Bloody Carbons

[Luke Vander Vennen]

"Bloody carbons" as in the British way, rather than the succesful hunter way, the British version of "bloody carbons" in this case meaning "stupid expensive carbons that took several months to set up and now won't bare shaft properly."

For the past couple years all I have shot is wood. I could never manage to find a set of arrows that would fly really well out of my bow. I'm not really sure why, it just never worked out for me. I got them to the point where I could keep a group of broadheads in a huntable group inside a close distance, but I wasn't satisfied with that. I tend to be kinda anal about arrow flight. If they don't fly perfectly, it bugs me that when I miss, I don't know whether it's my fault or whether it's simply the arrows not being fit for the bow.
"Self," says I "why don't you try out a set of carbons. Expenisve they might be, but from what I've read they seem to be really easy to tune and get to fly properly." Good deal, I say.
According to the spine charts, I should be shooting 400s (Bemans). Now I have no experience shooting carbons, so hopefully those people who make up those spine charts knew what they were talking about. I was hoping (planning) that these would be my hunting arrows this year, mostly due to the fact that these are my only huntable arrows.

Long story short, the other day I ended up with 5 fletched shafts and 7 bareshafts, all with white cresting strips, 3 grain per inch weight tubes, 100 grain brass inserts, and a variety of points. Total shaft weight: about 450-475 grains before points. I grabbed my arrows and some 175 points and shot a group. Squirrely arrow flight with fletches, nock hitting left with the bareshafts. From what I understand, this means the arrow is too soft. I threw on the 145 points, hoping that these would fly well, as I have several broadheads at that weight. Same deal. Same with the 125s. This sucks. I finally grabbed a couple 100 grain judos I had lying around. Still too weak!! The fletched arrows fly ok with the 100 grain judos, but the bareshafts are still hitting nock left. So what I have now is a set of carbons with a fair bit of money invested in them, that won't fly properly. This leaves me with the choice of either forking out the money I need for school to buy new arrows, or buying some 100 grain 3 blade broadheads and trying to be satisfied with some arrows that still aren't properly tuned. The last thing I want to do is wound a deer because I'm wondering if my arrows are ok. This would especially be a problem if my feathers get wet, in which case it would be like shooting bareshafts anyway.

What do I do?? Is it ok if my arrows look ok in flight with fletches, but are, according to bareshaft tests, too weak? Somebody help!


I forgot to mention that I draw them full length, so cutting them down isn't really an option.


Sorry for the long post, I had to vent a little.

[vermonster13]

You could put aluminum inserts in the arrows and take out the brass.

[Abel]

I know some really smart bowhunters who don't bareshaft or paper tune. They just tune until they get good, clean arrow flight with broadheads. Get some 100 grain Magnus Stingers. That should put you where you need to be. If you have to, go with a 85 or 90 grain broadhead. A 100 grain Bear Razorhead is about 95 without the bleeder blade. G5 Montecs come in 85 grains. Muzzy Phantoms are 105 without the bleeder. You could also buy a Dacron string with a little higher strand count to reduce the power being delivered to your shaft. Adding a second set of string silencers may help in the same manner. Also look at building up the sideplate of your bow to make it less centershot. You can make these arrows work!

[zilla]

Seems to me that I was reading a bare shaft "how to" a while back.  The author , as I remember it, said not to pay atention to the bare shafts not hitting straight.  But rather how they were grouping compared to the fletched shafts.. Thats just what I remember, and I could be full of it..

[**DONOTDELETE**]

How much fletching are you running on those shafts? I had some arrows doing much the same and went from 4 to 5 inch feathers and straightened things up nicely....When your rockets wiggle....put bigger fins on them bro....worked for me....who cares about bare shafting anyway?....shooting with wet feathers doesn't compare with a bare shaft ...i wonder who came up with that notion?

[HARL]

Luke send me your phone # and a time to phone.I'll explain a couple of things to ya.
            The O.B.B.

[vermontrad]

Vermonster hit it, take the brass out.

[Pete W]

check nock fit.

It is also possible you need even more point weight. Try heavier points before you try pulling the inserts.

[Guru]

Luke, Sometimes a little wind can have you scratching your head. Might not even realize it's blowing.What's your poundage?

Besides, slightly weak, but grouping with the fletched arrows is an ideal shaft for me.......

[B.O.D.]

Curt may be right Luke, even a barely perceptible wind can mess with your bareshafting...and it has been windy here as of late, eh?
BD

[heydeerman]

Luke,

My personal oppinion is bareshafting is not necessary. I plan on hunting with feathers so I tune my arrows with feathers. I recommend tuning the fletched arrows then fletch the ones your bareshafting and tune them.

I would start by taking the tubes out and keep the weight up front.Ptee suggested checking your nock fit. That can throw things off if they are too tight.

[B.O.D.]

Also true, I have never bareshafted( well, tried it once, about 10 YEARS ago:) )...hunt with feathers, tune with feathers.
It is funny though, once you get a good flying arrow, even with the fletching matted from rain to the shaft, they still seem to fly okay.
Kinda like a bareshafted arrow without even trying  

[Pullonmylimb]

If you heven't sanded the nocks yet do that.  I know the nocks that come with every carbon I've ever bought are built for compound strings and SNAP really tightly onto the string.  They will all shoot like squirels if you don't sand them.  Shoot them again after that step.

Are you sure your brace height is where it should be?  Remember any change to brace hight, nock set arrow spine effects everything else.

Read O.L Adcock's page on broadhead planning.  It helped me a lot.  You should be concerned with point of impact for the group not which was the nock is pointing after the arrow comes to rest.  http://www.bowmaker.net/tuning.htm

From your earlier tests it sounds to me like your TOTAL point weight needs to be about 200grns or less.  Take out the brass, install alum with heaviest field points and work down.  You should have some trimmings from the weight tubes left to stuff in and keep them tight.  I'm assuming you want to use the weight tubes so tune with them in.

