Does changing fletching size affect arrow flight?

[Yeoman Bowman]

Last week, while stump shooting, I had trouble with the nocks breaking on my 1535s. So I decided to switch to some old bamboo arrows for my next stump shoot. The bamboos fly great & they're rock solid.

Unfortunately, the fletchings on the bamboos are gray barred feathers (5") & would easily get lost in the weeds. So I decided to refletch them with some red & white 4" feathers (the only size I had).

I fletched one with 4" feathers & shot it. But unlike the gray fletched arrows, the new one consistently flew nock down, point up. So I'm confused.    :confused:   and bothered.      

My question is this:

Can the fletching size affect the arrow flight that dramatically? And will getting some 5" feathers to refletch the bamboos make them straighten up and fly right?

[Hud]

Larger fletch will can make an arrow fly better than one with smaller fletch, so you may not have noticed anthing before. I would move the nocking point up 1/8" and see if they fly better. Maybe something changed in your set up, string, string height, or nocking point.

If you can shoot the arrows, one bare shaft and two or three of the same shaft with feathers, not necessarily the same, you will see the difference.

[bsoper]

The larger feathers might have been compensating for a flaw in tuning that you didn't notice. The smaller feathers aren't enough to do that and are showing you the tuning error. Adjust the nock point most likely will fix it.

[Rob DiStefano]

adding rear grain weight to an arrow usually stiffens the spine.

[Running Buck]

Large fletching 5 1/2" will compensate for a less then perfect release. In the case of nock low, point high sounds like your nocking point needs to be bumped up a tad. You might want to try bare shafting a few of the bamboo shafts to see if the are weak spined?

[Bill Carlsen]

bsoper got it. I have found that if I take my time with bare shafting and get the arrows really fine tuned I can use minimal fletching.

[Jason R. Wesbrock]

Like others have said, larger fletching will hide tuning issues that become apparent with smaller feathers. If the arrows flew well with large fletching, but poorly with smaller feathers, odds are very high that you have a tuning problem.

[Kevin Dill]

All the above said, I now prefer the smallest fletching that gives me good flight with broadheads. Why? Less feather drag in flight. Less window or shelf kickout from large fletch. Less fletch to gather water or moisture on a hunt. Better clearance in the quiver. Less fletching wear.

Less is more.

[Bowmania]

Just changed from 5 to 4 and could not be more impressed with such a small change.  They seemed flatter and were guiding a big Snuffer with 285 total up front.

After reading Ashby Update #8 I have on order 2, 2.5 and 3 inch from Trueflight.  Actually the 2.5 is 2 1/4 and a little higher profile the you average feather. I'm planning a thread with chrono and flight results with the 160.  That might be somewhat delayed, I just scratched my non-donminate eye.

Bowmania