Self Nocks

[ib4elk]

I just finished up my arrows for the upcoming season.  Started these quite a while back and did self nocks and with the season only a few weeks out I figured I better get on them.  They really should be for a Halloween hunt trip but I liked the colors anyway.  May have screwed up as they are black on the end but the orange shows up well - will have to shoot them in low light to see if I can see them fly...  Here are a couple pics of the creation:
 
 

Now for the reason for the post.  Has anyone else done much on self nocks and found them to fly better than glue on nocks?  These (all 6 of them) fly like darts and with all my other arrows with glue on nocks there always seem to be a few that fly funny or they just are not as consistent as these.  Definitely good for the moral since my shooting has not been extremely hot as of late but man are these fun to watch fly.  Thoughts?

[TNstickn]

Awesome looking arras!! Are your glue ons pinching the string too much? I bet those self nocks dont pinch at all considering the care you obviously put into those babies.

[JEFF B]

they are nice i make self nocks as well good to shoot  

[**DONOTDELETE**]

I only have 12 arrows that don't have self nocks, because a friend gave them to me since he now shoots carbons... I get better flight with self nock arrows, they do help with a bad release.

[Pat B]

I prefer to make self nocks loose unlike plastic nocks. With the energy of the string pushing the arrow and not having to disconnect from the string you are probably getting a smoother release. You can make self nocks that act just like snap-on nocks if you prefer but for me, loose is the way to go.
  What material are your shafts? It doesn't look like you have your self nocks supported with a wrap of inserted spine. I would suggest you put a simple thread or sinew wrap just below the nock to keep them from splitting when shot.
Pat

[**DONOTDELETE**]

Pat B is right. But I didn't see the small nocks at first, must have been the bright Orange feathers.. Wrapping them will make it safer to shoot...

[Jack Skinner]

Like the others said unless you made those shafts from a hard wood like ash/maple/hickory you should use a small wrap for safety.

The arrows are BRILLIANT

I prefer self nocks now.

Hope you have a great season.

[frassettor]

Nice looking arrows

[ib4elk]

Thanks for the nice replies.  The arrows are ash.  I prefer the hardwoods like ash and birch as I can't seem to find heavy shafts otherwise. These came out to around 615gn with 160gn tips.

I did ask about wrapping them several months back and was told by several that I should be ok with not wrapping as long as I used a hard wood like ash.

The nocks on these were fairly tight on the string to begin with but now that I think some of the seal coat is coming off inside the nock from shooting, they are becoming quite loose which is fine.  I have only used Murcury nocks in the past that barely hold onto the string so the only thing I can come up with is that you just can't get glue on nocks perfectly straight like the self nocks thus the self nocks seem to be more forgiving.

I think I will stick with the self nocks in the future but just need to come up with a better sealing method.  The dip tubes (which is what I have used for years) work but you have to spend so dang much time after each dip to carefully remove all the excess inside the nock.  Any suggestions?

[Jack Skinner]

Use a rub on oil finish like tru-oil. As it wears just rub on some more, if your arrows last that long your doing good.

I dont always wrap my ash either and have none split, I still wrap some but mainly because it looks sweet.

[Pat B]

I would rather take the little time it takes to wrap the self nocks than to have a nock break. If that happens its not only your arrow that is ruined but also possibly your bow...and it looks cool
   You can probably wrap a dozen nocks in less than 30 minutes. Even on my hardwood shoot arrows where the grain is not violated I wrap the self nocks.
   Another option would be to add a spine perpendicular to the nock. I have done this with rawhide and hardwood spines. A simple band saw cut cleaned up a bit with sandpaper and the spine glued in with TB glue before the nock is cut.   Pat