arrow weight

[mike319]

is 460grn carbon arrow heavy enough for hunting whitetail?

[SoNevada Archer]

Not knowing what poundage of bow your shooting...some would say, not sure. But from me, the answer is YES. No matter what poundage your shooting!!! My bows shoot between 50-55lbs and I shoot arrows in the same grain range as you with no problems.

[Don Stokes]

Getting perfect flight from your arrows with broadheads is much more important than their weight.

[SoNevada Archer]

Don you are totally correct! Arrow flight is #1
I just happen to get that out of a lighter arrow.

[mike319]

sorry should have put in more info. i shoot a psa 52lb @28. thanks for the info ,its just all you read is that you should shoot a heavy arrow. these arrows fly grt out of my bow.not sure what is considerd heavy.
thanks
mike

[tradwannabe]

heavy would be considered 10 or more grains per lb of your bow. so 52lbs x 10 grains/lb = 520 grains. The thing is, it depends on the size of the animal as well. you wouldn't shoot an elephant with that but it should be more than enough with a RAZOR sharp broadhead (cut on contact) that flys perfectly and you hit the heart/lungs.
Rob

[Jason R. Wesbrock]

In a word: Yes.

[Daddy Bear]

Howard Hill considered a 450grain arrow with a good broadhead from a 40lb bow to be a good benchmark for a legal minimum on deer. But, he felt this combo was stout enough to shoot through a deer and also be adequate for larger game.

Daddy Bear

[jhansen]

Yesterday afternoon I spent some time extracting a cedar arrow that weighs 9.4 grains per pound of the draw weight of my bow out of a 1/2" pine board that is part of my privacy fence.  I don't want to talk about how the arrow came to be in the fence instead of the target I was aiming at.  The arrow penetrated half its length through the fence.  This arrow had a field tip on the front end, not a broadhead.  My point is that there is an old rule of thumb that states "8 to 10 grains of arrow weight per pound of bow draw weight" as what will work.  There are many now who advocate heavier arrows and this may well be true but this can only be true up to a point.  As arrow weight goes up from a given bow, velocity drops.  At some point the additional mass of the arrow will be cancelled out by the loss of velocity.  There's no free lunch in physics.  Someday I hope to have the time to do some scientific testing on this matter using a chrono and standard penetration medium.  For now I'll stick with the 8-10 grains idea.

John

(Man, am I gonna catch some flak for saying this!)

[James Wrenn]

Well after shooting deer with everything from 375gns to around 700 I still can not see a difference in how dead they were.It all works if you get good arrow fight and can shoot decent.jmo

[Daddy Bear]

I think it came from Fred Bear in 1943 from his shooting machine/calf liver packed target frame experiment.

"A good rule to follow in this respect is to select arrows that are not heavier in grains than your bow weight with a cipher added to it, and not lighter than 10 per cent less. As an example, in choosing hunting arrows for a 60 pound bow you simply add a cipher to the 60 which allows a maximum arrow weight of 600 grains and a minimum of 540 grains." -Fred Bear

[Gehrke145]

I shoot a 450 grain arrow out of a 55lbs bow at 28 for every including elk.

[northern trapper]

My hat is off to all the people that can make heavy shafts work for them. This summer I tried two of the top tapered carbon shafts with the intent of getting up to a heavy arrow for all the benefits that have been talked about. And trust me I tried with all combinations and weights but the bottom line is my 480 grain slim shaft 2300 carbons just outperform anything I tried ( by outperform I mean they tuned much easier and shot better for me). So to answer your question a 460 grain well tuned arrow will blow through a whitetail, in my opinion and experience yes!

[wtpops]

8.8 gpp is what you have, if it flys good shoot it, just remember 8 gpp is the limit for a widow.