Custom laser cut french curve fletching.

4" long X 7/16" tall.

They weigh 2.5 grains each.

Total (full length shaft) arrow weight with my adapter prototype, and a killer broadhead is 692 grains.

I'm gettin there. :-)

Rick

I’m likin’ it!! Great tool, eh??

Feathers are a pain in the butt to work with, but I'll get used to it.

Rick

I would say you are there. I would be happy with those spined for 40 @ 28 with my 30" draw. That snake will bite hard. >>>-----> Ken

Do you have a specific reason for the distance from the nock to the rear end of the feather?

MP

I'm going to shoot this shaft full length as is, and see what it does.

I'm fairly sure it is going to shoot way weak, but it will help me on my figuring for amount of & where to reduce weight.

Rick

What is the reason for weighing a feather. The glue weighs more than the feather.

[[[ "What is the reason for weighing a feather. The glue weighs more than the feather." ]]]

This glue don't weigh anywhere near what the feather weighs. It's FLEX super glue, and it takes so little of it, that you barely see you have wet the surface.

I'm working toward reducing tail weight to as low as possible, which will allow me to reduce front end weight a little more.

My goal is to achieve 650 grains of total weight. I likely won't be able to get down to that, but will get as close as I can.

Rick

[[[ "Do you have a specific reason for the distance from the nock to the rear end of the feather?" ]]]

Yes. It insures that my fingers/tab do not contact the fletching during the loose.

Rick

OK, show me your laser cutter please. I have a feather shape in mind but I can’t get a cutter made for it. Thank you

[[[ "OK, show me your laser cutter please. I have a feather shape in mind but I can’t get a cutter made for it. Thank you" ]]]

XTool D1 pro. Look it up. Definitely not top of the line, but suits my purposes.

Laser cutting the designs is the easy part.

Creating the templates, and adjusting the laser settings for those designs is the hard part.

Rick

Thanks Rick

You're quite welcome Thomas. It's an amazingly fun hobby, and quite addictive.

Rick

I was kind of in a hurry when I did these, so they aren't cut real smooth.

I just finished vector tweaking my laser template image, so the next ones will be real smooth. :-)

Rick

This is as good as I can get them, but it's plenty good enough.

Rick

They look different due to the fish eye effect of the camera, and how they are laying, but they are all exactly the same.

4" long X .4375" tall.

Rick

how to you weigh glue?

Very stream lined.

That lighter is 3" tall x 7/8" wide.

Rick

[[[ "how to you weigh glue?" ]]]

Coming from an old dentist, I would think you already have that figure out by now.

But, here's the way I do it:

(1) weigh a bare shaft.

(2) weigh a feather.

(3) total 1 & 2

(4) glue feather to shaft, and weigh shaft again.

(5) compare first total with last weight.

Example:

1st total = 450 grains

Feather glued to shaft = 450.2 grains.

Glue weighs .2 grains

Easy peasy. :-)

Rick

But the next shaft could weigh different because of the difference in the amount of glue applied to each shaft. Anyone being that exact wouldn’t tolerate that. lol

Like I said before - the glue comes nowhere near weighing as much as the fletching, unless you are gobbing it on.

I don't worry about it, but you did ask how to weigh it. :-P

Rick

Just went out, and laser cut 18 more.

Took me about 30 minutes.

They weigh 2.5 grains ( +/- 0.2 )

I can live with that.

Rick

I just don’t have the patience to pick fly poop out of pepper, I generally just eat it and don’t notice the difference…??

[[[ "I just don’t have the patience to pick fly poop out of pepper, I generally just eat it and don’t notice the difference…??" ]]]

I hear ya, and I get it.

But, if you are going to build multiple pieces of something, there's nothing wrong with knowing it's parameters, and building it in such a fashion that those parameters are repeated from one to the next as accurately as you can.

As far as the glue weight is concerned, I've never worried about it. The only reason I ever weighed it was someone long ago was curious as to what it weighed.

Good CA glues applied sparingly weigh practically nothing.

