I don't know if this will fit the post or not but just a thought on FOC: I used to make Native American style self bows and try and use them with arrows made per copies of museum collections. One thing that seemed to be true is that these folks, who did this for a living, prefered to have a LOT of weight in front of the bow. The arrows were often 33-36" long with the draw lengths assummed to be shorter than our modern lengths. Native peoples were often drawing to a 'floating' anchor point and not drawing back to the face as we do. This is how I shot for many years with a pinch style draw. (perfect for creating target panic for me when I tried to go back to my traditional bows years later!). The arrows were made with the larger diameter toward the point and this was often around 3/8" or so with the arrow tapered back toward the nock. Sometimes they were 'compound' style arrows with the front section being of hard wood and the rest of the shaft a light wood or reed. At any rate, with up to about a 1/3 of the arrow plus stone/bone point staying in front of the bow they got plenty of mass up front. (I also believe they used overspined arrows because they would be consistent. They would always shoot a bit left, but equally, were as a weak arrow could shoot more right depending on how much more weak it was...so it might have been a variable they could control- just my theory). Anyway, these arrows would fly a lot better than ones that were shorter.
Dan
Topic: Front of Center (Read 501 times)
