Thought I would share my first impressions of my new Sheepeater Spirit. I have had the bow a little over 2 weeks now. To be perfectly honest I have not got to shoot the bow as much as I would like due to work. I have gotten to put 250-350 arrows through it and here are my first impressions.
I ordered the bow from Brent (as stated a hundred times before, Brent and Mark ARE great guys) for the purpose of treestand hunting whitetail deer. I loved the thought of this small bow in the tree and all the incresed shot opps with such a short bow. The bow arrived and my first thought when I pulled it from the box is "this is a kids bow". It is TINY. Let me assure you that it is not a kids bow. The energy stored in this thing when strung is amazing. It is fast.
My bow 62@29 with a purple heart riser, osage limbs, and the black belley. I had Brent cut me a shelf into mine and I went with the leather grip instead of Rattan (my choice). It is beautiful bow.
The bow was noisier than expected just barebow. I then added some moleskin on the limbs and cat wiskers to the string and it is now as quiet as any (I am pretty picky about noisy bows). There was no noticable finger pinch at my draw of 28" and the bow was suprisingly very smooth when shot with little hand shock. I bought carbon express heritage arrows to shoot with this bow and the 350's and 250's were too stiff. I have settled on the 150's w/100grain brass insert and 125grain tip cut to 30". They are still giving me a bit of a stiff reaction and my nock point appears to be a bit low still as well. I am allready at about 3/8" above center on that. What is funny is I had some older aluminum 2018's lying around without the brass inserts and 125 grain tip and they match perfectly to this setup. Absoulutely gorgeous arrow flight and bare shafts hit right with fletched. I am not going to give up on the carbons just yet but I really like what I see with the 2018's. The bow is accurate for me out to 30 yards. Which is about normal with other bows I have shot. I only plan on those 10-15 yard chippers from a tree with this bow so long range accuracy was not really a factor when I bought the bow. My groups seem to fall apart once I get out to 40yards (but I am sure it's the indian and not the arrow). Expect to draw about and inch less with this bow, or at least I did. Stringing this bow is harder than any other bow I have shot. No big deal, you'll get used to it. Go with the Rattan grip.
Likes : Size/weight, speed, craftsmanship, noise level, precision (to 30 yards), lack of handshock/smoothness, no noticable finger pinch, cool factor (this bow is a head turner)
Dislikes: leather grip (that was my choice and both Mark and Brent almost begged me to go with the Rattan), stringing is a little harder than most, matching arrows with the shelf cut version seems to be more difficult (which I don't quite understand, I thought the closer the bow is to center cut, the more arrows you would be able to shoot through it, what do I know?)
Bottom line is everything Mark and Brent told me is spot on. I would buy another bow from them tommorow (if my wife would'nt hang me out by my gonads). This bow is going to make an AWESOME treestand bow. I have got a surprise for Mr. Pig Laden come this fall.
Blake McCord
Topic: My new Sheepeater Spirit (Read 1355 times)
