I ve never been a very good instinctive shooter, and after 40+ years of bowhunting, with a Wyoming elk hunt coming up in September, I decided I would try to paper tune my recurves. I built a frame out of pvc to hold the paper and went to work. Well, if anything, I'm more frustrated than ever. Adjusting my nocking point seemed to help, but my arrows are showing a weak spine despite decreasing my point weight and going up in spine of the arrow(Carbon Express Heritage 350). Lacking in patience as well as know-how, I'm about to throw in the towel. I figure the great bowhunters in the past most likely picked an arrow that seemed to fly well to the eye and stuck with it. Am I wrong about this? I feel like I'm wasting my time and should just pick an arrow as recommended by shaft selection charts, choose the point/broadhead weight I want, cant my bow if necessary and practice at every opportunity, realizing I'm as proficient as I will ever be. Any encouragement or suggestions would be appreciated.

From what I have read Mr. Bear went to the production line and took what he needed. He was also a leader with new products like his aluminum arrows and before that fiberglass. I would imagine he would have tried some kind of tuning for the new products.

Just a little over 700 times - www.acsbows.com/bowtuning.html click on 'download printable version'.

Don't know if Fred used it.

Bowmania

I bet Geronimo didn't. LOL

Didn't Geronimo trade hostages for guns and Whiskey?

I'd be surprised if any of the Ol boys found any need to play. Step up and let him have it.

If they did it then why can't we? Keep it simple. Those were the days of wooden ships and iron men long gone.

Today you get a feather not just right and some are changing underwear.

Neil Armstrong wouldn't have either. Doesn't make it a bad idea. Take your time, don't make knee jerk reactions, don't do anything that doesn't make sense. Paper doesn't lie, things that don't add up are usually on you. With enough deliberation you'll figure out why.

I honestly haven't confirmed if any of this is really true but I read or heard that Fred shot a 65# bow and could hit a deer out to 55yds and he was a snap shooter and besides plain ole shooting at targets with fletched arrows he did the same with fletched broadheads and if the arrows with the broadheads hit where he meant them to hit he would sharpen them with a file only and they went into the quiver,,,, and that's how my ole man would find the better arrows by shooting them fully made up, he never tuned arrows...

for what its worth I DO tune arrows and I like when I can put any broadhead on any of my tuned arrows with the blades in any direction and I know it will hit dead on for me,, plus its fun I guess.

I think most people from those days knew very little about tuning as we do know now. I’m pretty sure most relied on the trial and pick the best as your hunting arrows as described by others.

Well....he tuned the bow for sure. If he hadn't he would have had no need to rasp the arrow shelf down to his knuckle and build the sight window out almost even with the outside of the bow limb.

Most folks now don't get that you don't just tune the arrow. You tune the bow and the arrow.

Not only was he a decent hunter he was pretty good competing, he must of know something. I think all the good shooters knew how to tune their bows, bare shaft or paper is a good question.

Nrthernrebel...that's a little naïve. Especially considering that folks were tuning back in the '30's and maybe before that. And virtually everything that was discovered then, is proven and spoken as gospel now. Even the Thompsons "tuned" arrows/ All you have to do is read about the overly long arrows that they used in the Everglades to get them to shoot well. Hill "tuned" arrows. He didn't like arrows over 29" because it was too difficult for him to get the spine he wanted. Fred Bear gave us the "gospel" of the rule of 9's meaning that arrows should be in the 9 grain per pound range for optimum effectiveness. That's "tuning" and gets quoted on here every day. Why do you think that Ishi had arrows of different diameters in his quiver" it would have been just as easy for him to make them all the same diameter since he turned them by hand any way.

Ain't none of this new except some of the material being used in laminations and arrow shafts.

"He didn't like arrows over 29"

This should have said 28 "

Under spined arrows and a padded riser way off center, that's Fred bear

I believe even ancient people developed their own tuning methods. For exaample Ishi, as noted above, had different diameter arrows in his quiver. Here is a possible explanation for this: I've done some tuning with primitive arrows built by hand and using flint/organic points. Think about this for a second: you've just spent a good amount of time knapping a point or building a small game head of some kind, but it isnt flying straight from the arrow you had it mounted on. Are you just going to throw it away cause it isn't flying straight on that arrow? How about the arrow you spent a large amount of time getting straight, fletching, etc. Are you going to throw that away? I'm not going to! haha you just try a thicker(heavier) or thinner(lighter) shaft untill you get one flying straight. Another technique is to scrape it down a little in the center, or cut a little off the end....When building arrows by hand from shoots or cane without a spine tester the methods above are very logical and likely solutions natives would have come up with as well.

While they didnt know the word "spine" or have an understanding of dynamic spine as we know it today, If you build and tune primitive arrows by hand like they did, you will pick up on all the patterns and get to know how to fix flight problems just by trial and error. I imagine they got pretty good at it!

My point is that I believe ancient peoples made one arrow(or just a handful) at a time and tuned each one until it was flying straight. This means you end up with arrows of different diameters and different lengths in your quiver, but they all fly really straight. They may vary in weight a little but that is no big deal really, especially at reasonable distances under 30.

And yes I believe old Fred had a very good idea of tuning....like said above, he shot underspined arrows and tuned the bow by using thick strike plates. Its actually pretty smart cause he could should a lighter and faster arrow that way!

I read somewhere that he would start with an arrow too weak and add layers of tape to his strike plate until he got them shooting straight and down the line. He might've bareshafted while he was doing it.....who knows.

I was talking about just Joe average. What I was referring to was the technology and the availability to have such precision made arrows and components was not available back then. To tune now, according to a lot of those on here every arrow should be identical in all aspects. The only acceptable results is perfect arrow flight. With carbons that is pretty easy to obtain, even alum, but wood?? All though I'm not as learned as a lot on here, I never saw it mentioned about paper tuning or bare shafting in any of those old books on archery I've been reading lately.

Ask Aspirinbuster . He will know.

Klopsteg and the guys were tuning arrows in the '30's. And recording the results of flight, impact, and the ballistic coefficient affect. Since there was the written word in the form of very popular magazines, as well as books available in the library, I'd say quite a few folks were turned on to tuning. Rather than using paper, lots of those guys were "wand" shooters. And yes, you can get the same results shooting the wand as you can using paper.

Perfect arrow flight is only as perfect as the shot that we make at that moment. And although it's cool to have arrows matched within a pound of spine and 5 grains of weight, not many of us can tell the difference even at 50 yards.

One of the big differences now, as I mentioned earlier, was that folks tune arrows, rather than bows, or bows and arrows. It's virtually unheard for the average modern recurve or longbow shooter to come on here and discuss tuning a bow. They immediately jump to arrow length, or point weight. Rarely does anyone talk about altering the center shot measurement, the material on the sight window or arrow shelf, and a half dozen other things that have been used since waaaaay before my time.

Ol' Howard didn't talk about lining up the front end and back end of the arrow with the target either, but you can bet he did it. Just like Pope, Young, Compton...…..

There are proper times to tune the bow. There are proper times to tune the arrow. The idea is to have a tuned setup. You can still be on the marginal side of a tune and get what appears to the naked eye good flight with feathers.....then put on a broadhead and discover that it does not impact where your field points do. Once you are in the sweet spot of a tune it's kind of an addiction....you will never want anything less. Regards

I think Geronimo used canvas, not paper;)

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