A dumb carbon question from a woodie guy

[monterey]

I bought three carbon arrows at Walmart to play around with.  First thing I did was peel off the plastic vanes and fletched with feathers.

So, that finished I'm wondering about removing the inserts from the front.  Is it doable without wrecking the shafts?  What is usually used to hold the inserts in carbon?

[the rifleman]

You can try removing the nock and dropping a drill bit in and swinging the shaft so that the bit hits the insert w force.  If this doesn't work you cand thread a 8/32 bolt or field tip into the insert and heat the bolt.  Heat is not carbons friend.  Unfortunately I have had no luck removing some that were epoxied in like the epoxy axis uses for HIT inserts.
You can always cut from the nock end...

[Rough Run]

I bought some of those for my son a couple of years ago.  I wanted to re-tune them after he abandoned them, but i had no luck removing the inserts.  I believe they were epoxied into the shaft.  On the upside, that means you probably won't lose any in a target!

[monterey]

Yeah, cutting was the first option that came to mind but I'm trying to avoid damage.  It's all new to me.

I was just out shooting them alongside of my woodies and they did in fact fly very well without tuning but I'm also thinking to load some weight at the front.

[monterey]

I bought some of those for my son a couple of years ago.  I wanted to re-tune them after he abandoned them, but i had no luck removing the inserts.  I believe they were epoxied into the shaft.  On the upside, that means you probably won't lose any in a target!

I like looking for the positive side.  Targets are probably the extent of what they will get used for although I might be tempted to use them turkey hunting.

[Orion]

If the drill bit or heating doesn't work, and if the arrow is long enough, you can cut it off behind the insert and then chip off the carbon from around the insert, or perhaps heat it a lot to break it loose. This will enable you to use the insert again.  If you do, you might want to use a hot melt glue.  It's pretty easy to reverse.  Epoxy isn't. 

[Krex1010]

From what I’ve seen and been told by people that should know more about carbon arrow construction than myself...arrows that are sold with inserts glued in are almost always epoxied, and the amount of heat that would break the bond is doing more damage to the carbon than it is the epoxy. Epoxy glued inserts are essentially permanent unless you can pop it free with force as was described above...I’ve had no luck with it and have ruined a few carbon shafts with heat in my day. Which is why even if I absolutely know what length I want my carbons shafts, I never buy them with the inserts installed.....and btw the only dumb question is the one that isn’t asked....I’ve learned that the hard way too lol.

[monterey]

I should clarify my reason for removing the existing inserts. I want to use brass inserts for strength and be, strengthwise, compatible with brass glue on threaded units.

Maybe I'm overthinking the need to switch them to brass?

[Orion]

I've done the same thing (for weight, not strength).  Luckily, the arrows were long enough that I could just cut them off behind the inserts that were in them (to the overall arrow length I wanted) and glue in my brass inserts.

Now, if you don't know how they'll tune with the heavier brass inserts, you don't want to cut them off and end up with an arrow that's too short/stiff.  In that case, you might want to sacrifice one arrow, i.e., use heat to remove the insert as described earlier.  It may work without damaging the arrow, but even if you do damage/weaken the end of the shaft, you will be able to tune by further shortening it in short increments. If you ultimately end up cutting off more then the insert length to get a good tune, then you can cut all the rest of them to length.  Hope that makes sense. 

[wapitishooter]

Its been my experience that the inserts in them are really tuff don't think you need brass. You could also cut from nock end and bare shaft tune.

[monterey]

Thanks for the suggestions.  I think I'll leave them alone and go to brass glue on/screw in point mounts.  It will let me add weight and also makes changing field points and broadheads out very simple.

Thanks again