I finally got my hands on an awesome recurve that I love. I worked on it for a while yesterday after hunting and I got it pretty tuned with some new EFOC arrows. It is a tad noisy. I am used to the quietness of longbows. Any thoughts on hushing this bad boy up a little?

So far, I raised the BH a 1/4" to the max recomended height, I have my usual cat whiskers on it. I am shooting a pretty heavy arrow. (610 gr) I was going to but some calf hair on the ends of the limbs to help with string slap.... It is a 52#@26. I draw 26" that puts my arrows at 11.7 gr/pound kind of a twang sound

Is it a one piece recurve,string material, brace height? Pad the limbs will help.

Measure from the string nock to the end of the limbs, divide by 3. Put a SMALL section of catwhiskers or what ever you want to use at the 1/3 and 2/3 mark. Repeat on opposite limb. THEN adjust brace height for arrow flight. You may have to move the silencers a little, but by using this method you'll get the bow as quiet as it is ever going to be.

The "twang" could also be your release.

What arrows are you using? Length? Size? String? Without know if it's your arrows or not it's hard to say. Why do you say maximum brace height? Most bowyers use a suggested brace. Lots more questions than answers.

The treatment between the string and limb should make a big difference. Otherwise, it will probably never be as quiet as your longbow, just the nature of the beast.

That said, playing with the brace height, amount and distribution of string silencers, yarn wrap on the string or a pad on the limb, all will get it about as quiet as it will be.

If you are shooting three under, that always seems a little louder to me than split finger and is especially noticeable with my recurves. The difference in noise between three under and split seemed to be less with my longbows.

What kind of Tab/glove? I had a bow that was noisy like that. I was putting foam on the limbs, brush buttons...nothing helped.

Barbee string and brace height got rid of it.

Oh yeah...a tight nicloud can pluck the string as it comes off the string.

OK, here is some more info for you recurve guys.

~Carbon arrows, GT pro hunters, 55/75 with 350g out front. total weight of 612g ~ I am not sure of the string. I think it is 20 strands of FF. ~ I shoot split finger with a glove. ~ The bow is a 3 piece take down. 58" 52# @ 26(that is my draw) ~ The bow is set up at 7 3/4"( Palmer recommends 7 1/4"-7 3/4") ~ I have cat whiskers about 15" in from the ends of the limbs.

I know my release is sloppy sometimes. I am always working on my form. But even when I feel I got a good release off, it does not make a difference of the noise.

Arrow nocks too tight?

Have a bow that I could never get quiet until I tried one of Rick Barbee's new strings. Really made the difference. Be sure your bow is fast flight string compatible.

I just yesterday went through this very same thing with a friend of mine.

He is shooting a 58" bow, and had the brace height at 7.75"

I told him to raise it to 8.25". He said NOOOOOOOOOOOO, I'll lose speed & cast. I said OK then don't do it, but he did anyway. The bow got significantly quieter, AND behaved much better on the shot. No loss of speed or cast, just quieter & better.

He asked, "what do you think it will do at 9"?" I said - no way to know until you try. Raised the brace to 9" and the bow was even quieter, but had a noticeable (slight) arrow drop at 30 yards.

We then started lowering the brace height from there until the original cast was reachieved. Wound up being right at 8.75" for brace height, very quiet bow, and no loss of performance.

Recommended brace heights are just that - "recommended"

You'll never know where the bow (any bow) shoots best & quietest until you have tried/tested a wide range.

Rick

nocks being tight can cause a lot of problems, and I also wrap the ends in yarn

too tight nocks??? never heard of that! I do press em on tight.... I will loosen it. I like 97 string as well! 14 strand is what I have on my longbow. I really am not sure what the string is....It is what came on it.

I will losen my nock, and try raising my BH by 1/4" at a time

A set of stiktamers did wonders for my PSA.

With most recurves, string slap noise is the nature of the beast. There is nothing you can do to eliminate that slap, but there are a number of things you can do to soften/quieten it.

1 - and most important is tuning. With a good tune & match of arrow to bow most of the bow noise will go away. A good tune will often reduce noise even when lighter weight arrows are being used.

