After 35 yrs hunting: New understanding of "Sharp broadheads"

[Kingwouldbe]

Originally posted by George D. Stout:

I can shave hair with my file sharpened Bears, so they kill quickly and let good blood trails.
Enth' degrees.

After 35 yrs hunting: New understanding of "Sharp broadheads"

George, come on brother, surly you to, can learn something after 35yrs.

With no disrespect to Mr. Bear, his broadheads are some of the worst steel ever made, you have a wire edge on your SOFT, file sharped, bear heads, they will NEVER compare with HARD polished steel.

All he was saying is, his eye's have been opened, now after 35yrs, he has a new respect for what is really sharp.

[Bonebuster]

This year was a new one for me too.

I got some of the heads from Abowyer, and some Grizzly heads. I found the steel to be MUCH harder than the Zwickey, and Magnus that I am used to.

I found the difference between sharp, and the sharp that comes from hard, polished, steel.

[Sharpster]

Yup, all kinds of "sharp" out there.

As many of you know, my life has somehow evolved into the quest for the utltimate edge. (not sure how that happened BTW).

As a kid free-hand sharpening knives, the goal was simply to be able to shave hair off my arm with the grain. That was plenty good for many years, and still is to some extent but, always looking for a bit more. Next challenge was to get the blade sharp enough to shave against the grain. That still is my standard. If the blade will shave hair in any direction, it's pretty darn sharp.

Then I saw the hair whittling challenge on bladeforums. That's where you take one individual hair and carefully whittle tiny curls up along the edge of the hair... without cutting through it. That took some time to achieve!

Now if you guys want to drive yourselves nuts like I do, the hair whittling is a good time killer and so is cutting hanging plasic wrap. Pull a foot or so of plastic wrap off the roll but, dont cut it, just let it hang vertical. Then poke your blade through near the top and with no sawing motion, just straight down pressure, see if you can cleanly slice through it.

Soilarch has mentioned another great sharpness test- If you can get a blade to cut hair from your arm  without touching your skin... well you just can't get much sharper than that!

Shaving sharp as most of us think of it, is really pretty subjective. Fine hair is harder to shave than heavy hair, and long hair is easier to shave than stubble etc. so "shaving sharp" covers alot of ground. I have found a sharpness test that anyone can do and the results are accurate and reliable:

Turkey wing or tail feathers. Sharpen your blade and while holding the feather by the base of the quill, see how far away from the quill you can get and still cut off sections of the feather. A fairly dull blade will cut right against the quill but, the farther you move away from the quill the sharper the blade needs to be cut the fibers before they flex away from the blade. When you can cut the very tips off...    

Ron

[Steve B.]

Great info.  Thanks for the report, KSdan.

[Muskoxman]

This fall I was sitting on a moose gutpile hoping for some bear action when I decided to to nock an arrow to be ready. Well in the process the silver flame just brushed my string and TWANG. Needless to say I didn't have a spare string, so that ended my hunting for the night.

Like you say "spooky sharp"

[Buckwheaties]

anyone who wants to know.. Ron is 1st class all the way.
I ordered 6 grizz from 3 rivers and had them mailed directly to Ron, for $5 per head i received perfect, shaving sharp heads. I have messed with these grizz's before and as anyone who has, getting the ruff metal out of the way is the hard part, getting it down to a 25 degree angle, all the way down..so now all i have to do is to usr Ron's knife sharpner to keep them "scarey sharp".. Buy the way, Ron got behind because of a sick child he had to babysit, and couldn't go to his shop, so when i contacted him about my heads, he explained to me his sick child problem, and then PAID the 2day shipping to me.. I said no way, but he insisted and didn't make much money from my order.. a great guy to deal with and if you're worried about "day time minutes" he is great to talk to.

[Sharpster]

Hey Dick, You old mother trucker (his email address just so everyone knows I'm not being vulgar).

Good to see you posting! Thanks for the kind words but the thread isn't about me or KME. We're just discussing all the various edges that people consider sharp and the differences between them...and I know that you know the difference!

Ron

[Buckwheaties]

Hey Ron, just telling the truth... thx again..

[Friends call me Pac]

To me scary sharp is defined like this.  Breath on the edge and listen to the molecules scream as they are split in half!  Now that is scary sharp.

Heard that on a comedians record a long time ago.  Can't remember who it was but wish I did.

[wapitimike1]

Silver Flames are easy to resharpen with a ceramic sharpener. A few pulls and they are right back to scary. I have and shoot several heads I just use them as a good bench mark. Most of the heads at least geared toward the trad market seem very good. The compound gimmicks are a whole different ball game!

