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Joe(thebow)M

First Time Shooting Compound In Years - Today

This morning when I finished shooting my Longbow I decided what the heck, I'll get one of the Compound Bow's out and shoot it... Wow! I forgot just how fast these Compound Bows are, and the one I shot this morning is just an old Fred Bear wheel bow, #55 @ 30", 65% let off... I use Easton 2117 w/100grn field points & Feather Fletching with this particular bow.

Anyway, over the years I had become so accustomed to watching my wood arrows fly down range toward the target that the quickness of the Compound caught me a bit off guard as my arrow arrived on target in less then a heart beat!

Now I never have had all the bells and whistle setup on my compound bows, I never installed a string peep, and I still use the old style sight pin setup that doesn't glow, and I use the finger release method for all of them.

I am going somewhere with all this, and that is,,, what are folks using these days in the line of sights and such for their compound bows to bring them up to date? My accuracy is still good with this one. I was shooting 45's to 47's (five arrows at a time) from 25 yards using the 40cm archery target, pretty much staying in the red (9 points) and yellow (10 points) ring's probably 90% or better with each five shoot group, but I'm sure this can be improved on through equipment updating.

Any thoughts or suggestions? If I do go to Yanton, SD for the NFAS shoot in June of 2009, I want to at least have a half a chance to finish second from the bottom...
Ratfighter

Joe,
The EHBC shoot will use shots out to 60yds on each course at unmarked distance. The reason we try for the best speeds is to make for for inconsistent distance judgement. people have been shooting accurately at known distances for years and there is no reason why your old Fred is any less accurate than a modern compound.

If you decide to go with finger shooting, the Bowhunter limited class is the way forward, and certainly the cheapest class using a sight. However I would try your bow at say 50yards and then shoot the same target with a 45 and a 55 yard mark and see how much drop off there is, that way you can assess how damaging a 5 yard misjudgement would be to your score. My 3d setup allows 1.5" per yard wrong at 50 yards, so I judge it 5 yds wrong, I'm about 8 inch off where I am aiming.
Here's a link to the allowed set up for BL
IFAA

enjoy!
kirk

Re: First Time Shooting Compound In Years - Today

Joe M wrote:
Wow! I forgot just how fast these Compound Bows are,


I know what you mean Joe, i have been shooting longbow for a while now, took my brother in-law to the range with his new Reflex Highlander, i had a few shots with it to check the arrow flight, you know fishtailing, etc., no chance! I came up on target loosed and just saw a bright green dot appear on the target face. Almost like magic
Joe(thebow)M

Thanks for the info Ratfighter. Right now I have three compound bow's (55#, #60, and #65) set to mark 3 inches low off the top pin at 25 yards. This was done when I hunted quite a bit with them and I would hunt deer from the ridge tops in the area where I live. I never use a stand of any kind. My shots would/should be downward resulting in the arrow rising as I aimed low lung area. If I needed to shoot flat I would use a 'ghost' site that fell between the top and middle pin out to 25 yards, and if further I would make my best calculation on where to hold.

Now with all this said, the last shot I took at a deer was from approximately 50 yards out from top a ridge making the shot about a 30 degree downward arrow flight. I put the top pin at mid lung figuring that the arrow at this distance would not only rise but would also drop... Wouldn't you know it, the arrow sailed right over his back...

I like your 1.5" per yard setup. I will give this a try with this #55 compound. Can I ask what poundage of compound you are shooting so I have an idea what the 1.5" is based on? I may want to move to one of the other (60# or 65#) compound bow's?

I will check out the link you posted as well!

Thanks!
Joe(thebow)M

Re: First Time Shooting Compound In Years - Today

kirk wrote:
Joe M wrote:
Wow! I forgot just how fast these Compound Bows are,


I know what you mean Joe, i have been shooting longbow for a while now, took my brother in-law to the range with his new Reflex Highlander, i had a few shots with it to check the arrow flight, you know fishtailing, etc., no chance! I came up on target loosed and just saw a bright green dot appear on the target face. Almost like magic



And the funny thing is Kirk, I use to think this #55 compound was slow! What was I thinking??? There is graceful beauty about a wood arrow in flight to target from a longbow, that's for sure. I do believe laying off the compound's for a few years and only shooting longbow has made me a better compound bow shooter. At least it feels like it has.
kirk

I agree, it's a bit like playing a heavy strung acoustic for years, and then being given a Custom Strat with super slinky strings.

It sure makes it easier on the old shoulder joints, but i feel like i could do with a caddy to carry my Mathews round the course, that thing feels like an anchor after shooting my stick
Ratfighter

I shoot @ 60lb at 28" Although I've not run the Mathews through the chrono, the IBO is very similar to the Hoyt
My arrows are @ 225 gr (can't remember exactly)

I look to get @ 295 fps and wind the bows down until I achieve this.

