Wood Arrow Tuning

[snapper1d]

I have watched Master of the Barebow 2 about arrow tuning and started tuning my wood arrows.I have seen post on here of people making their own arrows ans a lot of them say they dont tune their wood arrows and didnt see any need for it.Well here is my experience and how I do it.I cut my shafts with my Veritas Dowel Maker.Then chuck the new shafts up in my 3/8" drill and sand them good with 60 grit paper to get them good and smooth.I cut to my draw length and put on the nocks orientated to the grain with it running left and right towards the bow and not up and down with the string.Then I will glue on the field points.Then its time to bare shaft tune.I will shoot a few of them which will be stiff to start with to see how the shoot.Then chuck the field point up in the drill and sand the shafts some and then shoot again to see how they shoot.If still showing still too stiff I chuck up and sand more.I keep doing this till I get one that shoots perfectly without fletchings.Then I will put on a makeshift spine tester to see where it comes to and mark that spot.Then I hang the shaft up and squirt a little lacquer in my hand and rub it in on the shaft and let dry.Then shoot to see how it does and check the spine also.Usually the lacquer will stiffen it some but a little sanding will bring it back down.After this I fletch and paper tune.The fletchings will even stiffen the spine some also but not much.Then paper tune and use some 220 grit paper to bring the arrows to perfect flight.Then the final lacquer is used to seal the shafts.I was never a good shooter and still not but by tuning my wood arrows now I am much much much better.Now they go where I want them to go and not where they want to go.

[snapper1d]

I forgot to add that when making wood arrows make sure the grain feathers on top are pointing away from you on top.This way if an arrow breaks they will go up and not down into your hand.

[Surewood Steve]

I have never noticed that the spine goes up when applying lacquer. But what we have found out is not to spine test just after sanding.  Sanding creates heat and heated wood bends or it "softer".  We let the shafts cool before spining.  By sanding each shaft to hit weight you must have several diameters.  That is why we have to make several hundred to get a few matched dozen.

[snapper1d]

Thats real good Steve that you match the shafts perfectly when you sell them but not all bows are the same at the same exact draw weight.Some are cut past center maybe 1/32",1/16" ect.Some center and other not cut even close to center like a self bow without a shelf.If I bought some of your shafts I am sure they would be perfect but may not be perfect for my bow.My point is I make my own shafts that all shoot perfectly from my bow and the others that make their own can do the same.

[gordydog]

Surewood Steve,  if heat softens spine after sanding,  have you found that cold stiffens spine.  Would minus 10 degrees change wood shaft spine?

[snapper1d]

I cant see any difference after sanding on heat.I dont ever sand but just a little bit at the time and I am working on a handful also so whatever little heat there is probably dissipates before shooting again.On lacquer changing spines.Different woods will soak up lacquer at different rates.A wood like west coast cedar will suck up a ton of it and when it hardens it will change a lot but a dense wood will soak very little and not change much at all.A group of shafts that are the same diameter and the same spine will be very close in the same weight.When you sand and remove wood to change the spine you would remove really close to the same amount of wood to get the same spine from the others.

[Grey Taylor]

Originally posted by snapper1d:
I forgot to add that when making wood arrows make sure the grain feathers on top are pointing away from you on top.This way if an arrow breaks they will go up and not down into your hand.

This is how experienced arrow builders make arrows. I do it this way not for the chance that the shaft can break, but for the uniformity of building the arrows all the same.
If you think about it, four fletch users will be nocking their arrows "upside down" about 50% of the time. Yet we don't hear about their arrow shafts exploding and sending slivers into their hands any more than three fletch users. In fact, I have heard of very few (almost never) instances of the shaft splintering along the grain like this.

Probably the best thing to do is use good quality shafts that don't have grain runnout to worry about in the first place.

Guy

[Grey Taylor]

Originally posted by snapper1d:
 A group of shafts that are the same diameter and the same spine will be very close in the same weight.

I respectfully disagree with this.
I don't make my own shafts but when I buy them I'm getting 200 or more of any particular spine group, diameter, and wood species. These shafts can vary wildly in their physical weight. I wish they didn't as then I wouldn't have to take the time to weight each shaft and group them into dozens.

Guy

[snapper1d]

"If you think about it, four fletch users will be nocking their arrows "upside down" about 50% of the time."

Guy,this is what the index tab is on the nocks for.

[Grey Taylor]

Agreed... if a nock with an index is being used    
I like index nocks and always use a Bohning Classic nock for my own arrows. But not everyone likes that nock.

Guy

[Surewood Steve]

Our sanding machine does one shaft about every one or two seconds, so at the end of an hour we could have 2 or 3 thousand in a cart, and stacked on top of each other thy don't cool very fast.  As for the question does spine stiffen the shaft at 10 degrees.  I have never tested that but it may to some degree.  Self bow shooters like to "warm" their bows up before shooting and they are all wood. I also feel that sealer and finish that you put on your arrows will help to control the wood, it certainly keeps moisture out.  However I believe that the difference between a cold arrow and a warm wood arrow may only be a pound or two in spine, and that may be a difference in some shooter but not in mine.  I blame most of my bad shots on my release.

[snapper1d]

Man that machine will spit out a shaft!!! I spine my shafts with nock on because at 90 degrees it can be quite a difference in some woods.Pine with thick grain can have a good bit of difference on spine.

[snapper1d]

Guy thats my favorite nock also.