paging all finger shooters and tuning gurus
 

okay, as some of you might recall, i am recently a mech release shooter-to-finger shooter convert. (don't hold that against me. :) j/k) anyway, to the problem at hand...the last couple of months i have been primarily working on the mechanics of finger shooting, namely the actual release. i feel like i have it down pretty well now. i am using a split-finger hold (one finger above, two below) and am using back tension and relaxing the fingers at the same time to let the arrow "escape" (thanks arthur! ;)) anyway, since i feel i have the release down, i began tuning my bow tonight. well, here is my set-up: 67#, 29" arrow, xx75 2315 or 2317, 125 gr. tip. (i wasn't sure which spine i would have to have as tuning with fingers is new to me.) i am tuning through paper...so, i grab the 2317 and fire it through the paper...nock high-right tear...hmmm...right tear is indicitive of a stiff spine for fingers according to my old easton tuning guide. high tear is due to high nocking point. no problem. next i grab the 2315 to see if i can get rid of the right tear. i fire away. sure enough, only a high tear now. (although, i figured the 2315 would be a bit weak for my set-up. anyone agree?) so, i begin to move the nock down and down and down...nothing but the same high tear. hmmm...okay just to see what happens i start moving the nock back up...result-same high tear...grrrr...now i'm getting frustrated. okay, so what gives? [:@] when shooting a release i have never had problems tuning my bow. now that i have gone to fingers, i have problems. now, here is another little tidbit, i'm using the wb for my rest. i know guys that shoot fingers with the wb and have really good arrow flight. i really liked this rest with my mech release and definately want to keep it. (so, please don't tell me to ditch the wb.) so, does anyone have any idea what is causing this? could there be some kind of nock pinch going on with my holding method? (bow is 34" ata, yeah, kind of short for a finger shooter. [8D]) i know for a release shooter sometimes a nock high tear is due to weak spine, but that isn't the case for a finger shooter, is it?
please, HELP!

RE: paging all finger shooters and tuning gurus
 

i'm just bumping this back up to the top...surely, someone has experienced this tuning problem, whether finger shooting or mech release shooting...anyone?

RE: paging all finger shooters and tuning gurus
 

First thing you need to do is take that paper, rip it into little shreds, toss it in the trash and forget all about it! IMO, paper tuning -which I do not care for in the least, anyway- is not very applicable to fingers shooting, regardless of what Chuck Adams says. Bareshaft tuning is much better for a fingers guy.

Release shooting is an inline release. Fingers release has a lateral displacement on the string which is transferred to the arrow. It takes some extra time and distance for the arrow to stabilize with a fingers release. That's one reason paper tuning is difficult with fingers. It's also why so many of us fingers shooters use big feathers. It helps stabilize the arrow quicker.

RE: paging all finger shooters and tuning gurus
 

Wow 34 in is pretty short for fingers. But I can'nt tell you to buy a new bow especially after I tell you to ditch you rest:D. I am just kidding. I partiallly agree with Aurthur as far as paper tuning a finger bow. I do use the paper tune to set my nock height, up and down tares I can get perfect .side to side tares are a little more challenging. I try to get as close to a bullet as I can. And thats my starting point. I then go outside and do the walk back method I group em tight at ten then step back to twenty make my adjustment to group em tight in the same spot as at ten then repeat to 30 and 40. By the time I'm done I can usually group a bare shaft with my fletched arrow out to 30 yds. Then I shoot my broadheads and they 're usually dead on.
As far as whats going on with you set up It could be your rest. I had a simular problem with the timberdoodle rest terrible tares no matter what. If you moved your nock up and down and still get a high tare. My guess would be a clearance problem Maybe a vane hitting the bottom of the biscuit. Or you could be getting alot of finger pinch with that short bow. I solved my timberdoodle problem by going to a cavalier freeflyte with a master lock plunger. I've tried almost every finger rest under the sun and this is my fav. I also use the tuning for tens method with this rest set up. Which is simular to what I explained earlier. But theres a little more to it. If you go to a flipper plunger set up Let me know and I'll get you the info to download the method.

