Rubber vs Fur

[White Oak]

For years the only string silencers I used were cat whiskers. Oh yeah, there were the propeller looking things and brush buttons but they were usually used along with cat whiskers.
A few years ago I was introduced to fur silencers and have had a love-hate relationship with them since.I love the way they look but have never really been satisfied with the job they do on my recurve.They are fine on my longbow but I am not really sure that it needs them. But they sure look good.
During the off seasons it was time to play. I was determined to get that fur to work. I would start with the 1/4-1/3 locations and move to every point in between trying various brace heights along the way.Then, as hunting season approached, off came the fur and on went the whiskers.
Well this time they are on to stay. I replaced my beaver balls again last weekend with cat whiskers. Found and marked the locations on the string, tied them on and shot them in. SILENCE.
I reduced my brace height by 1/2". This is the spot the bow likes best. Still silence.
I'll stay with rubber from now on. Granted, it aint pretty. It is hard to picture a hunter of old holding a bow with 4 rubber puff balls attached to the string but the darn things work.
Please don't get the idea that I am trying to sell anything.There are many other silencers out there. If they work for you, super.As for me, I'll be shooting with rubber.

                 Take care,
                           Ed  

[Ian johnson]

I like fur too, but found that the best silencers are catwhiskers, and if you have a recurve, bowhush helps a lot too

[JEFF B]

well Ed i use wolf hair and man is it  bees knees shoot the bow slience dont hear a thing and thats all i will use.  

[wtpops]

Try shooting fur in the rain, when those things get full of water you will take a bath upon release.

( ive never tried wolf hair, i would proably get arrested here in CalEfornia)

[vermonster13]

I had some wolverine fur that worked real well. I've had Hush Puppies on a few bows(I put Bow Hush on the recurves)and it worked good. I have a huge bag of cat whiskers that I bought from a fishing supply house for pennies on the dollar and they've never let me down so most of my strings get those because I'm frugal when I can be.    

[BUCKY]

I used cat whiskers until I found super string leeches.These are now my favorite.

[sweet old bill]

I use the string leeches as well, I also have some bows setup with the fur.

 I did find that you may find the sweet spot to reduce overall bow noise by Dividing the string length by 4 and get the results

example: 60 inch amo bow string div by 4 equals 15 inches.   now measure from the limb tip 15 inches and that should be the best spot for the bow silencers....

[Bjorn]

For me, fur or wool works fine with B50; but for D97 etc. you need some form of rubber-whiskers, leeches etc.

[Bowmania]

Rubber is not the key.  Years ago Black Widow suggested wool in 4 different spots - 2 up and 2 down - maybe a foot and 14 inches from the string nocks.  We're trying to get rid of oscillation.  Four will always reduce that better than 2.  I use 3 up and 3 down.  

My best judge a 20 and 3/4 inch wide buck I killed with a second shot.

Bowmania

[LBR]

One small set of cat whiskers works great on my longbow (it does need them, but it doesn't take much).

I'm like a lot of the others that chimed in--love the look of fur, but cat whiskers have always worked much better for me.  Besides eliminating noise better, they don't hold water, burrs, or scent.

One thing to keep in mind is silencer placement--one set in the right place can do as much or more good as two sets in the wrong place.  That's another benefit of cat whiskers--you can tie them on around the string and move them up or down for tuning, and if you do it right they will stay.

Chad

[Jeff Strubberg]

For me, fur is the way to go.

Fur (I use beaver) seems to work better on lower-pitched sound than higher, so I can see where silencing a recurve could be a challenge, and yes, it can soak up some water, but rubber is just too heavy.  I just finished up tuning some arrows to a Thunderstik Mag and was able to drop 50 grains of point weight by switching from rubber to fur.

Rubber silencers suck power out of your arrow.

[bowless]

I actually never liked the fur look until I bought some muskrat fur silencers from some guy on ****.  They look great on the Dauntless with a fairly low profile and work even better.

[electric blues]

I've got calf hair from 3rivers on the backs of the tips, and the huge nylon balls right above them, and otter fur about a foot apart from the nocking point. It is the quietest recurve ive heard. The nylon has to be as close to the tips as possible though, or they will really slow down the arrow. Good thing about otter fur is they dont affect the power noticably, but do affect the sound alot. try it sometime
there's no use in quieting the arrow if it wont do the job when it gets there

then again if your shooting 70lbs. i guess it doesnt matter what you put on the string

[LBR]

Jeff, a little goes a long way in the right spot.  As best I can figure, my silencers weigh maybe 20 grains each, and it only takes two.  By comparison, a 6" strip of fur silencer I just weight was 10 grains--that's not that much of a difference.

I haven't had any problems shooting through critters, and when I chrony'd my bow (through two or three different chrony's) I averaged 187 fps with arrows that weighed 9.5 gpp.  That was shooting with a glove, 14 strand Dynaflight '97 string, and 8" of .025 serving--not exactly a stripped-down string.

'Course it's like everything else--results can vary--but in my experience rubber silencers don't rob me of anything.  I shot the same arrows when I had fur silencers on my string--couldn't tell any difference.

Chad

[JStark]

Big fan of Bowhush and Hush puppies here.

[Tilbilly]

Another factor to consider is the cover you'll be walking through. I switched to yarn this year, big mistake. I walked through JUNGLE in my new hunting woods and ended up with more burs stuck in my silencers than on my pants. Going back to rubber.