Interesting bare shaft tuning results.

[longbow fanatic 1]

If you're not a stringwalker, gap or fixed crawl shooter, you may find this irrelevant. But then again, maybe you'll get some benefit out of it.            

So I spent time bare shaft tuning and got my bare shafts grouping well with fletched arrows at 15 & 20 yards. Then today, I went out and shot the arrows at 40 yards. I string walk, so that was how I was shooting these arrows. The arrows were impacting stiff, way to the left of the bullseye. Now a little more information. When I bare shaft tuned the arrows, I did so by shooting with my fingers directly under the nock, as I would for a point-on shot. I realized, by string walking, I was detuning the bow, causing the arrows to show stiff. I moved up to 20 yards and the arrows were still impacting six inches left (stiff). I then looked at the three bow strings I have for this bow. Two were 12 strand strings and one was an 18 strand. I had bare shaft tuned my bow with the 12 strand string, so I decided to shoot the same arrows with my 18 strand string to see if I would get better results. Would you believe that with the 18 strand string on my 20 yard & 25 yard crawl, my arrows were shooting right down the middle! At 30 yards & 40 yards the arrows were now showing slightly stiff, as I shot with my 30 & 40 yard crawl. That can be corrected by changing my "string blur" alignment. Amazing how much changing strings can affect the tune of your bow!

[pinecrest]

It's a huge difference. My ilf  bow would not tune with an 18 strand string so I made a 20 strand,both 8125.It is now the best shooting bow I've ever had.

[mgf]

You have to be careful in drawing conclusions because bare shaft flight is so greatly effected by our own shooting technique.

I've had bare shafts fly great one day (or for a while) all of a sudden show SUPER stiff. I had a heck of a time.

Not to say that tuning isn't important but the first place I look for solutions to tuning problems is in the mirror. It just seems that my own shooting errors have a greater effect than a slightly over or under spined shaft.