scored together. That's all

i guess the reality is that the majority of clubs and competitions i shoot at don't give a rats ass about ABA, AA, TAA rules and recommendations but focus on the fun family oriented experience that develops a strong traditional community regardless of the breed of bow you shoot. and trust me things get plenty competitive amongst the recurve , semi recurve, longbow and horse shooters for everyone to have fun.

This has nothing to do with what we are debating.

I guess what I'm saying is that I'm wasting time debating something that really doesn't matter that much luckily for me in QLD. I'll shoot the rules of which ever club has a competition and smile and laugh as I proceed to make a fool of myself. Maybe the perceived inequality between arrow types and bow types is much less than what we think and few people care.

Either way looks like I've spoken up to much again (see I'm good at making a fool of myself) so I'll just go and shoot my carbons out of my semi recurve and hope not to hit one of the chickens.

Have a good night all

[Kendaric]

Yes Susie I must agree i thought this thread was about aluminium arrows not longbow definitions!
Cheers

Very true, sorry about that, the thread got hijacked.

That's the beauty of conversation, it can evolve naturally.

And yes BowmanBjorn, I understand what you are saying, and your point is valid and shared by many. Thank you for your contribution.

[Kendaric]

Yes Susie I must agree i thought this thread was about aluminium arrows not longbow definitions!
Cheers

Very true, sorry about that, the thread got hijacked.

That's the beauty of conversation, it can evolve naturally.

Either way looks like I've spoken up to much again (see I'm good at making a fool of myself)

Not at all.

You have a point that is shared by many, if not most, and I understand what you are saying. Look, I must apologize, my rebuttal was probably done poorly.

[GrahameA]

Morning All.

The difficulty of having rules/guidelines/whatever is that:

True, but the work has already been done. The ABA guidelines work fine.

No. What ABA does is ABA thing. However, they represent less than 50% of archers in Australia.

... b) (they are) a consensus agreed upon those (or at least a majority) ...

They do not have consensus. If you are unable to demonstrate that better than 80% of people agree with all content then there will issues.

[Gringa Bows]

Dont give up ,Jeff

[Kendaric]

No. What ABA does is ABA thing.

Very very true. The ABA is not Trad.

What I am trying to say is the the ABA descriptions are accurate enough to be borrowed directly to use a guidelines for bow types at a trad event. Except for the 'modern longbow' distinction, they are loosely followed by already - and the fact that ABA calls the modern longbow a longbow, further indicates that trad events are following these guidelines by lumping these longbows in with traditional longbows and calling the whole lot longbows.

I've heard it said that it is all too complicated, but you know, sometimes you have to clarify something to make it simpler. Trad shooters are not simpletons.

Maybe it is time to have a set of guidelines (I'm not saying rules). This would help define the spirit of Traditional Archery. Whether the organizers actually follow them at their own privately held trad events is up to them.

The modern longbow of today is simply a marketed re-badged semi-recurve, to make it much more appealing and sellable, which people have brought into. Marketing can move mountains. I re-iterate, there is nothing wrong with these bows, they are often sweet to shoot and have graceful lines, which is part of the appeal, a nice compromise between a full recurve and traditional longbow. Whether they shoot better or not compared to a traditional longbow has no baring on this issue.

If another division in Trad could be avoided, then I see that as a plus. But to remain true to the spirit of traditional archery, then the modern longbow semi recurve should be rightly put in the recurve division.

I think that this would probably be an unpopular move, and I understand and sympathise why - the reasons and psychology are many.

Another division could be an viable compromise. But here in lies the real problem (aside from the belief that this adds complexity, that some feel, that Trad shooters wouldn't understand it) - what do you call this division. You can't call it a modern longbow, because that don't work in with traditional sense. You cant call it a traditional longbow, because it simply isn't in the traditional sense of a longbow common through the bulk of the last century in Australia, calling it a semi-recurve division just seems odd, and a quasi longbow is a tad insulting.

Just because something is difficult, doesn't mean it isn't worthy. The great thing about a forum like this, is it allows people to express ideas, and perhaps between all of us, a working solution could be meet.

