Been shooting 3 - 5” shield cut feathers on my arrows for a bunch of years, but thinking about making up some 4 fletch arrows this weekend. Should I stick with 5” or go with 4” feathers on my 4 fletch arrows? Any recommendations would be much appreciated!

Been shooting 3 - 5” shield cut feathers on my arrows for a bunch of years, but thinking about making up some 4 fletch arrows this weekend. Should I stick with 5” or go with 4” feathers on my 4 fletch arrows? Any recommendations would be much appreciated!

4" IMO

fletch an arrow up and shoot it but if it ain't broke don't fix it.

I use 4". Here's why--- i bareshaft tune carefully so my arrow does not need and fletching for field points ( when the wind is calm and my release very good--for the other 90% of the time the feathers save the day.

And, i just like the way 3 4 inch feathers look on my arrows. They reduce speed a bit less than bigger feathers and i can always cut two four inchers from a primary feather--not always the case with fivers.

I use what I have mostly used, and that is mostly 5" feathers, because that is what was suggested when I started in the mid 60's. That has worked very well for six decades now and never saw an issue with penetration, or noise, or otherwise.

Now with that done with, I have used 3, 4" as well and they fly right with the 5" at most hunting distance. Some guys here use 2" X 3 feathers so just about anything will work. No one person's choice is heads-above better than another's, so it becomes a shoot what you like thing. This year I'll be shooting both 4" and 5" because that's what's on the arrows. Choices are good as long as this doesn't become another 'my choice is better than your choice' thing.

This last time this subject came up I tried a couple different fletching patterns. One was 4” x4 fletch, 2”x4 fletch. Really didn’t see any big difference even out to 40 yards. From previous experience using 5”x4 fletch I noticed more noise and slower arrow. The noise may have come from the cut of the feather or I might have offset them to much? Either way the comments from the other guys about shooting flu-flus killed that setup.

That is totally a personal preference. If you like slow and loud, by all means go four 5 inch.

When I did my testing with 5, 4, 3, 2.25, short Bazers(?), and 2 inch I found no advantage over 2 inch only disadvantages. In fact, the chrono showed a maaybe 1 FPS, but at 22 yards I found a close to 4 inch difference between 5 inch and 2. If I shot a sight it might have been 3. Shooting without a sight is not an exact science. For me very significant.

There is no reason to choose four fletch, that I could find unless as above you like loud and slow.

The only arguement I can't combat is that 5 look better. When it comes to recovery a five inch arrow and a WELL TUNED bare shaft recover at the same rate.

Bowmania

I started with 5"x4 and was told by "the guy" that it didn't make enough difference until out about 60 yards? When I started making up my own arrows I tried 5"x3, mainly to save money and it was easier to put 3 fletchings on. Never noticed any difference, but I'm not that good maybe? I've read that shield cut is noisier than parabolic, but I've got too many shield cut 5 inch to change now(cheap). I have some arrows that came with a garage sale bow, that are 4"x5 fletchings? Seems bit of over kill, but they do look nice! If I was in need of feathers, I would try going to 4 inch, especially if I cut my own out of full length and could get two from each.

The great thing about the internet is if the opinion you are reading or looking at doesn't agree with yours it is easy enough to look around and find one that does.

"If you like slow and loud, by all means go four 5 inch." What a bunch of crap. Show me the chrono readings and the decibel readings.

Guys -

Use whatever you think looks best, it just doesn't matter.

Viper out.

Im with Bowmania on this one, 4X5" is overkill and, gives diminishing returns for me. I use 3X4" parabolic and they are as accurate as a 5" and quieter and few FPS gain. And for whats it worth shield cut are noisier than parabolic.

I'm getting cheap in my old age so have gone to 3" since I chop mine from full length. I have proven to myself that it doesn't matter as long as the are the proper spine and weight.

I am kinda happy that my shooting skills are not good enough to interfere with the feathers I think look the best on my sticks. 3 x 5” for me.

I'm with Fred Bear, Ben Pearson, Art Laha, Glenn St. Charles, Saxton Pope, Art Young, Byron Ferguson, Howard Hill, Roger Rothhaar, Larry D. Jones and Gene and Barry Wensel. :)

4 inch wild Turkey feathers that I chop out.

French curve cut like Howard. No need for 4 Fletch, eh.

I like 4-fletch. But it starts with a well-tuned arrow. I then have better visibility in flight, better steerage when conditions are adverse. No concerns with nock or feather orientation. I can use the smaller, lower-profile feathers, with very slight offset and noise from the feathers is no issue. If it is, there is a badly cut feather in the mix. Although I prefer the looks of 3, 5" shield cut, the performance of the 4", 4-fletch makes me a fan.

