Feathers weaken or stiffen

[acollins]

I am in the process of bare shaft tuning. When I add feathers will it stiffen or weaken the shaft. Is it enough to worry about.

[Car54]

I have always read "stiffen".

[Pryor]

Just got done tuning some 1535's to a 40# recurve.  Bare shafting with 150 grn points was barely weak.  Put feathers on and paper tuned, and shot bullet holes.

[acollins]

Thank you. That's where I am at right now. Mine are just a hair weak. I was trying to decide if I shout cut them or not. So I think I will fletch them up and see how they shoot.

[Caughtandhobble]

Originally posted by acollins:
Thank you. That's where I am at right now. Mine are just a hair weak. I was trying to decide if I shout cut them or not. So I think I will fletch them up and see how they shoot.

Leave at least one bare shaft, comparing bare shaft to your fletched arrows is what tells you what is going on with your arrow tuning.

[Bladepeek]

I like to add a masking tape wrap to match the weight of the missing feathers on my bareshafts. Might as well come as close as possible.

[acedoc]

Any weight on nock end should stiffen spine as per what I understand.  Glad to know what others have experienced

[McDave]

I like to keep a bare shaft of all the arrows I shoot.  After I've shot the arrows for a while, usually the feathers on one of them will become tattered.  Rather than refletching that one, I trim the feathers down to the quill and it becomes my bare shaft. Then I fletch the bare shaft I started with. Having a quill and glue makes for a more accurate bare shaft than a completely bare shaft.

[jhk1]

I could be wrong, but I think it's the drag caused by the feathers (more than the weight of the feathers) that result in the fletched shaft acting stiffer than the bare shaft.

[stujay]

Stiffens.

[AZ_Longbow]

I use electrical tape. Weight on the back always stiffens to me.

[acedoc]

I ran into some tuning issues due to a long draw and heavy bh. One of the options I came up with was to add wt to nock end. Apparently small increments at nock lead to large tuning changes

[McDave]

Originally posted by acedoc:
I ran into some tuning issues due to a long draw and heavy bh. One of the options I came up with was to add wt to nock end. Apparently small increments at nock lead to large tuning changes

That's correct, about a 2/1 ratio.  In other words, 20 extra grains on the back stiffens the spine about as much as 40 grains on the front weakens the dynamic arrow spine.  Gold Tip has rear adapters that are made for the purpose.  I have used them with good results.

That said, I think I'm about the only one who likes them, so YMMV.  Other people have complained about the effect on arrow stability and from a hunting perspective, the effect of weight on the rear is contrary to the positive benefits of EFOC.  In other words, weight up front helps with penetration.  Weight in back might help too, if you have a perfectly straight hit.  If you have an angled hit, weight in the back might actually retard penetration by bending the arrow more in the direction of the angle.