NEED ARROW HELP

[MATHEWS2005]

I bought my first trad. bow and it's a longbow 55 lbs. 28" amo 64. I have a short draw lenght of 26". How many GPI would you recommend.And broadhead wieght. Thanks for all the help guys.

[cedar]

You will be pulling around 49 lbs.  The general rule of 10 gpi would give you a 490 gr arrow.  I always use 125 gr broadheads(no special reason, just personal preference) so the arrow would have to be 365 gr bare shaft.  I shoot about the same poundage and my arrows get about 175 fps out of my longbows.  Anything between 10 and 12 gpi would be good.  Other opinions may differ.

[toehead]

Fred Bear recommended 9gpp as a good overall compromise b/w wieght and speed and that's a great starting point.

[bigbadjon]

I personally shoot 10gpp, but I don't notice much of a change from 10 to 14 gpp. Historically I buy my arrow shafts, weigh them finished, and then buy points to bring them to weight.

[Stumpkiller]

Don't confuse grains per inch of arrow length with grains per pound of draw weight.  The latter has been in use since the 30's but the former is a new concept - probably brought on by light carbon shafts.

[MATHEWS2005]

Ceder or carbon? What are you guys shooting?

[GREATBROWNKNOCKEMDOWN]

IF i were you id probably start with carbon, they  are either straight or they are broken, and until you get your form down you won't have to worry about wood arrows being bent or having wobbles. thats just my opinion.  i shoot and hunt with woodies now after switching from carbons only after a couple months.

[SEMO_HUNTER]

I went the other direction and started with woodies, now shooting carbon. I can switch back and forth though because at close ranges 0-20yrd. they have the same point of impact
.
As far as grains per pound......obviously the carbons are much lighter than the woodies.
I dropped from close to 11 grains per pound with woodies to around 8 GPP with carbons, both shoot great but I'm leaning more toward the "Straight or Broke" choice with the carbons.
I'm not really sure yet and I'll have to give them a little time before I make up my mind completely about that.
I could have added weights to the carbons, but they shoot so good the way they are, that I don't see the need to.

The carbons are definitely much easier to make, no sanding, spining, then sanding some more, then finishing, and finally fletching. With carbons just fletch and then tune with different wt. points to see which work best.......as long as you start with a spine that's close to what your bow needs.

I would like to mention that by starting out with wood shafts, I learned a great deal about arrow spine and how it affects accuracy. That's something that I would recommend everybody who is new to traditional archery fully understand because it will help you in the long run. It's just not as simple as picking up a handful of arrows at Walmart, slapping some broadheads on them and going hunting.....expecting perfect arrow flight, that's just not going to happen.

I would suggest that you don't go overboard and buy a dozen of either shaft choice right off the bat. Just get enough to test and see what you are comfortable with, then you could always refine your search later and buy more when you find what you like. That way they don't end up in the classified ads section and you take a beating on them.
As a matter of fact, there's nothing in the world wrong with shooting used carbons as long as they are from a trusted source. If they are in good sound shape, not cracked or abused then you could get lots of life out of them.
Generally, you should be able to find some good used ones if you shop around a little bit.