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What will you test or tinker?

tarafrost said:
Building a dozen new arrows. Gonna try Easton Match Grade (6.5s so I can use my existing Lumenoks), slightly more spine, and up the FOC and TAW a bit by going to 125gr Iron Will single bevels in front. Should take me from low 400 grs to around 450. Will likely slowly up the draw weight a bit to get to 55 or maybe even 60 lbs by the Fall hunting season, but gotta build up to that due to a shoulder injury.

The shafts, vanes (Bohning Blazers, white & purple), white wraps and such are queued up on the workbench in my garage, just waiting for the time and motivation to start the build process.
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Sounds very similar to my own arrows and projected “tinkering”. I don’t use wraps but I had my first fletch failure ever from my own fletching process, so I may have to revisit my cleaning/preparation and try a wrap as well.
 
If I end up with a new Ethos like I'm wanting, I'll be doing lots of tinkering. I have a tendency to go a little overboard with tuning, and I'd like to work up an arrow built around a 100gr head. My current sticks all have 125gr on them. Seems 100gr options are easier to find.

Luckily Victory makes the back weight system and I can change things up till I find the trajectory and speed I like. Trying to stay in the 450-475gr range with decent FOC. My Enkore likes the 475s I currently shoot, but that ethos is a touch faster.

BT
 
I have two things on the agenda for this next year.

The first is I want to move from a .166 arrow build to a .204. My x-impacts have been great over the past few seasons but good lord are they finicky to get them all tuned. I'm hoping a slightly larger diameter will give me a little more forgiveness. Been eyeballing the victory rip xv's pretty hard, I think with the right insert/collar combo they should stand up to hard impacts, prob going to sacrifice a couple for science.

The second is to take my backup bow and make a pseudo "bomb proof" build: ezv sight, no stabs, I'd want to go WB rest but still want to use my skinny arrows so I'll prob slap on an old qad hdx I have laying around collecting dust.
 
elk yinzer said:
From time to time I see other internet gear junkies (if I may use that term as an honor since I know you know the space well) write negatively about the FMJs, but never really tuned into what the specific alleged issues are, care to elaborate?

I've been using them for 10+ years now, absolutely zero complaints and something about the feel of aluminum vs. carbon I just strongly prefer. But I'm just a functional 35 yard bowhunter, not much of an archery guy in and of itself. I am due for a new dozen though and that price tag is starting to give me a sore ass.
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So, I've never owned FMJs, so I can only speak to the specific complaints I've overheard, and not from experience.

One complaint is the high GPI in relation to the spine. With a straight carbon or alu shaft of the same spine, you could have the same TAW with a lighter shaft and heavier point, increasing your FOC.

One complaint that I've never really explored in any detail is that over time FMJs weaken. Something about bent or dented aluminum causing microfractures in the carbon, or something, IDK, just that a given FMJ might be weaker than a comprably-spined carbon or aluminum arrow. Or that as the shaft flexes through paradox over a large number of shots the dissimilar materials eventually begin to work against each other causing microfractures or adhesive failures or something along those lines. One of the haters can correct me on this. Really, this seems more like commenters arguing hypotheticals rather than actual experience.

The last one is more a criticism of the HIT system than FMJs per se, that hard hits without shock collars will force the HIT insert deeper into the shaft, causing it to splinter apart. I use 5mm Axis with Ethics components and avoid any HIT issues.

Out of curiosity, what induced you to chose FMJ shafts over straight carbon or aluminum? I went with the 5mm Axis because of the price, the generally positive reviews, and the available the Ethics components. I think my next set - whenever I get them, not this year - will be Victory VAPs, and I'll see what these micro-diameters are all about.
 
DelaWhere_Arrow said:
I’m considering going to 340s from 400s myself, and maybe upping my BH weight to 125, bringing my TAW above 400 gr (currently right at 380). I’m right on the edge of 400/340 spines according to the spine charts and generators, 60# at about 25.5” of draw. It’s not going to affect me much but I’m curious to see how they fly and how much speed I lose (already just under 250 fps and I’m purdy near maxed out on speed according to the archery shop) but how much KE I might gain. If the returns are negligible, I’ll probably just revert to my current setup which hasn’t done me dirty.
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casts_by_fly said:
I’m right on the edge also. I’m at 62# and 27” but on a pretty hot cam (bow tech rpm 360). I’m shooting 340’s now with 100 gr heads and they fly really well. I threw on some 200 gr heads and shot them out to 20yd in the basement and they looked really good too. That tells me I probably only need a 375 spine or so with 100 gr heads. For next hunting season I’m thinking of adding 100 gr inserts (maybe lighter) after I see how they fly at 40-50 yards this summer. I’m also going to play with 3 and 4 fletch a little. Worst case, nothing makes anything better and I go back to what I have now.

im also going to play with some 400’s I have downstairs for summer targets. In my old bow I shot them with 75 gr heads but at 29.5” arrow length (and a too long for me draw). I think if I cut them down to 27” and keep the 75’s on them they should shoot decently. I’d drop 50 grains or so and be around 5.8 gpp. not crazy light but I’d pick up 20 fps or so and have a crapton of them to shoot. I was intending to shoot a lot more 3d this year so why not.
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I've been playing the last couple days. I made up one of my gold tip 340's (my current arrow) with 2.75" tac drivers and a 4" wrap. I have to refletch some this year anyway, so I'll leave the 4 good ones I have on the bow for the rest of this season and tinker with the rest. The tac drivers with a wrap look pretty sweet (all white in my case for now) and shooting the single one I made in the basement it looked pretty good at 20 yards. When the weather warms up a little and shooting outside isn't awful I'll try it out to 40 to see if I want to do more that way. I think the answer is yes, but let's see.

