Wednesday 28 September 2011

Test Shot+Update

I've been shaping the nocks this evening, they will look a little odd as the tips of the bow are twisted over at about 45 degrees. I've glued on fairly big chunks of Waterboffalo horn as this will allow me to cut a groove lined up correctly to the plane of string and bow, the nocks will look slim from one side and fat from the other.
I found an old string which fits, although the bracing height is a bit low, I shot 3 arrows, just to test it, but I seemed strangely reluctant to pull it back to full draw.
Maybe I'm still a bit bow shy having broken that last bow (the Hornbeam) or maybe I'm just being sensibly cautious untill the nocks are fully shaped and I have a proper length string on it.
I've had it back to 28" 45# on the tiller using my tillering string adjusted to the right length.
A bit more work on it tomorrow cleaning it up and I'll shoot a few more arrows through it and start serious finishing. Pics in a day or so.
I shall give it a good try out at the club at the weekend.

Strange results!
I made a decent string, the bow didn't seem to shoot very fast, but I think I was holding back as it was slapping my wrist a bit. I put on my bracer and it was more comfortable and I could get a nice full draw. It felt much faster and grouped really well, but slightly low and left. So I took the Hazel bow and that seemed to shoot higher, hmm strange.
The difference can't be accounted for by speed as it was too much and the Hazel bow is probably slower.
Maybe the grip or arrow pass just makes me shoot low. Anyhow I got the chrono' out to settle the matter of how fast it shoots.
I got an average of 167.47 fps (having discarded the fastest and slowest readings) thats 114.18mph which is a good bit faster than the Hazel bow which doesn't quite make 100mph. That's very respectable for a 45 pound bow, and virtually as fast as my 50# longbow.
They say a rough guide is to add 100 to the draw weight to give a figure in fps.
For the record, the fastest reading was 169.1 fps

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