What Wood?

[Taiga Recurve]

I am looking at putting together a dozen woodys and I am not sure what type of wood to go with, I pull 61#'s.

What are your suggestions and why?

Thanks

T

[Taiga Recurve]

TTT

[madness522]

POC is a very popular choice as well as Sitka Spruce.  Laminated birch would be a durable one too.  Or you could go to a heavy weight Ash.

[LBR]

POC is my preferance--good POC.  You can get junk in any of them--go with a dealer with a good reputation for quality.  Spruce would be my second choice.

Chad

[Jack Skinner]

Although POC smells good and is very Trad. If you are looking for around 10 grains of shaft weight per lb of bow draw weight (60lb draw 600 grain arrow) it is not a good choice. It is also not very durable.

Some better choices to get your arrow weight up and for durablility are Ash, Birch, Douglas Fir. There are others of course. I have tried just about all and like Ash the best for my 60lb selfbows with 190 grizs. I get bare shafts around 400 to 450 grains and finished shafts around 600 to 640 grains. They are very straight good quality extremly durable.

Of the three I mentioned above doug fir seems to be a bit brittle at times for me and not as durable. But I use it to make my own shafts from boards because straight grain boards of doug fir are easy to come by at Lowes.

Of course ask 10 archers get 10 different answers.

[LBR]

Depends on your draw length and point weight Jack--I shoot 66#@30.5, and with 125 grain points my arrows average around 9.5 grains per lb. (620-640 grains).  No problems shooting through deer, hogs, rabbits, armidillos, etc. so far.  Hope to do another "test" on a hog or three this weekend.

POC isn't as durable as ash, but as my favorite bowyer says, everything is a trade-off.  Trying to get (and keep) ash shafts straight drove me nuts.  Most of the shots I make that break an arrow would break most any arrow (including carbon--been there, done that).  Again though, ash shafts are tougher in general.

I think your last statement is dead-on!  lol

Chad