I am going to experiment with point weight, FOC etc to see how much heavier I can go up front and still keep a reasonable gap per yard (as the higher the front of centre and kinetic energy, hopefully the longer the trajectory will stay flat)
My Martin Slayer has now been shipped and after running the specs through Archers Advantage and OT2, I can be looking at dropping this down to 55lb and still achieve 300 with my current set up. We'll see!
Joe(thebow)M

kirk wrote:
that thing feels like an anchor after shooting my stick


I do know what you mean my friend!
Joe(thebow)M

The Ratfighter wrote:
I shoot @ 60lb at 28" Although I've not run the Mathews through the chrono, the IBO is very similar to the Hoyt
My arrows are @ 225 gr (can't remember exactly)

I look to get @ 295 fps and wind the bows down until I achieve this.

I am going to experiment with point weight, FOC etc to see how much heavier I can go up front and still keep a reasonable gap per yard (as the higher the front of centre and kinetic energy, hopefully the longer the trajectory will stay flat)
My Martin Slayer has now been shipped and after running the specs through Archers Advantage and OT2, I can be looking at dropping this down to 55lb and still achieve 300 with my current set up. We'll see!


Thanks Ratfighter. I doubt I would be able to achieve much more then a IBO of 250 fps with either Bear Compound, though I might with a different arrow setup?

If I remember this right - I think the IBO for my Big Horn ReFlex was 273 fps. This is the 65# Compound with double hard cams. Not an easy or even moderate bow to pull back on for me, but it sure does send an arrow fast. I'm thinking I was shooting 2315's off that but accuracy suffered with the duel hard cams. Not greatly, but enough to make me rethink it's usage for serious work.

I'm not so sure if the duel hard cams ever caught on, though I could be wrong about that?
Joe(thebow)M

I just looked that ReFlex Big Horn double hard cam up on a search, and it is still offered, only it is in split limb form now. Mine is not a split limb. It also doesn't look anything like what I have so it has been redesigned. They claim no vibration on this new model. I can tell everyone the old model had/has horrible vibration... Worst money I ever spent...
Steve B

Hey Ratty 501 is that 225grains for the arrow total? or maybe a typo and you mean 325grains? cause that really is seriously lower than 5 grains per # which could cause major problem with the lack of energy transfer into the arrow, and thefeore into the limbs ( due to lack of weight that the string would push)
Ratfighter

Hi Joe,
Most 3d archers in the UK go for carbon to get the weight down.

Bow design has certainly moved on a pace and performance doesn't have to come with harsh and nasty cam properties.
If you were to shoot one of the latest designs I am sure you would be pleasantly surprised.
There have also been a few blind alleys explored in the last few years and lessons learned are now allowing numerous manufacturers to produce bows @ 350 fps mark. Whilst this is far in excess of the regulation 300fps for IFAA events, it does allow a lot of leeway to bring the poundage down and bring the arrow weight up
I could and often do spout on about compouinds and their virtues but it is only 3 years ago that I was virtually pulling my shoulder out of its' socket to shoot a 64lb CSS making 290 fps (with the arrow set up I still use today)
now I was shooting the Hoyt Trykon at 57lb and making 297. There was a move towards very short axle length bows to produce the speed, but these can be very twitchy. These days, with the benefit of development 36" axle length bows are easily exceeding the 330 mark, giving good stability and string angles. All good news for finger shooters.

There are a number of bows worth looking at but personally, I would avoid, ultra short axle length, 80% let off and split limbs. I would take notice of where the centre point of the bow is in relation to the berger hole and how close the throat of the grip is to the berger hole. The nearer the centre of the bow the arrow is, the less influance you can put on how it is delivered.
Ratfighter

Hi Steve,
My memory is truly terrible but I am running 4.6gr per inch, according to OT2, I am sure it was 228 on my grain scales when I was building them but that could have been Ruthy's.!! (I'll weigh an arrow and edit this post accordingly)

On the subject of 5 grains per inch, I had conversations when choosing the arrows and Tony Weston, Chris Jones both concur that 5gr per inch minimum isn't necessarily true. The 5gr per inch rule was brough in as a regualtion as a safe minimum for competitions. This was some years ago and composites, materials, bow design and shock absorbsion have all moved on. They both felt that 4gr was about the limit these days. I shot my original Merlin at 4gr per inch by mistake and it sounded awful, not only that, the energy didn't transfer into the shaft as well and performance at 4gr was worse than it is at 4.6gr. Above 4.6 the perfomance figures just tumble. That is why I intend to range test different FOC's to see what the optimum is for my set up.
I spent a fair bit of time during last winter testing various set ups with my Merlin, and found that my current one worked the best, although with the slightest bit of wind I suffered. Due to circumstances I swapped to the Hoyt and didn't have the chance to experiment with the arrow tune. I haven't even shot the Mathews over 5 yards yet, so I have no idea what the arrow perfomance is like yet, and I haven't even put the figures into the computer. Now the Martin is on it's way, I have a lot of things to look at over this winter. I certainly want to get a better arrow performance in windy conditions (well it is the UK), the Martin may well give the opportunity to bang the point weight up and sort that out, whilst I can drop the Mathews down in poundage and up in point weight for known distance shoots. Who knows!
Ratfighter

Just to correct myself, my arrows weigh 281gr
U-V's weigh 228gr

I really should win the lottery so I don't have to work nights
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