arrow speed shock

[kansas stik man]

i have a wild horse creek kestel longbow.  its a reflex deflex design , 54" , 49#@28 and i pull 26" .  i shoot full length golt tip trads.  with 100 grain brass inserts, 145 grain tips and tree 5"  sheild, my total for arrow weight is 475 and i only got 130 fps out of the crono!  i dont know enough to know if the crono was not working right or if thats accurate.  all i know is that i would have guessed more like 150-170 fps range.  is the crono right?  are my arrows really traveling that slow?

[jsweka]

I don't know if those number are right or not, but that's also the reason why I have never chrono'ed one of my bows - I don't want to be disappointed.

[FerretWYO]

One common theme is that most guys think their bow shoots a lot faster than it really does. I would not be surprised if those numbers are true.  They are not bad numbers though.

[kansas stik man]

my arrow guy told me that use little armed guys loose alot of speed in comparison to guys that can pull the full 28" or even into the 30s  not much can be done about it i dont want lighter arrows and i think fast flight string would spell bad news

[Mike Most]

At 26" draw on a 49# bow, your losing a bit 42-44# of draw weight at that length, and shooting an almost 500 grain arrow, In using my chrono, I would say its close if your using a finger release. Placed right you can still drive it through a deer.  

[kansas stik man]

well have no concerns that it wont do the job i just thought it shot faster thats all , it would be nice to shoot a little heavier bow but arms get tired faster and with age ill still be able to shoot it.

[AWPForester]

Last year I hunted with a 60 inch 48 @ 26 inches Maddog Prarie predator.  I was shooting a 425 grain GT Trad 1535 arrow at 164 fps average.  Some as high as 167 and as low as 162, with a dacron string.  Never heard of your bow, but my brothers Maddog was 47 pounds and the same specs averaged 161 fps with a dacron string.  So, either one of the chrono's are wrong or that bow is just slower.

I would suggest a couple things.  Pull through your release as to make sure it is not static  That will increase performance and accuracy.  But more important, put you a Rick Barbee ultra cam string on it and you will increase the speed 10-12 fps while silencing it to a mere hush.  Between the two you'll likely gain 15-20 fps.

Niether one is a neccesity, But that string maximizes performance while minimizes the noise.  I would seriously suggest it for no other reason than it being a great string that is quieter than any I have tried.  And I have tried quite a few now.  And there is nothing wrong with wanting the best from your bow.  God Bless

[JamesKerr]

That sounds a little slow to me. However if you got consistant arrow speeds than it is probably correct. I wouldn't worry about it though. Most arrows that are going faster are making more noise than that arrow going 130 fps. A quiet arrow is always a good thing.

[JRY309]

You are shooting a heavy arrow,probably 11 gpi or around that.I have seen some chronograph's have about a 20 fps difference.How accurate is the chrono you shot through,compare it to another one if you can.I don't worry about speed,I can never shoot as fast as my buddies 30" draw compared to my 27" draw.Even if I shot 10# to 15# heavier bow.

[Earl Jeff]

Those numbers look right to me. Not to worry just put the arrow where it belngs and all will be right.

[Jim Wright]

There are regularly posts here concerning bows that get considerably higher speeds than profesional reviews like Blackie Schultz in Traditional Bowhunter Magazine have ever been able to obtain testing a different high-end custom bow every month. Some chronographs are apparently very generous. Shoot your bow and enjoy it, don't be disappointed about speed, you may have simply encountered one of the stingy chronographs.

[58WINTERS]

Mike Most evaluation is correct. I had 60" 60@28 Bob Lee takedown recurve a few years back. I draw 27-1/2 I think I was shooting 2016and 2018's at the time arrows in the low to mid 500's for weight. Best chrono was 169 never could make 170.

[gringol]

200 fps is not as common as people claim.  From what I've read 160-170 is about the average and is plenty fast to do the job.  130 sounds a bit slow to me, but I have only chrono'd one bow because I don't want to be disappointed with my setup.  It FEELS fast enough, so that's good enough for me.

[Sam McMichael]

Most of my bows that have been run through the chrono clock out at about 155 or thereabouts. Some have been quite heavy draw weights and others not so much. If the arrow is reasonably heavy and is tuned well, 130 or 180 fps won't make all that much difference with a clean hit in my opinion. On a poor hit, it is a crap shoot whatever the speed.Yeah, I would like sizzling speed, but you ain't gonna get it with most trad set ups - but you don't really need it.

My wife's bow style and draw length is similar to the poster's, but it is 42@28". With 440 grain arrows and drawn to 26&1/4" she get quite a bit more speed than that, if her draw length is 1" shorter there is about an 8 fps drop in arrow speed on average. Encouragement for her to get a full draw.  Amazingly, her bow tested out at 28" exactly what is posted on the Stu Miller arrow chart, so at least the chrono we used was either on the same or off the same as the one used on that site.  You are drawing a bit less grains per pound that she is, so I am going to guess that something may be off a bit. Perhaps the chrono is giving a consistent slow reading or perhaps you are losing some of your drawing energy due to a shorter draw length than you think or are having a fading release that is robbing you of your drawn power. I have seen lots of cases, including dvds of Howard Hill in super slowmo, where the arrow starts coming considerably forward before the string leaves the finger tips. John Schulz would call it a soft release, apparently even Howard Hill on occasion had a softer release. I caught myself at a 3d shoot with this, on the chrono set up there it made a 15 pfs difference and I was surprised how consistent that soft release was, my real release was probably only 24" before I fixed it.

[rraming]

Originally posted by jsweka:
I don't know if those number are right or not, but that's also the reason why I have never chrono'ed one of my bows - I don't want to be disappointed.

Made me change my equipment, not a bad thing really.