Predator IV Pendulum

[Buckfevr]

I started to set up the Predator IV pendulum. The first thing is that the sight sticks way out in front of the bow. There was no way I would hunt with it like that so I took a look at it and talked to the owner of Predator. I asked him if I could mount it directly to the riser without the sight mount, he wasn't sure about clearance and whether I'd have enough room for adjustments, but I've got it setup that way and I did the initial setup in my house and I've got plenty of room to pull it off. So that's good. I would not have used it with the sight mount as is. I suppose I could have drilled a couple of holes in the sight mount and used it, but this seems to be working out real well. This sight is definitely a pain to setup. Especially without the sight mount because that is where elevation is usually set. Instead I'm setting both windage and elevation on the sight. One thing for sure you don't want to waste your time setting elevation until windage is set on this sight, because the windage adjustment is sure to throw off the elevation. Once windage is set it is easy to maintain while adjusting elevation. While I think that all pendulums are a pain this one in particular is even more so because it has the additional speed adjustment and a short range adjustment. But I can already see that it's going to be a real good deal. The round sight guard glows in the dark and lines up with the peep which will increase accuracy and the fiber optic is very bright. The speed adjustment will let me get out to 35+ yards or so with my setup so that is good. It also has a short range stop so that I can dial in on shots as close as say 5-6 yards away. And the other perhaps best feature on this sight is that it is absolutely silent.

I guess I would recommend this sight, but with the caveat that the sight mount would probably need to be drilled to bring the sight closer to the riser, unless you're hunting big timber where clearance problems aren't an issue.

[Buckfevr]

Just a follow up on this sight as I finally got it setup right. First off I have to say that I tried to set it up three times and really could not get the performance I was looking for. So I called and spoke to "Lou" who spent a good 15-20 minutes on the phone with me educating me on how the sight works. He explained the speed adjustment and what that affects and then the "midrange" adjustment and what that affects and how the short range stop plays into helping set the trajectory. He also explained that depending on the arrow weight/point weight combination, the sight will have to be tuned to match that. This sight isn't simple to understand right off, but when you do, then you really have a tremendous amount of versatility in terms of tuning the pendulum to your arrows trajectory. With that understanding I was able to setup the pendulum in under an hour with the following results: Dead on at 5 yards, 1/2" low at 12-13 yards, 1/2" high at 25 yards, and dead on at 34 yards. I did not test past this range as that's all we have to work with in my buddies back yard. Shooting the 85 grain Slicks on 5575's, I was shaving vanes at 25 yards, a 4 arrow 1" group. That is not accuracy that I've ever experienced before with fixed heads and I think that it is a combination of the flight characterstrics of the Slicks and also that the round sight guard of the pendulum lined up with the large aperture peep, gives it another reference point for increased accuracy. The thing though that I most enjoyed was after we had it setup was the shooting. I really enjoyed not having to think about range estimation and just focusing on aiming and shooting, what a joy that is. There is a definite learning curve with this sight, but now I really like this sight and would highly recommend it.