Always liked (3) 4 inch feathers on skinny shafts. Most my arrows nowdays are 4-inch shields, but also have 3.5-inch sheild cuts with twine wrapped front edges. Like two reds with a flo-yellow, and have used that combo for many years. Use Gateways 'cause they are cheap enough and the Flo-yellow is a very bright hue of yellow and real easy to see.

Bob, I like the way you faded the blue into the white on the crown.

4 fletch equals more work for me. I don't use full length feathers so I can't get the two 4" out of a feather so I have to buy my 5" feathers. I'd have to buy the 4" also. If I did buy full length I'd have to cut them in half, fletch them, and burn them. Way too much work for hardly any benefit.

Doesn’t matter what I like. You need to figure out what you like!

3-5” feathers. Always have, always will. In my experience the “noise” that the arrow makes in flight is always followed by the noise made when an animal hits the ground.

I've shot 5" for years and they have performed well on the range as well as on the hunt. And in my case, much like George, after all these years if it ain't broke, why fix it. To me this is a personal choice that everyone makes for themselves.

Viper X2. I like the idea of either 3"x4 or 4"x4, just because it's different and looks cool, but I'm cheap so I usually just stick with the same old 5"x3 that I've used since 1980, seems to work. Heck, I bet six 2" feathers would work and it's look pretty snazzy... .

Guys -

Do we really have to do this again?

60 yards, 40# rig.

Viper out.

It looks like the bigger fletching is in the bull to me

I like to tinker with all this stuff. I gave up on 4x4&5x5. my tuning is not good enough for fletches smaller than 4", for those of us not great at tuning 3x5 is our friend :)

Do something unique and use 2 fletch. Even that isn't really unique any more but it isn't more unique than some of the other suggestions.

Viper,

You picture clearly shows RED fletching is more accurate than green.

3,4 inch feathers have always worked well for me, and I find no reason to change.

Viper's photo also shows that feathers are way more accurate than vanes. I knew it! And the sample size of four arrows proves it irrefutably.

Viper...please describe your 40# rig...and draw length :-)

Viper, That's one picture - 4 shots at 60 yards. How many shots did you use to come to that conclusion?

Unless you shoot like a machine your shooting is off. The vanes weigh more and should be lower or the feathers caused so much more resistance that they impacted lower. Proving my point.

Did you resight and retune for the stiffer vane?

Two - 3 inches at 60 yards can be the shooter or the tune. I'd say more likely the shooter even if it was Brady.

When I compared 2 inch feathers to 5, here's what I did. I set up my chrony and shot probably 10 arrows each (it was about 11 years ago). My chrony does 5 shot strings. I ended up with 1 FPS faster ave. with the 2 inch. Not enough to change, but it didn't make sense to me. The comparison was 6 inches of feather to 15 inches.

That night I was in bed thinking of the why. I'M PRETTY SLOW. It should have occured to me that I was shooting at 6 feet and the resistance of 15 inches of feather wasn't very apparent at 6 feet compared to 15 yards.

Went back to the range and shot groups of the two arrows without a sight at what ended up being 22 yards. I probably shot 20 arrows each, but it was apparent after about 4. Without a sight there was a 3 to 4 inch difference. Now that made sense to me.

That was shooting feathers to feathers, not feathers to vanes. When your testing something you have only one variable. Which is impossible, because we're humans shooting, but you don't add a variable that you can control.

One more thing, I had a club member stand behing a 20 yard bale and shot a 2 and 5 inch feathered arrow at 30 yards. He identified the loud arrow at the 5 inch every time.

And for the very critical the 2 and 5 inch were fletched with the same Bitz, so they had the same helical.

Bowmania

OK if you like four fletch go with it. heck it is only $2 + - a couple cents for the extra feather

Fred Bear on Arrows

Your next heading here is “arrows and broadheads.” I draw 28 inches, and my arrows are 29 inches with either the blunt field point or the broadhead attached to it, so in the case of the broadhead, I have an inch to the back of the head at my full draw length.

I am not concerned about whether my feathers are left- or right-handed, but I do like a helical fletch and I like a very large feather. I’ve never shot other than three-fletch arrows. I’m sure four-fletch has advantages. I think that they can be cut lower and stand up under wet weather probably better than three-fletch, although I’ve never used them. My fletching is 5 inches long and begins 1 1/4 inches from the very end of the nock. They are spirally fletched so that the shaft revolves in flight. Never use straight fletching on hunting arrows.

