Straightarrow--
Yes, it is confusing, and as the other guys have commented on, there are very many variables that must be taken into account for each given scenario. I prefer to compare in two different categories, "apples to apples", and "apples to oranges".
In "apples to apples" one would compare two bows of similar design. In this case the bow that has the deepest brace would win, simply because the deeper the brace, the closer the string is to the shooter, and less distance it has to travel to a specific drawlength. This shorter distance takes more pressure on the string to torque out of line, therefore it is more forgiving.
With "apples to oranges", alot more things come into play, and I perhaps mis-spoke on my previous post. Shorter ATA does become critical, but it seems no-one really knows at what point, or how drastic. The amount of string travel from full draw to rest for a specific drawlength always dictates the amount of forgiveness, unfortunately the shorter ATA offsets this to some degree, along with cam design. Much easier to compare "apples to apples" than it is "apples to oranges".
I own both a 41" ATA with a 7 1/4" brace height, and a 31 1/2" ATA with the same brace, and can tell you that the 41" is much more stable. Interestingly, tho the 41" ATA bow is 10" longer than the shorter bow, it only gains 2" in amount of string being played out due to different cam designs. BUT, the distance of string travel from full-draw to rest increases to 3 1/2" extra distance of travel on the shorter bow. If we simply deduct the amount of extra string being played out by the longer ATA bow (2"
from the extra distance of travel of the shorter bow,(over 3 1/2"
it is easy to see that the shorter bow STILL carries an extra distance/forgiveness variable of 1 1/2". This would be the overall differential of forgiveness between the two, and is why the shorter bow is more critical of form errors, IMHO. If you weren't confused before, you should be now!! <img src=icon_smile_wink.gif border=0 align=middle> Good shooting, P12
Edited by - Pinwheel 12 on 01/05/2002 06:05:05