Your shafts are pretty long at full length. Did you take that into account when you consulted the chart?

[Randy Morin]

Dont worry about how the bare-shaft is angled into the target.  Pay attention to where they group in relation to the fletched shafts. You want to be weak to begin with so you can slowly shorten your shafts (Dremels work good), or reduce weight up front etc.  Also I would leave the weight up front and not worry about weight tubes.  Stick with combinations of brass inserts, steel adapters and point weight.  If you stay a little weak (bare shafts grouping slightly right of fletched) you will be happy I bet.  Then shoot some fletched broadheads and see how they group with field points.  

Your close now I bet but your messed up looking at nock left etc.  Thats not what you want to look at.

[Luke Vander Vennen]

Thanks for all the help guys. One thing I did forget to mention is that the arrows are grouping a bit right of the fletched arrows. They seem to fy on target for the first bit, but after a couple yards they kinda slide to the right. I'll try get out there today to shoot some more and see if I'm right on that.

Curt the wind thing could be a possibilty. It has been fairly windy lately, but when I was shooting it seemed under control. I'll try again today and see if a change in wind makes any difference. I'm shooting about 50 pounds.

I think my nock fit is ok, I don't think they're tight enough to throw anything off. I do have a fairly thin string, so that could be why these carbon nocks fit.

I'm a little scared of taking out the weight tubes because of how light the carbon shafts are. Without the tubes, and with a 100 grain point I'll be shooting under 500 grains. I was hoping to keep arrow weight up for deer hunting.

If nothing else works, and for some reason I can't get these fletched arrows to group, I might try taking out the brass. Is it possible to take out inserts that have been installed with 24 hour epoxy? I heard people saying that using epoxy helps prevent mushrooming, but it also prevents you from being able to remove the insert.


One nice thing about these carbons is that they penetrate really well    . I blew threw some 1/4 inch plywood when I missed with my bareshaft. I was shooting a judo too, the thing left a hole 1/2 inch in diameter  

[Labs4me]

Regardless of how they are marketed, carbon arrows are not all that. Just had Jay's Sporting Goods (Clare, MI) cut me two (2) dozen carbon shafts at my desired length to the tune of $174!. Weighed them on a scale when I got home and the shafts which are supposed to weigh +/- 2 grains weighed anywhere from 292 grains to 315 grains and EVERYWHERE in between. I realize we're not talking about building rocket ships when we discuss arrow tunability, but a good starting point would be to check to see if your shafts weigh the same. Unless you are shooting aluminum arrows, you CANNOT have confidence in the manufacturer's claim that your arrows will weigh the same.
I have intentionally omitted the name of the company so as not to be accused of product/company bashing (since when has relaying truthful information been construed as product/company bashing). I will say that after I called the company's corporate headquarter (in Utah), I was made privy as to what +/- 2 grains ACTUALLY means. It DOES NOT mean +/- 2 grains per shaft within a given dozen shafts. It means, +/- 2 grains per batch. A batch might be 1000- dozen shafts. So when you go to your retailer and buy a dozen shafts, THAT dozen shafts will weigh, say, 292 grains (+/-2 grains). But if you go back to that same dealer and order the same shaft two months later, THAT dozen shafts may weigh 315 grains (+/- 2 grains). The key point here is, ordering the same carbon shaft on two different occasions or from two different retailers does not guarantee that you will end up with a quiver full of arrows having the same weight.

When I asked, how is it that my two dozens shafts are so inconsistent in weight, the manufacturer speculated that the retailer must have put together two dozen shafts which were from different batches.

A dozen 2219s at my length ALWAYS weighs within a grain or two of each other and have for the past 25 years, no matter where I purchase my shafts. This has not been my first hand experience with carbon arrows.

For what it's worth...

[Randy Morin]

Luke, 500 grains is plenty at 10 gpp. for deer.  If you use a 100 grain steel adapter and 125 grain head you will be up plenty high.  Dont think you will get the epoxy inserts out though so it's not gonna matter in that regard.  Next time use hot melt till you get tuned then go back and epoxy your hunting arrows.  Sounds like you are a little weak if your bare shafts are hitting right of your fletched...thats good!
Now you can shorten your shaft slightly or reduce tip weight.

Also Luke, I've been shooting Cabelas Stalker Extremes for 4 years now and they have been wonderful.  Straight, smooth, not too light, and easy on the budget at about $55.00/dozen for shafts.

[Smallwood]

u can take them out if you heat the field point slowly and with a pair of pliers, gently try to twist the f.p./insert until it starts to move, then pull it out. i use a plumbers torch or alcohol burner, but you could use a gas stove as well. i really think that going to the lighter insert will help you get to where you need to be.

[Walt Francis]

A 450-500 grain arrow equates to 9-10 per pound of draw weight, which is plenty of arrow weight from a 50# pound bow for deer.  As recommended above, building out the side of your strike plate with a small piece of leather, tooth pick, match, or anything, will make a weak spined arrow fly better.  Up until the last thirty years it was more common for people to tune their bows to the arrows rather then their arrows to the bows.  Fred Bear, who had access to all the bows and arrows anybody could want always tuned his bow to the arrows he was shooting.
As far as going hunting with the clear conscience, Dean Torges just posted some excellent thoughts on that subject,  http://tradgang.com/noncgi/ultimatebb.php?ubb=get_topic;f=1;t=049034
I couldn't state my feelings on tha subject better then he did.

Walt

[Naphtali]

At least two responders have written that the brass insert should be replaced with aluminum. Why, to reduce weight, or because brass insert is somehow causing instability?