I have no particular color preference on fletching, except that I’m often making a film in which it is very important in having the camera follow the flight of the arrow. For this reason I have used rather bright-colored feathers—white and yellows, maybe with a black cock feather for a contrast, and, for some reason, my arrows are never camouflaged. The last three years I’ve been using Converta-Point Magnum® arrows, of course, and they are aluminum. This is a handicap in the woods, there’s no question about it, but it’s one of the things you have to put up with when you are in the filming business. (Author’s note: These were the “new” arrows we had introduced in our 1968 Bear Archery catalog. A special insert was designed for use with broadheads, and there were blunt, field and target points as a part of this new system, so that the archer could use the same arrow shaft and simply interchange the points for practice, hunting or field use. The shafts were especially made for us by Easton. Fred came up with this system and filed for the patent on Nov. 2, 1966, and the patent #3,401,938 was granted on Sept. 17, 1968.)

I do not use any preparation on the feathers to keep them dry. I use a plastic bag pulled over the arrows when they are in the bow quiver and held in place with a rubber band. This, of course, sometimes is a handicap, also, because if you are surprised by game it’s pretty difficult to pull this bag off without making a little rattling sound, but I’ve never found a waterproof fletching material that stood up under very much rain. (Author’s note: This was written before we introduced our Weathers®, all-weather plastic fletching material, but Fred continued to use real feathers even after we had done so.) Naturally, I don’t fletch my own arrows, and I use the Razorhead® (the Bear Razorhead, if you’ll permit me), and I always use the insert even in shooting an elephant … and there’s a reason for this. The insert opens up an “X” hole and gives better penetration because it relieves pinching on the shaft and leaves a better blood trail. I use a Razorhead® with the insert for all kinds of game. Makes no difference the weight of the bow or the size of the game.

As I said before, I like an arrow that is nine times my bow weight in grains. Penetration is a matter of kinetic energy, and it is a well-known fact that a heavy object moving at the same speed is much harder to stop than a lighter one. There’s another factor in the case of an arrow. A given bow has a certain, I’ll call it “quickness,” of return to the string from a full-draw position. A heavy bow can handle a heavier arrow with a great deal more striking energy.

Bowmania...did your friend survive ? ??

jk -

25" Aero-tec riser with 36# WinEx limbs drawn to 28.5" and bolts set full in, sight and stabs. Arrows were 1914s with 5" helical parabolic feather fletch and 1.75" Easton straight vanes. Both arrow configurations have the exact same weight. I can and have done that all day with both sets of arrows without changing sight setting.

Viper out.

"Guys - Use whatever you think looks best, it just doesn't matter.

Viper out."

Best post here.

Great post Frank (Nemophilist) thanks for sharing it! I'm pretty sure Fred Bear knew what he was talking about when it came to actually killing game.

Viper...thanks.

jk -

Just for the record: weight on fingers approx 40#, fps = 185.

Viper out.

Tony, I think my most important point was the number of groups at 60 yards or were they shot with a hooter shooter. I'd say not, when I see 'weight on fingers'. It could have been a fluke.

Bowmania

old buck, you need to adjust your spectacles since that arrow the native is shooting has feathers on it; and you can clearly see the wrap he has binding them to the arrow. He likely didn't order them from Lancaster Archery, but he indeed is using feathers.

It took you long enough to spot them feathers George. "LOL"

Back to answer the OPs question. IF I was going to go to 4 fletch, I would use 4" feathers rather than 5".

Now this guy got some serious fletching.

And this guy says he don't need no stinking fletching. "LOL"

I wonder if these Amazon guys argue about fletching. "LOL"

I’m always real careful when I think I’m disagreeing with Tony....

But as usual, it’s never just one thing. A stiff, properly spined carbon arrow coming off of a cut-well-past-center target bow using an elevated rest and maybe a Berger Button is a totally different proposition from a heavy cedar arrow coming off of a bow with a shelf that stops well short of center or maybe has none at all. The carbon snaps back on line almost instantly and the cedar may wallow side- to-side all the way to the target.

Funny thing about fletching; the more you need it, the greater the penalty for it. Viper’s pic just shows that when everything else is done right, the penalty is minimal. He tends to do things pretty well...

JMO... 4X5” is more than I would want in a big game arrow. And I’m probably too cheap to use 4 when 3 will do just fine. On the other hand, having really large fletchings is really good for your arrow survival rate when you’re out stumping. Kind of a mixed bag on small game, though, because your quarry may hear your arrow coming in like a big ol’ hawk in a power dive.

JMO, if you need more than 3X4”, you probably have a tuning issue to clean up. But hey.... if you like ‘em, use ‘em.

If you have already registered, please

sign in now

For new registrations

Click Here