2 - Brace height. I did not include brace height in #1, because you can tune for great arrow flight with varying brace heights, even though certain brace heights may not be where the bow is best behaved.

3 - as others have mentioned, nock fit is very important. The tighter the nock is on the string the harder it is for the arrow to disengage from the string. An overly tight nock will drag the string forward with the arrow farther than a more loosely fitting nock, thereby increasing the force of the string slap on the limbs generating more noise & vibration.

4 - Padding the limbs. Contrary to popular belief, the string generally does not slap the limbs in the contour of the curves. The slap occurs mostly beyond the curves after they start flattening out. Usually within about the first 1". If you are getting slap beyond that first 1" it is highly likely you have other issues. To pad the slap I place a 1" piece of industrial grade velcro about 1/8" beyond the run out of the string grooves, or the run out of the curves. This has worked better to deal directly with string slap than any other method I have tried, and does so without interfering with string alignment, or creating an undue pressure/hammer spot on the limbs.

Rick

When you have tried everthing that you can and are not happy put on some (larger) size wool puffs on the string and some limbsavers about 3-4 inches above the fadeouts on your riser. You will notice a difference!

BOW HUSH AND HUSH PUPPIES!!!

Thanks for all the info guys. I am kinda new to recurves. I have been shooting mostly longbows the last 8 months.

Rick--that looks like a Howatt Hunter in your post. What kind of string material do you use on it? Also it shows the amount of twist you prefer in a flemish string. Thanks.

Ken, these limbs are Bigfoot SS statics. I actually prefer a little less twist than that in my string. This is a string I took off a different bow, and was a tad long, but it is still under 1" per twist, so it works just fine.

Rick

That should have said - still under 1 twist per inch. LOL

Rick

Thanks, Rick.

I have a several nice strings built by our local trad guru but he makes them a tad too long, IMO (not AMO!). I have to twist them to about 2 per inch to get the right brace height. I'm afraid that might be robbing some efficiency and increases noise.

Try a good tab.

I agree with Backcountry on the possibility of the arrow nocks being too tight. I use a #32 drill (.116") at about 600rpm and push the nocks sideways into the spinning drill. If it's still too tight I use a 3mm drill (.118"). I have not used a 3mm endmill. If it gets too loose I fatten the serving with floss.

-Joe

Why not just make your strings to fit your nocks not the other way around?

I just turn my string silencing issues over to my stringmaker...we put new strings on three of my bows when I was at his house this weekend and all three, two of which are recurves and the other a deflex/reflex longbow, are hunting quiet without anything on the string or bow...BCY-X with the right construction methods is amazing that way...my Kodiak Deluxe is now the quietest bow I have ever shot without doing any tinkering with the brace height

DDave

WOJO 14 what nock are you loosening? I think they are refering to arrow nocks not the string nock if thats what youre thinking.

ya, if figured that out. my arrow nocks are not too tight. They are Gold Tip GT nocks. If anyone was wondering.

Dkincaid, sometimes the nock/string fit can be sculpted-retrofitted. Works for me. I am not a string builder.

-Joe

Never needed more than Catwhiskers to silence a recurve.... installed as described. Usually I don 't use anything on a recurve. Yarn and fur silencers just don 't cut it.

Try 12 strands of 97 and .026 center serving nice fit for GT nocks,I just clicks lightly.Jeff F

Snap on or tight nocks definitely add noise.

I put 2" wool puffs 20 to 25% of the AMO length down from each tip, shoot 600 to 620 gr Douglas fir arrows with Mercury or opened Bohning nocks and use a B-50 string (endless loop of Flemish depending on the bow). I set my brace height as low as I can get it and keep to a dull thud on release. My riser is calf- hair or leather with a "hump" of paper-match or thin leather underneath at the center-point to minimize arrow contact and a seal shelf pad. All my hunting recurves currently are one piece.

I work at it to get my recurves hunting silent; keeping in mind that quiet and fast is better than quiet and slow IMHO.

Also have a very loose and high grip - no idea if that helps or hinders.

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