Rick

Rick I was just smarting off there nothing wrong with keeping your mind gears turning….

[[[ "Rick I was just smarting off there nothing wrong with keeping your mind gears turning." ]]]

I know. I was just explaining where my mind set is. It's all good. :-)

Rick

I say it doesn’t matter. jMO

Nice looking feathers! Gotta beat those dang choppers.

[[[ "I say it doesn’t matter. jMO" ]]]

If you are talking about the glue - You are right. It does not.

Ranks right up there near the top of "Titanic Trivia". :-)

################

[[[ "Nice looking feathers! Gotta beat those dang choppers." ]]]

Thanks. :-)

How do you get them to lay flat enough to cut? Or does the file compensate for that?

With the burner, it seems like there’s always a discrepancy between the shape of the ribbon and the final shape of the fletched feather, especially since I tend to end up using a fair amount of helical… because that gives me the best contact between shaft & quill….

I don't think any of that stuff matters. Put some feathers on some straight arrows and hunt.

[[[ "How do you get them to lay flat enough to cut? Or does the file compensate for that?" ]]]

Against a straight edge, and held in place with magnets on an expanded metal table.

#####

[[[ "I don't think any of that stuff matters. Put some feathers on some straight arrows and hunt." ]]]

You & I obviously have "very different" goals as to what our arrows will do. That's ok. It's all good. :-)

Rick

Uncut Widowmaker Smash .250 shafts.

The fletching & wrap combined weighs 8.5 grains.

^^^ That's with glue LOL. :-P

The pin nocks weigh 14 grains

With stock ouserts, and 175 grain heads they weigh 675 grains total.

I'm going to have to use my JoJan to fletch them from now on. The EZfletch is just to fumbley with these low profile feathers, and kinda crushes them.

My goal of "at or near 650 grains" of total weight is getting nearer to achievable. :-)

Rick

Nice!

I thought you might have some kind of Dark Magic at work there, Rick! ;)

Them Arrahs are looking good!!

Amazing how much better they look fletched with the JoJan.

It don't crush them, and lays them down nice & flush.

Rick

Slick!!

Surprisingly, when the JoJan is adjusted to these shafts it lays down the same amount of offset & helical as the EZfletch.

I have four fletched up, and two bareshafts. Will start the tuning, and more figuring soon.

Rick

I didn't try to do any tuning, but I shot these some today.

Just wanted to see how they acted.

Tuning will come when it's warmer out.

They are 34.75" in length tip to tip. Yeah, that's long. :-D

Full length 32" shafts / 33.25" throat of nock to BOP on outsert.

Bare shafts show they are considerable weak in spine.

Astonishing thing is though - This Jerry Hill French Curve fletching straightens them up, and does it quickly.

Fletched arrows actually shot pretty good considering how weak in spine they are.

Looking forward to how they will do when the tuning is right. :-)

Rick

Looking good as always....Rick Barbee

Truly Traditional Nice Picture Rick

Do you have a pic of that laser cutter?

[[[ "Do you have a pic of that laser cutter?" ]]]

It an Xtool D1 Pro 2.0

I am going to cut more fletching later. I'll take some pics when I do.

Rick

Good lookin fletch.

Following this post are pictures of the laser.

Rick

Paper tune at 9 ft.

I may need to do some fine tuning, but will wait for warmer weather.

I did not cut down the shafts. They are full length for a total of 680 grains for the arrow. Average speed is 211.5 fps

Rick

680 grains at 211 fps? Impressive doesn't quite seem adequate to describe that level of performance.

Are you plotting a triple stack pig-kabob?

This is as good as a paper tune gets for me.

Variation is in my loose.

Stove up arthritic fingers just won't let me do any better.

Rick

This was from 15 ft.

Rick

I went out and shot these a few times from 30 yards.

Bare shafts & fletched.

No wobble. No kick, but a slow arching drift to the right making them impact about a foot right of the aim point.

That tells me weak, but I'll have to wait for better weather to work with it.

Rick

I was somewhat thinking it will be weak, but you should be OK with a full turn out from the tiller bolts.

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