brucelanthier

I was watching a fletching video a while back with Byron Ferguson and he said that if shooting inside of 20 yds then the best fletching would be a 5" magnum feather. It would provide maximum control under all conditions. This made a great deal of sense to me. My maximum range would be 30 yds under very good conditions but most, if not all, of my shots should be within 20 yds or less. Right now I am using 3 different kinds of fletching but have been leaning mostly towards feathers and am considering using feathers bigger than the current 4" ones. The one drawback with the feathers is wet weather but that doesn't seem like a big deal. You could just have a few arrows fletched with 4" or 5" vanes too.

Now, to what I was wondering. Those of you that shoot short yardages, do you use 4" vanes or bigger, 4" feathers or bigger? If not, why not? Wouldn't you want maximum control when arrow speed is not the issue?

If you needed arrows for a longer, second shot you could just have a couple setup and in your quiver for that possibility.

bigbulls

I don't hunt at 60 and 70 yards but I do practice at that distance andI use 4" feathers almost exclusively. The only other vane that, IMO, works as well as a feather is the quick spin speed hunters. I find that the controlfeathers offer far outweighs the minimal velocity loss.

I haven't shot themyet, other than just a quick couple of shots behind the store,but I have fletched up a few arrows with six 4" feathers and a few others with six NAP quick spin speed hunters.I can say that there was absolutely no fishtailing to the arrow what so ever from 30 yards out of a bow that I just threw a rest and sight on. No tuning at all was done.

One day I will get around to shoot them through a chronograph at distances farther than 20 yards to see how much velocity loss there might be.

W.T.F.

the 2 biggest drawbacks I see to useing feathers are getting them wet and the noise. the amount of noise feathers make when shot from the faster shooting bows that we use today is signifigantly louder that that of a vane, not to mention how noisy they are if you bump them on something.Furthermore I have watched shooters all winter shoot 600 with 55x with plastic vanes and you dont need to be anywhere nearthat accurate to double lung a deer. If there was an advantage to the feathers then I would say go for it, but in my opinion the disadvantages out number the advantages by quite a large margin

YooperMike

Yeah, what bigbulls said. I shot feathers and they definitely control your arrow very well. I currently am running 4" vanes with as much helical as I can get, and they are doing a very good job. I shoot full length arrows, such is the problem with my 32" draw, so I need all the control I can get, and the 4" does the job for me. I was shooting at 65 yards this past weekend, and they did well in that area too.

brucelanthier

That's kind of the crux of my question. If you only shoot inside of 20 yds why would you use blazers when a bigger feather would offer more control and not affect speed.

Have you tried using bigger feathers or is that much control a little overkill?

BobCo19-65

I don't believe that I saw Byron's fletching fletching video. I do know that Howard Hill also recommended three 5-5.5" feathers (both shot longbows). Personally, I use a 5" parabolic feather and shoot them up to about 60yards. I've tried all types of shapes including Pope and Young but found the parabolic to be the quietest in flight. Howard also used the parabolics because of the same reason.

I do try to get the best helical I can get on them though as the seem to stabilize a fixed broadhead the best.You can really get a great helical on a tapered shaft.

brucelanthier

I understand the wet part but inside of 20 yards is the noise feathers make that big of a deal?

brucelanthier

It's very good. It is put out by Gateway. It also has Chance Beaubouef building target arrows.

BobCo19-65

What does the magnum fletch look like? I've seen and used maxi-fletch's before. Very stable, but noisy until they get worn in.

bigbulls

Yes but a 5" feathers usually makes contact with the rest a little and makes noise when you start your draw. That's whyI am playing around with more than three 4" feathers.