I have been wondering what negative effects, if any, an over spined arrow will have on a setup. I understand how a under spined arrow will negatively affect arrow flight, but I don’t see how a over spined arrow will hurt except the added weight will slow it down. But what about arrow flight?

This came to mind after i went to buy some carbon arrows and the only pro shop within an hour only had the PSE CFE 400. With my set up (Q2 @67LBS, 29.5" arrow and 100 GR heads) i only needed the 300' s however the owner said a over spined arrow will not hurt at all. After some thought i could not disagree so I purchased them.

Curious of your thoughts

I' m still new at this, so I may be confused, but wouldn' t a 400 be underspined if you needed 300' s? 400' s would be correct if you were shooting ~60lbs, but at 67 you need a stiffer arrow, hence the move to 300' s.

Someone correct me if I' m wrong, hopefully I' ll learn something here.

Assuming a well tuned bow, shoot through or drop away type rest, use of a release and perhaps a string loop, the pro is correct according to Bob Ragsdale.

With these variables, parallax is minimized and the arrow is sent straight out of the bow with as little flexing as possible.

Matt,
400' s are for 82-93 lbs, if you go by PSE cart but it doesnt take into acount cam type- tip weight. so it would be just the opposite as you described

Thanks Anthony, I was looking at an easton arrow chart(guess I need to work on the reading comprehension). It does seem a little silly that the companies can' t agree on a numbering scheme though. What sense does it make that an easton 400 is different from a pse 400, and that for the numbering schemes go in opposite directions?

To tell you the truth being overspinned will effect arrow flight as much as being underspinned. The only difference between the two is that being overspinned will not be dangerous to shoot as compared to being underspinned. Being spinned correctly is always your best bet.

this is not always the case, take a look at a 2219 aluminum as compared to a 2613. The 2219 will be a lot heavier then the 2613. But the deflection at 28" on the 2613 is .265 and .335 on the 2219.

In my experience a slightly stiff spine is easier to tune than a slightly weakd spine. Obviously the correct spine is what you want, but sometimes you just can' t get that. In my case I' m on the cusp of 400' s and 340' s....400' s don' t tune worth a damn out of my bow....

I' m talking about Bemans BTW.

Jason, I' m assuming that the 340 is a stiffer spine (I don' t know) then the 400' s, and you have mentioned that you can not get the correct spine, and you are sort of in between.

Here is a little advice, try using the arrow length to your advantage to get the correct spine. You may want to try to lengthen the arrow by an inch or so, and maybe even go to a heavier tip. You may also want to increase the poundage of your bow. Since you are in between, I think that you made the right choice by going with the stiffer arrow. With a little tweeking, I' m sure that you can get it right on.

If you are already at the stops on your bow. Then I would suggest going with the less stiff arrow. Backing off on the bow weight a bit, keep your arrow as short as possible, and go to a lighter tip.

Exactly right Bobco....340' s are stiffer. At the time I shot 400' s I couldn' t make them any shorter and didn' t want to go lighter on the point weight. So, I opted to got to the heavier spine for ease of use, so to speak. Now, I couls probably shoot the 400' s with ease since I just put a new rest on and can lop off at least 1.5" . I just bought a dozen ICS camo shafts though and they are tuned, so next year at the earliest I' ll think about changing them.