New Bow, Now What?

[GrahameA]

Hi All.

This post was really started as a result of thinking about other things and people buying bows. I have often thought that people buy bows or a particular bow for many reasons, those reasons are their reasons but not necessarily the reasons that sway me and get a bow to shoot well is not a five minute exercise. Whilst it is not quite Trad it may make for an interesting read for some.

A few months ago I purchased a pre-loved Hoyt riser. I have wanted a modern Hoyt riser for some time having had shot a few, they have all 'shot' well and they have a reputation second to none in the world of Target Bows and when the opportunity came up to get one at a good price I grabbed it. A few weeks ago I thought that I had better do something about it rather than let it collect dust on the shelf and got carried away and visited my local Archery shop and purchased an Arrow rest (and a couple of other things). Then over the next few days I put together and started tuning it.

I had purchased a Shibuya rest for two reasons a) they are adjustable so they can be set-up so the arrow shaft contacts the button correctly and b) they are strong and last, you don't want to be trying to fix/refit an arrow rest when you should be shooting arrows. So I fitted the rest and set it up.... an hour later I was happy with it.

Next step some limbs, hhhmmmmmm. I decided to go with a set of limbs off another bow, rather than the limbs I had originally marked for it, for the moment and adjusted the tlller bolts so that the limbs would be approximately halfway in the poundage adjustment fitted them to the riser and grabbed a spare string and strung the bow and unstrung the bow and adjusted the tiller bolts and strung the bow ...... and unstrung the bow and adjusted the tiller bolts ......... and strung the bow and unstrung the bow and adjusted the tiller bolts and ......

I spent a bit of time getting the tiller somewhere near where I thought it should be and the bow was felling good ... poundage felt about right. Thanks goodness the bowstring was laying central otherwise I would be spending a bit more time to get it central

Fitted a button that I had and got it feeling right.

So after a few hours I had the bow together and hopefully somewhere near correct.

Next day dropped into the club early and set myself up on the indoor rang at about 5m fitted an X7 and had a shot. a) the bow did not feel bad and neither did it feel good it obviously needed some work and b) the arrow was not where I wanted it to be. So I shot a few more arrows and there were all grouped off to one side. I was reasonably confident that the arrows were correct and suspected the button.

So pulled it out, replaced the spring, put it back in and shot another set of arrows. Much better but still not where I wanted them. Back to 18m and more arrows and some fine adjustment on the button .... involving taken it out and fitting a match instead of a spring and adjusting its lateral position, shooting arrows, adjusting and finally pulling it all apart, putting back together correctly, shooting, adjusting the spring tension, more shooting and adjusting and several hours later I was happy with how it was shooting. It was not as good as I was expecting but at least I had this nice group of arrows in the middle.

A couple of days later I was back at the range and started playing with the tiller. Great success..... it only took me a couple of adjustments to get it right and suddenly the bow was feeling much nicer and the groups had shrunk. The groups had shrunk enough for me to start shooting at single spots as I did not want to destroy any arrows. I then spent the rest of the afternoon/evening playing with the brace height until I was happy with it.

I am now at the stage where I have put in a some time in getting the bow set-up and I am very happy in how it shoots, it is quiet there is no vibration and it is stable. I need to make a couple of string for it and shoot them in. I have taken it along a few times and I enjoy shooting it and it has met my expectations and a bit more. Now it is just a matter of spend some time shooting it and getting used to it and perhaps do some fine adjustments.

If there is a lesson in all of this it is that even the best of bows need to be set-up and tuned to give their best.

[Mick Smith]

It sounds very complicated Grahame. I think I'll stick with my non-adjustable bows. It's hard enough to get them shooting straight.

Still, I suppose it must be worth it and you wouldn't persist with it unless you enjoyed it.

As a matter of interest, how do you compare with other competitors at trad shoots? I assume you use one of your older target bows, minus the stabilisers and sights, to abide by the rules. Does your equipment offer any advantages or disadvantages over the more typical equipment most archers would use at shoots? Personally, I find it interesting and perhaps even refreshing in a way, that you use and generally prefer target oriented bows. I realise there's a whole different world out there, where target bows, clickers, kissers, sights and stabilisers rule. Do you own much in the way of what most of us would call more conventional trad gear? Not that there's anything wrong with your choice of gear at all. I'm just curious.

[DavidM]

Hi Graham

I find it rather cathartic and fun setting up a new bow. Being a barebow string-walker it can be a bit more tedious and fiddley setting up, but it gives you some things to think about. Tiller is an interesting subject I tried 1/8 ” then a 1/4” positive tiller and ended up going with a zero tiller set-up on the Spigarelli, To be honest I didn’t notice a whole lot of difference between them. I know some string-walkers will go with as much as 3/8 positive tiller as a minimum. I try to tune the bow at the point on distance and put up with whatever it does at the other string crawls, I use a beiter plunger to adjust for the weak and strong shots, screwing it in as needed on the spot.

[GrahameA]

Morning David.

I find it rather cathartic and fun setting up a new bow. Being a barebow string-walker it can be a bit more tedious and fiddley setting up, but it gives you some things to think about. Tiller is an interesting subject I tried 1/8 ” then a 1/4” positive tiller and ended up going with a zero tiller set-up on the Spigarelli, To be honest I didn’t notice a whole lot of difference between them. I know some string-walkers will go with as much as 3/8 positive tiller as a minimum. I try to tune the bow at the point on distance and put up with whatever it does at the other string crawls, I use a beiter plunger to adjust for the weak and strong shots, screwing it in as needed on the spot.

