IF YOU SHOOT WOODIES

[Plumber]

just a little reminder if you shoot wood arrows take the time to inspect them before an after you shoot. today we were on a 3-d course there was a guy in the group behind us he had a arrow blow up on him. it was not a pretty sight. he had about 3 inches of arrow burried in his hand with about a 1/4 inch sticking out hopefully he will be alright. his bow was 45lb SO if you shoot an miss checkem over good p.s. watch out for the kids. alot of them shoot wood also thanks for your time. ED

[2-BIG]

Whew......I thought you were gonna say,"You might be a redneck!".    Really though, it is good advice and hopefully the fellow will be alright.

[WESTBROOK]

MAN dont that just give ya the willys!!!

Eric

[mcgroundstalker]

I think that ANY type arrow should be checked after each shot. Matters not if ya missed the target or not. I've seen carbon arrows do the same thing...    ... Pretty Ugly When It Happens.

... mike ...

[Rufus]

Yeppers, got some scars to prove the point. I was lucky and just the nock flipped around and chewed me up but nothing buried in me. Took awhile before I could get the nerve to pull back and fire away.  I check my arrows real regular now days.

[Plumber]

ttt

[bow'narrow]

Had a friend take the back third of a wooden shaft through the web between thumb and forefinger. I pay real attention to orienting shaft grain and rift when I build arrows.  Also, summer or winter my bow hand wears a glove.

[ThePushArchery]

I will add to this post as well. I am new to making woodies, and I made up my first dozen about a month ago.

Well after an arrow was shot about 40 times they started blowing up on me! I had about 4-5 out of the dozen do this within the same week. I aligned the nocks correctly and they were splitting as if the string was a band saw, all the way to about 8 inches down the shaft.

After a couple conversations with 3R specialists, and my local trad archery shop, we came to the conclusion it was the nocks. I was using Bohning T-nocks with Fletch-tite platinum to glue them on.

After a few "experiments" of sorts, I determined that the glue was breaking down the plastic while drying, and after a bunch of shots, they were giving out, but taking the wood with them on each half.

Be careful, and learn from my mistake!

[Plumber]

ttt

[R. Combs]

as bow'arrow said, having the rift aligned in the right directions is very important. With proper alignment if your shaft does break, it will break up and away from the hand.

              top of arrow
 point<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
              bottom of arrow
 point>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>nock

Rick

[Art B]

Just curious, were all these broken arrows cedars?

ART B

[swampbuck]

I've blown a woodie apart outta the bow luckily it didn't bite me just scared the crap outta me.

Check those carbons as well

Also XX78 alum shafts sometimes get stress cracks because their harder alum than the XX75's and it can happen with those too even if not likely

[Pat B]

I have only had one woody blow and I have shot many thousands of wood arrows. It was POC and I later found out that it had an unseen crack. I was fortunate the only damage to me is where the string hit my arm, just below my shooting arm shoulder.
   It is a very good idea to inspect and slightly stress arrows that have hit hard objects or that were hit by other arrows. If there is any sign of damage, they become kindling!

[Dartwick]

Im one of those bad trad shooters that uses aluminum.

[aromakr]

I have a hard time believing that Bohning would produce a nock that was not compatible with their glue. Something else is going on. I suspect it might be the nock fit to the shaft. Check and see without glue how the nock fits the taper, if it wiggles like a loose tooth the taper is incorrect.
Bob

[freefeet]

I had two bohning classic nocks shatter on impact with the target while bareshafting a couple of weeks ago.  I was using the same glue.

It was a tough target, so fairly strong decelaration, and the bareshafts hit it at a fair angle.  They made quite a loud crack when they hit, thought i'd cracked the shafts but to my amazement it was the nocks, the shafts were ok.

My fletched shafts have the same nocks and glue and they've been fine and i've shot them a couple hundred times, but with 3 x 5" fletching they hit the target very straight so the force on the nocks isn't lateral as it was in bareshafting and they don't hit with as much force as a bareshaft due to the drag of the fletching.

But, anyways, i ordered some other nocks when i ordered some new shafts and won't be using bohning nocks on future arrows after seeing what i saw.

[Hatrick]

I happened to be with Plumber when this happened. Not a pretty sight. The poor fella was normally a compound shooter and one of the guys in our group coxed him into using his longbow for the day and supplied him with the arrows. Needless to say he felt pretty bad about this.

I've made and shot a ton of woodies over the years. I've been real lucky in this department. R.Combs gives some real good advice in a previous post. If you're new to this and want to make/shoot wooden shafts please re-read what he's saying about the grain pattern.    Dave

[c'ville]

I had one blow up on me this summer.  Stuck about a 3 inch piece straight into the joint on my forefinger.  Not a good feeling, now I always where a glove

[ThePushArchery]

I too thought the same thing with the glue/nock combination. The nocks are snug to answer that question.

I proved this out by taking Bohning classic nocks, (which have a real thin wall plastic at the wide end of the taper) and I glued one up. While whipping the excess glue off, the plastic nearest the shaft end of the nock actually starting whipping off. It was eating through the plastic on contact, and so much so, that it was whipping the plastic away 5 seconds after applying.

[aromakr]

cpnhgnlngct:
That is how plastic glues work, they soften the material so the glues become part of the item being glued, I will bet when the glue hardened so did the edge of the nock.

I did an experiment yesterday. I took a Bohning "T" nock and filled the cavity full of Bohning Platinum glue, that's probably 10 times the amount of glue you would use to glue a nock on, it did soften the edges of the nock while the glue was liquid, however when the glue was set all was solid, no distortion of the nock. I do not believe the nock or glue are at fault unless some kind of solvent was added to the glue that was non-bohning, if that was done then all bets are off. I often see on this site people recommending using other than Bohning thinners, that's a no-no. Don't get me wrong I'm not a Bohning fan. I do use thousands of their classic nocks every year, however I don't want too see them get a bad rap for something that is not there fault.
Bob