And whilst it could be said that what we have already does work, it is not accurate in a traditional archery sense. Are we traditional archers or just bare-bowers with timber arrows.

[BowmanBjorn]

And.... I'm back managed not to shoot the chickens!

Why not have recurves, semi recurves, longbows, horse bows and any other traditional bow shoot together in the same devision. For those true to trad shooting wood arrows and a NEO TRAD devision for the multi price take down super bows and carbon arrows? And a junior devision where everything goes from small 10lb solid fiberglass bows to beautifully made custom laminate bows.

3 simple divisions, everybody shoots together and a simple enjoyable awards ceremony at the end.

[ron300wm]

I lick that bowman lock me in for that

[wishsong]

I was reading through the ABA rules posted and it states that Traditional division must be shot using the ‘Mediterranean’ loose. I see plenty of people getting all geared up to shoot trad but then go and shoot three fingers under. Which puts them straight into "Modern Longbow". I've explained this to a few people much to there disgust. I guess the rules are to stop people gap shooting.

Doesn't bother me as I don't do a lot of club shoots.

Thats just insane if thats the case IMHO ...

a. It doesn't stop you gapping , and for many longbow set ups shooting Field archery distances, 3Under isn't an advantage past 40 metres as many set ups would be over the target

b. its a silly rule ... and precludes people on a sense of "trad " thats a modern invention, not reality

c. its a silly rule ... whats wrong with gapping - or any conscious aiming method ? Isn't Trad ? - utter silliness. and again a pre conceived notion that somehow seems to be confused with the pre compound era ... an era in fact when the very basis of modern archery [ in its "hunting/leisure" sense] is largely founded in the Field Archery movements of the USA pre compound - when the NFAA was king and heaven forbid, people aimed...

are people concerned they'll get outscored by gappers ? maybe learn to gap , maybe get better at instinctive but for the sport to flourish there are plenty of restrictions that validate barebow longbow shooting without erroneous limitations such as 3 Under vs Split

Saxton and Pope.jpg (66.29 KiB) Viewed 6905 times

as for 3Under ...
are these guys not trad ?

and I should have precluded this by saying my preferred tackle is a Flat laid string follow Hill style bow with cedars and my aiming out to 45 metres is sub conscious/ "instinctive" and my release is split.

the 3under distinction just irritates me

[greybeard]

You will notice that the arrow is anchored down on the jaw line, which I believe is quite safe [and probably self nocked arrows].

The problem appeared to arise when some ABA members tried the three under method but foolishly anchored just below the eyeball so they could sight down the arrow.

Apparently the risk of a nock blowing up on release and causing eye damage was a concern for ABA and their liability.

Daryl.

I was going to post about the Mediterranean release but thought it best to start a new thread.

[bstan86]

Apparently the risk of a nock blowing up on release and causing eye damage was a concern for ABA and their liability.

ahhhhhhhhh - one of the 20th and 21st century's greatest advances in social etiquette - "I am not responsible for my own actions and I get to blame others when I screw up and hurt myself"...........

[toby]

Couple of questions
1/ Who first penned the term Semi Recurve? And if he had of called it a deflex reflex longbow or a hybrid would we still be having the same debate?

2/What to most people is the profile of a longbow & a recurve limb? Forget any curves, just width depth & length.

I have observed more variations in the deflex reflex type bows than any other. They can be a typical longbow limb lay up just simply glued in a form with a deflex reflex design & that is the only difference between them & a flat laid bow. To a recurve limb profile that narrows more towards the tip to finish in a tip similar to a longbow.

Like it or not a deflex reflex longbow, hybrid bow or semi recurve or whatever you want to call them are not recurves or longbows for if they were there would be no semi or deflex reflex in there name. So either give them there own catergory or just put them all together & just call them Traditional Bows for competition purposes.

As far as traditional interpretations go in an Australian sense. Virtually all our early descriptions come the Americans or the English anyway like it or not. I am not aware of any Australian invention of major development in Tradional archery equipment that would give us the right to call it our own.