Pet Peeve Time!

IBO DOES NOT HAVE A STANDARD!

IBO has tournament rules. They enacted a minimum arrow weight/maximum draw weight rules because people were blowing up bows and hurting themselves and others trying to get flat trajectory and gain a scoring edge on unmarked yardages by shooting insanely light arrows out of insanely heavy draw weight bows.

It's the shooters that started this IBO rating BS, which is nothing more than a way to figure out what speeds they could get with an 'IBO legal' setup. Manufacturers picked up on it and started advertising 'IBO ratings', even though IBO has NEVER established any criteria for such ratings, nor have they ever even authorized the use of their name in such advertising.

People started wanting manufacturers to warranty their bows for arrows at 5 grains per pound, and now most do. But they charge extra for it because they know they'll be replacing more bows.

Here's how the whole 'IBO rating' thing came about. An IBO rating should be taken with a 400 grain arrow at 80 pounds draw. That is the minimum arrow weight for the maximum draw weight allowed under the rules. Oh, but there are too many wimps that can't draw 80 pounds, so lets settle for 350 grains at 70 pounds. But there is no draw length specified in IBO's tournament rules, so what do you do? Short answer was they stole the 30" standard from the AMO rating.

You could just as easily shoot a 200 grain arrow from a 40 pound bow and call it an IBO rating.

There is an AMO chart on www.bowjackson.com that lists minimum recommended arrow weights, taking draw weight, draw length and cam type into account. It is minimum arrow weights for shooter safety, not hunting arrow recommendations.