I dunno. Since the Deluxe bows were such failures, I assume Bear learned to never make such a poor bow again. If one notices, Bear ran from the terrible Deluxe bows they made and did everything to make other bows archers could actually use.
Also notice, it's rare to have much stress in a '62 Kodiak, '62 Grizzly or '62 Kodiak Special. Most those bows have little to no stress issues. And delamination/blow up's, the utmost worst failure of a bow design, is non-existent in 1962 models. In the 1962 models, stress isn't nearly the factor it is as in other years.
It was only by odd rarity that cash value was assumed on the rare year that Bear made an albeit beautiful, but mostly useless, flawed 1960 DLX bows. If Winchester made a Model 70 that you couldn't fire because it might blow up, I bet it'd also have some value to some people.
I've looked into several 60KSD's from members here and I'm still open to getting one and will shoot it until it fails, but they still can't shoot as well as the 1962 Kodiak Special. They can't because the 62KS grip blows the 59/60 grip away. That and the '62 Kodiak Special won't delaminate in your hands, ever.
A different question is, how many Kodiak Deluxe bows and Kodiak Special Deluxe bows can one shoot every day? Weekly? Monthly? Yearly? How long can one leave a Deluxe strung while hunting year in and year out? How many animals can one kill with a Deluxe?
If a guy likes a wall hanger, that's fine by be. Enjoy it. Spend that cash on it. Hang it above your bed if one likes. But please don't claim some collector high ground about bows that can't be bows. A bow needs to be "bowed" to be a bow. An unstrung bow is just, well, an expensive historical stick. And that's cool, but they really aren't bows anymore, because they aren't strung and bowed. As stated before, my opinion is a bow unused is a useless bow. Bows were never meant to hang on a wall. Bows are meant to shoot arrows and kill things or at least shoot targets. A bow that can't be strung is like a vintage car without an engine. If one has wall hangers, enjoy them, but please don't compare them to working bows still in the field and getting better with age.
The 1960 Deluxe bows are most certainly not getting better with age, nor is their influence on traditional archery. More and more, the 1960 DLX's are seen as what could go wrong with a bow. The 1962 line up, on the other hand, is garnering more appreciation because hunters of that era actually would like to use them in the field.
While I'd love to shoot a 1960 KSD until it blows up, I know it'd never be the bow that a 1962 KS was in fact. Just my opinion and please all readers take it as just that.
Topic: EXP 1962 Kodiak Special (Read 1783 times)