I also built up a 'target' arrow to try. I have some older gold tip 55/70's that my dad shot in his bow with 75 gr heads. I tried them full length (29") on my 27" draw bow but bareshaft was rough looking. I ultimately got it down to 25.5" or so and bareshaft looked pretty good in flight so I threw three blazers on there. With the 75 and with 100 gr heads it flys pretty well (again 20 yards indoor). I'll see how it does outdoor and go from there. I drop about 80 grains of weight going from my hunting arrow to this one and get down to about 5.25 gpp which is pushing IBO limits. Kinetic energy calculators say I should pick up 25-30 fps which is a lot for targets. If they fly well I'll make up a batch and use them for casual 3D this summer.

I also stripped down some older 340 spine vapors because the vanes were 15 years old and dryrot. I'll cut them down to my hunting shaft length and use them for hunting target practice here at the house (shooting from a saddle out in the woods at weird angles and distances). Lose one? no biggie.

Rick
 
1. gonna make sure my rifle is holding zero and get a Trijicon scope if it doesn't
2. want a larger, light platform (waiting on those big carbon ones to drop)
3. might figure out how to make aluminum steps quiet without adding so much stuff to them that it negates the weight savings over my tree hopper steps (it's mostly the jangling in my carry pouches...once in my hand I am careful enough for them to be quiet)

Other than that, I'm pretty satisfied for once and am just going to shoot 3D and scout. My goal is to find a nice buck near my cabin 3 hours away in the national forest and finally take a big buck in the larger mountains, instead of these hill bucks near my house.
 

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Trying out these this year. I got to test them with the cold weather about a month ago and have been really impressed.
 
It’s more of a feel bad for me gift. I was medically retired after a year and half of fighting work comp and the city. The site was her way trying to make things better. I’ll take it. She’s a keeper.
 
elk yinzer said:
I need to find a backup release. My Free Flight is somewhere between 1 day and 50 years away from pooping the bed and I somehow failed to secure a lifetime of backups before they closed up shop.
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I think I have one laying around for some reason. It is the D loop, trigger relax model I believe.
 
Iron_llama said:
So, I've never owned FMJs, so I can only speak to the specific complaints I've overheard, and not from experience.

One complaint is the high GPI in relation to the spine. With a straight carbon or alu shaft of the same spine, you could have the same TAW with a lighter shaft and heavier point, increasing your FOC.

One complaint that I've never really explored in any detail is that over time FMJs weaken. Something about bent or dented aluminum causing microfractures in the carbon, or something, IDK, just that a given FMJ might be weaker than a comprably-spined carbon or aluminum arrow. Or that as the shaft flexes through paradox over a large number of shots the dissimilar materials eventually begin to work against each other causing microfractures or adhesive failures or something along those lines. One of the haters can correct me on this. Really, this seems more like commenters arguing hypotheticals rather than actual experience.

The last one is more a criticism of the HIT system than FMJs per se, that hard hits without shock collars will force the HIT insert deeper into the shaft, causing it to splinter apart. I use 5mm Axis with Ethics components and avoid any HIT issues.

Out of curiosity, what induced you to chose FMJ shafts over straight carbon or aluminum? I went with the 5mm Axis because of the price, the generally positive reviews, and the available the Ethics components. I think my next set - whenever I get them, not this year - will be Victory VAPs, and I'll see what these micro-diameters are all about.
Click to expand...
ive been shooting FMJs for awhile now and have never experienced any of the problems folks talk about. I have re-used arrows that passed through deer and never saw any of the flaring on the ends or dinged up shafts...im also a very average shooter as far as shooting time and shoot smaller deer here in S la so theres that....for me, choosing the FMJs was just pure laziness on my part...i got a heavier weight build with out having to actually build arrows, just threw on a 125gr head and boom 450gr TAW done.


All that said to say this year ill probably finally get away from the FMJs and tinker with some insert weight combos between the GT hunter XTs and Easton Axis.
 
Camelcluch said:
Well that was a short lived tinkering session. The UV sight is head back. I’m lefty and this is a right handed sight turned upside down. That’s strait garbage.
Canyon Pounder here I come!!!!
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I'm a lefty as well. I hate when they do stuff like that. We always get the short end of the stick. I'm glad I was able to find a lefty specific sight in the CBE Trek Pro.

BT
 
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