[Larry247]

I've settled for sharp in the past, not anymore.

I like the blade to start in the hairs direction and it just falls off...The hair that is....

When an animal is hit with something super sharp, they most of the time don't even know where the fly went that bit them.

[Dan Chamberlain]

That's sharp!  But like you said, one deer isn't a good sample to determine if it was the sharpness of the blade that caused the deer to react the way it did.  Two cases come to mind.  A friend shot s nice buck while it was feedin on acorns.  He was using a cut on contact style two blade broadhead.  The deer jumped, looked around and then went back to feeding until his knees buckled and he dropped.  

A second friend - and I witnessed this - was hunting from a tree (not a tree stand as those weren't invented yet or widely used. This was in the early 70s) Another nice 8pt walked under his tree and at the arrow's release (45# Bear recurve) the buck looked up at the same time, and the arrow planted itself right in the thickest part of the deer's skull right between the antlers!  The deer back stepped a half a dozen steps and looked around.  Then it started shaking its head.  After a few moments of confusion and head shaking, it wandered off about 30 yards and looked back at the tree.  Shook it's head again and went back to feeding.  

Sharp is better than dull.  That's a given.

Dan

[MikeW]

He was using a cut on contact style two blade broadhead. The deer jumped, looked around and then went back to feeding until his knees buckled and he dropped.

I had the same thing happen with a Woodsman head except the deer spooked a little when the arrow bounced through the brush. He kind of took a couple jumps and then went back to walking slowly until he stumbled and fell.

[KSdan]

I also have seen lots of varied response to arrow hits. . . my MAIN point was the massive amount of blood in under 30 yds.  It just got me thinking about sharpness.  Ron at KME agreed with me.  A scarey "SHARP" head makes more difference than we think.  Dead is still dead. . . but for those marginal hits and perhaps even better/shorter blood trails. . . I am going to learn "SHARP."

[George D. Stout]

KSdan....also learn spare strings, BandAids and pressure points while you're at it.      Be careful son....I cut myself with my old file sharpened heads.

[BradLantz]

most trad guys I know can run their heads down their arms and cut a bit of hair off ... that aint "sharp" .... sharp is when you're afraid to run the broadhead down your arm because it'll slice right down into the skin and cut you bad


I came from the compound world and I have yet to see anyone get a 2 blade resharpenable broadhead "sharp" like a NAP Thunderhead or G5 Striker head or a Steel Force .... I'm trying to get there though

[MikeW]

I have no problem getting my STOS heads so sharp I'm afraid to touch them, Woodmans are an other story.

[Sharpster]

Originally posted by BradLantz:
I came from the compound world and I have yet to see anyone get a 2 blade resharpenable broadhead "sharp" like a NAP Thunderhead or G5 Striker head or a Steel Force .... I'm trying to get there though

Brad,

The heads you mentioned above are pretty darn sharp out of the pack but you can do much better. I've seen many Grizzlies, Magnus, Ace and other broadheads that were way sharper.

Here's a Grizzly that is sharp enough to whittle a single hair. Look to the left of the dime. What looks like a split hair to the right of the dime is just a shadow.

 


The only out of the pack broadhead or blade that I'm aware of that can do this is the Silverflame. Give me a call if you need some help.

Ron

[Steel]

I hate to say I am pretty poor at sharpening broadheads,knifes,or anything else that needs a edge.I have bought more knife/broadhead sharpers in the last year than I know what to do with hopeing to find something that will work for me. Right now I have one custom knife that I can get shaveing sharp and for some reason I can get the Mangus Stingers pretty sharp on some sharpening sticks I have so I use them to hunt with.

[Doc Nock]

Cody,

I'm a charter member of Sharpening Impaired International, so, welcome!

Talking to Rod and Ed Ashby, I learned that while my heads were showing signs of "super sharp" (as defined readily here and elsewhere), they had a very, very fragile 20* bevel on them. I had to keep fussin with them constantly to stay sharp..even in the quiver for just a day!

Having PM'd the original poster of this thread, I know his intent is as stated, a "very sharp" commercially avaiable, expensive head just proved to show him that throughout all his 35 years of "thinking" (believing?) that he had sharp broadheads, made him realize that "perception" of "scary sharp" is just that--perception-- until compared against something truly SHARP.

Thing is we can argue that point of "relative sharpness" till we're all purple, cause there is no real "measure" to prove or disprove the point.

Revelation is a funny thing, it comes to each of us in it's own time and way...