Poplar Shafts

[heartlandbowyer]

How do you wood gurus think poplar compares to the other wood shafts?

Weight?
Easy to straighten?
How they spine out?

Thanks
Cory

[JamesV]

I use 5/16 poplar dowels and they shoot good in bows up to 45-50#.

James

[nineworlds9]

Pretty light gpi, but good stiffness and very tough.

[heartlandbowyer]

The lighter GPI is kind of what I'm wanting. I would like to try and make a more FOC wood arrow. I shoot 55-60lb most of the time at my 28.75 draw and cut my arrows to 29.75 bop. I would like to stay around 10gpp with a 200-225 BH.

[Pat B]

I've been using poplar shafts that Stringstretcher
(Charlie Jefferson) sent me and I love them. They are a lot more durable than other doweled shafts I've used and are only slightly lighter than other shafting I've used. 500gr-550gr for my 30" arrows for 55#-60# bows.

[59Alaskan]

As Pat states they are very tough.  They don't smell as good as cedar when you eventually do break one though....

[ron w]

I got some from Twig Archery and they were excellent in every way!  

[dino]

Good poplar is a good shafting material.  Plenty of spine range tough and straightenable. If you are working from dowels they are rarely cut correctly that makes a poor quality shaft for the most part.  The majority should be culled and difficult to straighten.  I've made up a good portion of poplars that were great arrows but all the wood was selected cut and processed with an arrow shaft in mind.  That helps

[wingnut]

I made a bunch of poplar shafts a few years back.  We cut them with straight grain and turned them ourselves.  I used them for a couple of years and took a lot of game with them.  A very good shaft IMHO.

Mike

[Fletcher]

Originally posted by heartlandbowyer:
The lighter GPI is kind of what I'm wanting. I would like to try and make a more FOC wood arrow. I shoot 55-60lb most of the time at my 28.75 draw and cut my arrows to 29.75 bop. I would like to stay around 10gpp with a 200-225 BH.

Sitka Spruce is a very good arrow wood for higher FOC arrows.  I has the highest strength to weight ratio of all woods.  It has a fiberous structure that makes it very tough.  Hildebrand has some very good Sitka shafting.  Do you know what spine you are needing?  I may have some on hand.

[heartlandbowyer]

Thanks gents for the info.

Rick, I'm guessing based on wood I've shot in the past I'm gonna need a 70-75 maybe 75-80 with 200-225 up front.
I'd like it to be in 11/32 with knock taper to 5/16 but not having ever messed with poplar I'm not sure that is a viable option and still staying in the 10 GPP range.

Cory