Painting bows....

[LATradHunter]

this may sound like a dumb question, but will paint adversely affect a bow's performance?  I was thinking of doing a camo spray paint job on my PSE legacy... Anybody painted a bow before? any advice is much appreciated.   :D

[RightTrailWrongTime]

I don't think it would affect perfomance but why not just skin it instead of covering it up with paint? Plus it's huntin season and paint stinks!

[Charlie Lamb]

Paint mine all the time with no adverse performance issues. Can custom paint for the area and conditions and the paint smell dissipates quickly.

Not sure deer are that afraid of paint anyway!
 

[Charlie Lamb]

[Str8Shooter]

I've never noticed a performance difference from painting bows. The smell does dissipate quickly. I don't hunt with pretty bows so I don't mind making a tool blend in better. Plus, you can get creative. I just started these limbs with a psuedo-snake skin effect. I'm going to finish the effect with medium brown, dark brown, and black when I buy more paint but so far this breaks up the bow really well.

 

Chris

[deadpool]

nope not at all,

 

shoots the same way it did the day before I painted it, jus dont paint and hunt in the same day lol

[30coupe]

My old Black Bear was that ugly light green that was popular (for some odd reason) in the 70's, so I painted it about like Charlie's cornfield bow. No change in performance, but I don't gag when I look at it now.  

[30coupe]

Oops! Wrong button. Time to go to bed!

[Kevin Taylor]

Str8, how do you get that pattern ??

That's awesome looking.

[Str8Shooter]

Kevin,
  I used a pattern to get that effect. My pattern was actually a flat diamond sharpener that my kids broke. The metal section with the cutout ovals. I'm sure that you could find or make a pattern that would work.
  I lighlty sanded the limbs, then primed them. I sprayed the whole limb a light tan. Then, I used the template and worked down the limb with a light green. After that dried I repeated the process with the template in tan. I moved the pattern over to get an overlapping effect. When I pick up more paint I'm going to finish it out to get a slightly darker look. I might even mask off the template into a "V" pattern and make it look like a rattler skin.

If that doesn't make sense I'll see if I can post some pics of how I did it.

Chris

[Kevin Taylor]

Please do...I need to try that

[d. ward]

Well actually the paint should make little if any difference.It's usely a pretty thin layers..But please be forwarned.Removeing factory or manufactures clear finish especialy epoxy type finishes and yes sometimes camo paint rawhide snakeskins and other backings will sometimes but not always (pending on thickness and make of bow)can remove up to 2 pounds of draw weight.Once the backings paint or clear finish is replaced at about the same thickness of layers and type finish evenly it should be around the same weight again..but does not always add that weight back(sometimes)..There would be little diff in just a couple layers of paint or clear...But it can and or will sometimes change things again pending on type and thickness.As mentioned especialy epoxy type finishes.bd