I will get back to Mick's comments later.

I not so much enjoy setting up a bow up as getting a sense of accomplishment at the end when it is all working well. I like to put the effort in getting things set-up and then leave it alone. This one has been set up for Barebow and I am happy with it at the moment although it is still a project in finalisation. I have been toying with the idea of making a string from 452X for it however I will probably stay with D97, everything else has D97 so that is something I am familiar with and have a few spools of it. I have thought about adding a weight to the riser but for the moment I have no intention of playing with it until I have put in a few months of shooting it.

Which Spiragelli do you have? They are a bow that I know little about however the few I have seen look intriguing and they are popular in Europe.

I don't stringwalk however part of the reason for grabbing that particular riser was that it is not a TEC riser and would go through the ring so that possibility was open if I wanted to put the hours in.

I am happy to play with the tiller until I get no rock in the riser and that is what I initially aim for as I draw the bow and then adjust so there is as little apparent vibration, etc. in the bow as possible. Stringwalking throws all those things out the window as you change the the point at which the force is applied. I could change my button to another model which had graduations so I could easily adjust things however my preference is to set it up and leave it alone. Adjusting things in 'the field' is an approach that has not worked well for me.

[GrahameA]

Hi Mick.

It sounds very complicated Grahame. I think I'll stick with my non-adjustable bows. It's hard enough to get them shooting straight.

Still, I suppose it must be worth it and you wouldn't persist with it unless you enjoyed it.

It is not that complicated, it just takes time. I would put it down to the 'whatever in me' in that I like 'things' to perform the way they were originally designed and occasionally built.

Whilst you may be of the opinion that you shoot a non-ajustable bow it actually is. In the simplest form you can change the arrows and the nocking point and the brace height and the string material and ....

You have a lot of area to fine tune the device. However, for the simplest of bows the arrow is the most important. You are generally pushed into working on the arrows as you have little opportunity to change/adjust other things.

There is a DVD on Assembling Arrows starring Byron Ferguson in which he cuts the shaft to get the natural frequency of the shaft to match the time that the arrow takes to clear the riser and so that the nodes align when the arrow disengages from the string.

He glues and and unglues the insert in the shaft quite a few times until he gets it right ..... and perhaps that is part of why he is as good as he is, attention to detail.

As a matter of interest, how do you compare with other competitors at trad shoots? I assume you use one of your older target bows, minus the stabilisers and sights, to abide by the rules.

I have no idea as I rarely submit a scoresheet and often am behind a camera and I generally shoot a selfbow.

Trad Rules - not a subject to get me started on in that almost every event they will change and the only common factor is that most of them do not endorse sights. Although an astute reader of the rules would note that there is....

Does your equipment offer any advantages or disadvantages over the more typical equipment most archers would use at shoots? Personally, I find it interesting and perhaps even refreshing in a way, that you use and generally prefer target oriented bows. I realise there's a whole different world out there, where target bows, clickers, kissers, sights and stabilisers rule. Do you own much in the way of what most of us would call more conventional trad gear? Not that there's anything wrong with your choice of gear at all. I'm just curious.

Hmmmm...... If you were to follow the USA Archery rules for Trad you would discover they have a division for essentially pre-1970 Target Bows. Is that the sound of someone fainting in shock.

Clickers are not new, kissers are not new, sights are not new and stabiliser, lets call them 'Torque Flight Compensators' as they were originally called, were not exactly invented yesterday.

What is 'Conventional Trad Gear'. I go to few shoots and I see people shooting everything from 'Built by the Archer' selfbows, wood-laminates, wood/bamboo/fibreglass/HMG through to the latest so called, manufactured-in-giant-complex, 'Traditional Bow' and everything from arrows being shot 'off the knuckle' to being 'shot off shelves' to 'shot off feather/toothbrush rests' to 'Hoyt Super rests' to modern 'metal target rests' the really only common factor is the use of Feathers for fletching and the use of Wood/Bamboo for Shafting and even that is slowly disappearing. However, it causes me no great issue as there is more to 'Trad' than the gear or the rules and everyone gets to shoot in some division.

However, a simpler answer is perhaps, 'Yes' and target equipment should be better as it should be built from the start to produce a bow that is repeatable and consistent in its performance. Against that you have to weigh that generally it is not the domain of high poundages (thus not the domain of fast arrows) and the bows tend to be longer and heavier but a Target Recurve is not as long as a longbow.

[DavidM]

Hi Graham

I shoot the Spigarelli 650 club riser,

Its 4 1/2 pounds just on its own. It will almost hand vertical, but I have added a 8oz fixed weight as well, obviously very stable t shoot. There is also room in the riser itself for further weight as you can see in the picture. It is quite a popular riser in Europe as you said. The guy shooting against Michael Fisher in the world FITA field championships was using one I noticed. I don’t notice the weight to much, until I swap over to the ELB and then in notice. I have tried several “cheaper” adjustable graduated plungers before going to the Beiter ($150 ouch), now I realise it would have been easier and cheaper to buy the real deal in first place.

The only thing I haven’t made up my mind about in tuning is arrow weight. Currently I’m shooting 255gr from #44@27”, they shoot nice, they punch bullet holes in paper tuning at 20yards, but are very unforgiving to a poor release. So the jury is out on that one but I think heavier may be better.

[Mick Smith]

Thanks for that Grahame. I'm a nosey buggar, aren't I?