Okay guys, I'm ready to learn something new. It's the offseason, and I need something to distract me for a while.

Tell me the down & dirty on bow manufacturing. I wanna know where the various manufacturers buy their limbs from, what they're made of, what grade options are available, what the differences are between them. Feel free to show your bias, and tell me why A is better than B and C. (If anyone even knows...)

After a few minutes of googling, I learned the following:

Hoyt, Matthews and Martin all make their own (or at least they DID), using materials purchased from Gordon Glass Composites. They also sell base materials to ski, snowboard manufacturers. Interesting stuff, really. www.gordoncomposites.com But, I'm sure there are nuiances to their respective assembly processes (materials, tolerances, processes, etc..).

HCA and Elite buy them pre-fabbed at Barnsdale Archery. http://www.barnsdalearchery.com/ I have no clue how Dave Barnsdale puts limbs together, but people always say he's the top dog in limb building. I wouldn't mind learning why his limbs are so great, and everybody else is playing catch-up.

I read somewhere that gordon's pre-fab limbs run around $10 per set (manufacturer cost), but I'm not sure of anyone actually using them. Like I noted earlier - most companies are buying the components from Gordon and building them themselves.

I also found out that PSE, Bear and Jennings (at least used to - not sure if they still do) use Compression Molding, where the components are placed in a mold and then pressed in high heat and presure to let the epoxy cure and squeeze the air bubbles out. Neat stuff.

I think Bowtech is compression molded as well - not sure.

And - what the heck is Magnaglass?

Also - since we will probably have a lot of visual learners in the audience for this little discussion - if you can dig up pictures, please do.

So for those keeping score at home, I notice that there are a whole lot less limb manufacturers than there are bow companies. That says a lot.


[/align]I know, I know... This is another one of my conversations that is really "out there," but it is what it is... I figure that somebody might learn something new, or I might pick up a neat piece of info to store in the databank.


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