Bow Strings

[Deeter]

What are the different bow strings such as b50 and what not?  Also what do most people use on their bows?

[Deeter]

Also what is the flemish twist?

[Alexander Traditional]

I think B50 is dacron,it is for bows that are not fast flight capable. It has to do with the limb tips being reinforced. I like and have been using fast flight 97. You'll hear all sorts of different opinions on this however. Dacron has a break in and will stretch where as the different fast flight materials will not stretch hardly any. There are a number of sponsors here that can give you some advice if you give them a call and tell them what you have as far as a set up.

[Stumpkiller]

FastFlight (basically, everything but B-50 & B-55 Dacron) came out in the mid 1980's.  Any bow made prior to then may or may not have a reduced livespan shooting the stretchless strings.  Some claim it will not hurt them.

But some bows disagree.

 

(This was actually from a dry-fire resulting from a damaged arrow nock that shattered on release).  

If you shoot a second-hand bow you just never know if it spent a long time in a hot car or had been dry-fired repeatedly or other abuse (twisted limbs corrected with heat, etc.).  A non-stretch string may be the last straw.

The limb tips are going from 120 mph to zero in 1/4" or so.  Less stretch = less spring and sharper impact curve.  The design has to accomidate the stress or . . . sompin's gotta give.

[Nativestranger]

I know some may disagree with this. But a lot depends on the construction of the string. An endless loop 16 strand dacron string with minimal twists may stretch less and be harsher on the bow than a 8 strand flemish fast flight with more twists and padded loops.

[LBR]

What are the different bow strings such as b50 and what not? Also what do most people use on their bows?

There's tons of different ones.  I have B-55 (dacron), Dynaflight '97, 450+, 8125G, and 8190 Universal.  Probably will phase out 450+ in favor of Trophy or 452X.

I only sell around 1,000 strings a year--based on that small sampling, I'd say there's not any material that has the market cornered.  Dacron is still popular because a lot of old bows are still in circulation, and there's still a lot of folks that don't trust anything else.

Dynaflight '97 is still popular, and has been since it's inception.  8125 has a following, and 8190 is getting more and more popular (it's only been on the market a year).

450+ is my least requested material--and my least favorite, behind dacron.  It's still a great material, but fuzzes up quicker, is more aggravting to work with, and doesn't hold it's color nearly as well.

 

Also what is the flemish twist?

The way the string is constructed.  Individual strands in 2 or 3 bundles, the loops are formed by twisting and working the ends back into the body of the string.

 

(This was actually from a dry-fire resulting from a damaged arrow nock that shattered on release).

If you shoot a second-hand bow you just never know if it spent a long time in a hot car or had been dry-fired repeatedly or other abuse (twisted limbs corrected with heat, etc.). A non-stretch string may be the last straw.  

Just my opinion, so take it for what it's worth.  I've never seen a bow ruined by a string--at least one that was made properly.  Many years ago I did see one that had a tip sawed off by a tiny FF string with non-padded loops.  The bow was old, not FF compatable, and didn't have the string grooves cut at the correct angle.

In my opinion, you might get a few more shots from a damaged bow with a dacron string, but if it's going to go it's going to go.  I've seen more bows blow up while being shot with a dacron string than with "FF".  I don't think it was the string's fault at all.  The point being, when a bow delams the first thing everyone asks is "what kind of string did it have on it?".  If you say "Fast Flight", automatically that's determined to be the culprit.  If you say "dacron", they start looking for something else to blame.

 

I wonder if the vectran content in UC that supposed to reduce creep also gave it some stretch.

Nope.  Vectran has practically no stretch, no creep.  When it goes, it goes all at once--that's why there are no 100% Vectran string materials.