Out with the old, in with the new, arch and craft baby!

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I’ve broken 6 or 7 arrows since I started learning to shoot my Warbow. The first 3 I stripped the feathers right of them, I think they were the 2,3,4th shots I ever made. I was wearing a paintball glove to protect my hand (I hadn’t got any protective gear at that time, just the bow and arrows) unfortunately I failed to notice the plastic finger guard was in the fletchlings path until it was too late.

Using fletchers tape, I managed to replace the lost flights/fletchings easily enough, I then took it one step further and used linen thread to increase their strength. I also had to replace the plastic knocks, which don’t seem to work well with my Warbow, as they just snap.

(TIP: Hot Glue is useful, as you can reheat the area to remove them at a later date).

Anyway, heres the first arrow which I totally destroyed:

First Arrow I totally destroyed, there was a split up the grain for about 5" so I couldn't just saw and add a new target bodkin.

I’ve made a Fletching Jig from old wood and metal scraps based on a design I saw on youtube, it works, but I need to refine it, it’s a bit too big in all the wrong places, pictures of that to follow, but here’s an arrow I made using the jig.

Brass Tip, apparently using steel tips annoys "pro" archers at clubs with £500 sets of matched arrows, which get damaged if they hit one of yours in a target if it snapped off

I'm getting neater, I've noticed the White and Black fletchings have differnet angles, which makes it difficult to thread it evenly, so I'll be picking them so they match as closely as possible when I make my next arrow.

The arrow length is as long as I can make them, I've got 12x 28" arrows which I can draw with minimal effort, 34" uses a different set of muscles, and I'm still struggling full draw, but hey, it's early days...4th week coming up :P Tendons/Muscles take time to adapt, and I jumped in at the deep end.

It’s good fun, and I enjoy it, more to come at some point.

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Permalink | Comments (0) | May 17, 2010

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