RE: paging all finger shooters and tuning gurus
 

I agree with Arthur P paper tuning with fingers will not produce the results you are trying to getif you can get decent groups with your set up you are headed in the right direction.

RE: paging all finger shooters and tuning gurus
 

well, taking everyone's advice, i scrapped paper tuning in favor of bare shaft tuning...last night i took some arrows, scraped off the vanes and began comparing fletched arrows impacting to unfletched impacting...i have to say, there was no right and left impacting of the arrows compared to the fletched arrows...so, that tells me that my spine is correct...i did however get the nock high flight (unfletched arrows impacting below my fletched arrows. surprise, surprise [:-]) i again, played the old "move the nock up and down" game...same results...[:@] so, i think well, lets fiddle with the rest. i moved the rest back and forth slightly while shooting arrows and got what i expected to get, the arrows impacting the target right and left of where my pin is set but still showing that high nock impact...grrrr...so, i decided to try to force the arrow to show a spine problem, just to make sure spine isn't the culprit here. i start cranking the poundage up and down while shooting unfletched arrows. and sure enough, the arrows are showing the appropriate stiff spine and weak spine impacts. so, i'm really thinking that it is either a couple of things causing the high nock impact:

1. my form (it could be, but i've never had this problem when shooting a mech release)

2. my holding method (yeah, a 34 is short for fingers, i know, but by golly i want to make it work [8D]) which could be causing some kind of pinch on the arrow.

i personally think it is number 2, but would like to hear some opinions. can anyone suggest what else it might be? i am just beside myself trying to solve this...and let me ask this...when i get my bow "tuned" will i be able to shoot bare shafts and hit exactly where my fletched arrows do?

thanks everyone for all the responses, they really have helped a lot...:)

RE: paging all finger shooters and tuning gurus
 

Make double sure you're not torquing the string, especially if your letoff is more than 65%. First time I looked in a mirror with a fingers draw on an 80% letoff bow, I about had a cow! I was having trouble getting a good tune and my accuracy wasn't what I expected, so I checked my form by drawing in front of the mirror.

Lo and behold! There was an 'S' curve twisted into the string, because my bow was straight up and down but my wrist was turned out about a 30 degree angle at the bottom. Rather than the string tracking straight from the top cam, through my fingers to the bottom cam, the top half of the string was a good inch offset from the bottom half.

You gotta make sure your string hand wrist is aligned with the string so you won't get that twist.

Don't know if that's your problem, but it's definitely something you must check. [&:]

RE: paging all finger shooters and tuning gurus
 

HOLY COW! that never even occured to me! i could very well be doing that for all i know...i will be checking that ASAP. thanks!

RE: paging all finger shooters and tuning gurus
 

let the string roll off your fingers aginst your cheek, this will keep the string from oscelating as much upon release.

RE: paging all finger shooters and tuning gurus
 

well, i don't know if anyone is interested, but...

as soon as i got home yesterday, i set my little girl down and grabbed my bow, stood in front of a mirror and drew it. arthur was right. i was torquing the string when holding it...my string looked just as arthur described. i was really having a difficult time NOT doing that everytime i drew. (probably from the last couple of months of shooting that way. [:-] bad habits, bad habits, bad habits...[8D]) so, i think i will be changing my holding method. i am now drawing with the split finger method, but once i get to my anchor point, i am going to drop the top finger (the one above the arrow) off of the string and hold only with the bottom two (the ones below the arrow.) this does two things for me...one, i don't torque the string doing this. two, it is a little easier to hold at full draw due to relief of the steep string angle created from the relatively short ata bow. after dropping that finger off, the arrow really seems to fly a LOT better. i didn't get a chance to shoot any bare shafts though as it started raining. but the fletched arrows flew really well. does anyone see a potential problem with drawing and shooting the way i do now?

thanks to everyone (arthur p, timbow2 and bigpapascout.) you guys really helped a lot. it sure is nice having a place to come with questions and being able to get quality responses. :)