Tell me about predator bows?

[snowplow]

I don't hear much about these guys but l sure like the looks of their bows!

What do you guys know about them?

For reference l shoot a 54" javaman helmsdeep @ 30.5". It's a fast bow.

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[snowplow]

No predators????

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[Yellow Dog]

My goto bow 15 years ago before I got into other bows.   

Extremely fast, smooth, good manners and may take a little extra tuning to get them acceptably quiet.

Guys either love the grip or hate it. It fills your hand and the shelf is cut super low. Some shooters have complained about fletching cuts on their bow hand with the low shelf but I never had a problem with it.

60 arrows at 20 yards with one years back.......

[snowplow]

Nice! You know I want one of these really bad I just kind of fell in love I think. Although I haven't got one in my hands so who knows? but I haven't read a single bad thing about these bows except for some people don't like the large handle. However, the new ones are made with a smaller more conventional grip it sounds like.

sounds like this design is basically unchanged for many many years. anybody know how it compares to like a wengerd or a stalker or Bob Lee etc?

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[Tajue17]

I have an originally Pittsley Preditor,, I'm pretty sure its the quietest high performance type recurve I have even with a 10 strand string on it!  no carbon just flat grain elm but with Ron's original limb design which looks like a duo-flex style I think its faster than my double carbon Palmers which are known for being fast bows..   

its the grip that shakes people you either love it or hate it but once you understand it and spend time learning how to hold it you become very deadly,,  basically you lightly choke the throat of the grip with you're pointer and ring fingers and loosely lay your other two fingers down and that's it, at first you're point of impact might be different but if you keep shooting you will see...

the bow is 50@28 its fast enough where I have no issues shooting heritage 250's with 275gr points including insert I think 670gr total and my trajectory is fine ,, the bow is amazing.

there is a guy on youtube who shoots treesharks  in Georgia his early vids he uses an original Pittsley..

[snowplow]

That's such excellent info thank you!!

That's exactly how l describe how l grip the bow!

Wow can't believe you can shoot 250s!!

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[Tajue17]

the story with the 250's is before I went to the 10strand I was shooting heritage 150's with 100gr inserts and 125gr points with a normal fast flight I forget the strand cound maybe 14strands but its the same arrow setup I shoot from my 50 & 48# palmers..  once I put the 10 stand on these arrows where coming off the shelf with a weak spine.. I have a bunch of different bareshafts here for matching arrows to bows and it turns out the preditor now wanted a 29" heritage 250 with 100gr inserts and 175gr points and it bareshafted those perfect out to 20yds,, that extra arrow weight also made the bow more quiet with a 7 3/4 brace...   the 150's had 5.5 High back shields but the 250's for the preditor I shoot now have low 5" parabolics which is how my point of impact didn't really change out to 20yds because of less drag but after 20 they start to come down quicker than the 150's did.

[Tedd]

Lots of draw length without stack. great looks, easy to get multiple limbs, grips vary. I could never get a tune that was perfect without rubbing the side plate. I had two Predators. Tuning became an every arrow kind of thing and I drove myself crazy. I was using Easton Axis at the time and I have learned to hate them since. So maybe it was me or the arrows. (though I did try every shaft in the house too). I'd like to try again, I think there are some better shafts on the market. But honestly I never tried so hard to get a good tune as I did with those bows. 10 of thousands of shots later I moved to another brand of bow.
Tedd

[Tajue17]

that's intriguing,,  definitely don't doubt what Tedd said because I had that same issue with other bows which I considered too sensitive for me in other words a PIA to shoot accurately  the best way I found is have others shoot the bare shaft too and see if its the same for them IDK but the pred I have was pretty stable when I first bought that I shot it 60yds with 2114's and I was impressed at my grouping....  I would love to shoot the original Pittsley,the Darton Predator Ron Made and the Hunters Niche version all side by side and see if a difference can be felt..  I heard several times they are loud but after PM'ing those owners I learned they all had niche bows and not knocking niche preds but I wonder if something was changed in the limb design or brace heights maybe they like a Dacron string or padded string .    if  anyone ever comes across an original RH Pittsley 48/50lbs in the rare snow or zebra camo Please Please LMK I'll reward you if I buy it  .. 

[stagetek]

I'm a big fan of Predators. Fast, quiet and I like the larger grips.

[stagetek]

...and an old favorite.

[Tajue17]

I'll get a pic of mine later its early now,,,,, so I had 5 does 2 below and 3 near my stand yesterday afternoon at the same time..  the one that was going to be within range a big ole doe knew something was up though she hung around for 20 minutes in no shot positions and just as she turned to sneak back the way she came I started to draw to get that quartering away shot and don't ever believe they can't hear wool clothes move cause she did they always do when they are nervous and close but she did a tiny snort and hopped back into the pine brush and stood there laughing at me till dark!!  I was thinking of this thread before I tried to draw back because I really wanted her for this thread with my predator..  but looking at my bow its serial is 61099 so I believe its the 610th or 60th bow made in 99 I bought it off a guy soon after for 250.00 who was trying to become a dealer for Ron and it fell through so he said it was his dealer cost and maybe so because I think they only went for 450-500 back then Ron came out with a limited edition Camo Model I've been looking for one since.