brucelanthier

Thanks very much to the extremely informative replies. After reading all of this about the importance of spine, spine testing and arrow flightI am going to have to get moving on a spine tester.

Black Frog

SA mentions cutting off both ends of the shaft. For me that is standard procedure except for EastonACC's and X7's.

I cut 1" off the rear of the arrow first thing. Then I cut the other end to desired finished length. A lot of the straightness problems with shafts(especially carbons)can be at the very ends of the arrow.

It may not beneccessary for every carbon, but it can't hurt, and paying attention to all those little details adds up to aid in better and moreconsistent arrow flight.

brucelanthier

He mentioned that in another thread and I have since incorporated that into my arrow making routine.

davepjr71

Beyond the application stand point the spine tester looks like a cool tool to have and the one on the link does not look that complicated to build. Of course, with the dial on the top like suggested.

bigcountry

What I have found by actually measureing the straightness, is I rarely find mfg. stand up to thier claims. I find it makes a huge difference with broadheads. I have a good article in bowhunter June 2004 where they tested this and found shooting thru a machine, anything over .003 makes a difference especially with broadheads.

A guy that can hit a skoal can at 30 yards 5 out of 5 times probably can't with arrows .006".

Black Frog

I have a Hooter Shooter (shooting machine) and while I haven't tested this scenario, I'd be willing to wager that with my spine/straightness tester that you could find the 'high' side of those .006" arrows, fletch them all in the same orientation, and if they all had consistent spine from arrow to arrow- I bet they would group broadheads better than the .003" arrows if those had erratic spine differences.

But yes, if spine is consistent with both groups of arrows, obviouslythe more straight ones will generally perform better.

TFOX

Exactly what I was thinking and thanks for saving me some typing.

davepjr71

This may have to do with the spine and i apologize if this changes the subject. But how do you fellows handle a weight issue on a shaft? When


I place 2 of my arrows on the spinner they rotate to a specific point w/ Blazers. I even tore off one of the wraps w/blazers and re-did and the shaft spun to the same point.

brucelanthier

I read about something similar. The guy called it the float test. He would plug up both end of the bare shaft and float it in water. The side that always spun to the top was the weak/light side of the spine and the side the spun to the bottom was the stiff/heavy side of the spine. It sounded like it made semse but I don't really know if it is true or not.

Black Frog

Well, think about this- what if you had a shaft that had a gentle arc runoutto it. As you spin it and it comes to rest, wouldn't the arc naturally go to lowest position, or at least tend to be in that direction? Is this the heavy side or the lowpoint of the arc? I dunno. maybe it is- maybe not.

I don't put much faith in floating arrows. The items you use to plug the ends of the shafts may influence the light/heavy side more than the shaft itself.

And light/heavy sides may or may not correlate to a weak or stiff side of the shaft, which is what I'm more concerned about. The spine of the arrow is what is reacting to the energy being put to it during the shot. I'm not saying finding the light/heavy sides isn't worthwhile, butIam of the belief thatfinding the actual stiff or weak sides (if you have the ability)vs heavy or light sides is more beneficial.