Arthur P

No offense taken, Black Frog. No worries.

I do check my arrows in several places up and down the shaft to make sure I don' t have an S curve.

Black Frog

Arthur-

I brought that up because when manufacturers state their straightness spec, is that only for that center position between 28" ?

c903

Ditto on the condemnation of selling stuff you know is flawed and claiming the item is/are new to some other poor soul, on eBay. Glad to see that there still are honest bowhunters who care enough to do the very best, regardless that some have insinuated that; " Half-ass and close enough" is the name of the game today.

I also see the ante is up. Now I need to use my money to purchase several dozen shafts to get one dozen, but I still do not take the flawed shafts back to the dealer. Just sell them to another person and perpetuate the rip-off.

Arthur P

They don' t say whether it' s for the center position or not, but one would assume it is. I' d wager the arrows are machine gauged and I don' t know how many reference points they use. Nor do I know if they have any QC inspectors that pull any arrows off the machines to manually inspect them for any kind of statistical sampling.

c903

Art:

I definitely like your method and knowledge of checking and evaluating shafts and the material. Your background makes it quite worthy to hear what you have to say regarding the subject. (I may still have to get on your case in other subjects).

I am quite elated to hear your report on your aluminums. Hope the tolerances you determined are common. As much satisfaction, ease of setup, ease of maintenance, and reliability, I have had with aluminums for so many years, I would say they are.

I have never had an interest in using carbons. Too many reported problems. After this thread, I will never shoot carbon.

JeffB

Arthur, I’d like to expand a bit on one of your points..

The real problem is that everyone wants something for nothing. The arrows that are precise enough to handle those speeds and still “execute” well, are indeed available: for a price. For those who cannot afford the high dollar shafting like the ACC’s, or the “hand picked” all carbon shafts, unfortunately you are not left with much of a choice.

If the arrows you (a general “you”) bought are indeed out of tolerances, most manufacturers are willing to replace them (and generally go to the trouble of giving you really good ones so they don’t hear from you again, LOL). I did it several years ago when Beman ICSH first appeared. My dozen was appalling. I sent 7 or 8 back, and received the same number of very good shafts back. Of course it’s easier to get replacements when you test bare shafts. Pre-fletched arrows (unless they come pre-fletched directly from the manufacturer and NOT the distributor) can be more difficult to replace.

Of course I agree that all arrows should measure up to their specs regardless of what those specs are or how much they cost (I’m sure everyone here knows I’m ONE OF the most anal people when it comes to arrow quality, if not THE MOST anal person re: arrow quality here on these boards). And I have voiced those concerns and offered my testing results (often to deaf ears it seems) to many folks on several message boards. I for one am glad to see this thread taking up so many posts. People need to be aware that not only are they being sold inferior shafting, but also that the inferior shafting is even worse than they advertise. Problem is most bowhunter’s (and I mean the vast majority of guys who are not hardcore archer’s), could care less as long as they can poke a deer in the Kill-zone from 20 yards…and the manufacturers know this. They know most guys can’t get any more accuracy/consistency out of Goldtip 3D Pro than they can a Goldtip Hunter, for example.

As we’ve seen here, I think most of us on these boards are way above average in regards to our existing knowledge, our desire to share it, and our desire to learn more. But WE are the minority. The only real way to solve this problem is to make better bowhunter’s who then in turn, will not put up w/ flawed product from the manufacturers, because they will be able to tell the difference. This goes for Pro-shop owner’s too. Unfortunately all but the best shop owners are fairly uneducated about arrows (among other things), other than how to cut, fletch and install inserts.[:' (]

I had a fellow come in a few weeks ago w/ his son. They both had $700-$800 bow set-ups (son was actually picking his up, as he bought it thee week before), and bought a dozen arrows to split between themselves. However, the Father went on to ask me that because he was shooting 125 grain broad-heads for the past few years if he should stop using the 75 grain field tips he’s been sighting in & practicing with for the same years. This fellow later told me he had been bowhunting for roughly 15 years. []

It’s hard to “police ourselves” when the vast majority of the voting citizens don’t know wrong from right……..[:' (]

Black Frog

A lot of this has been talking about straightness tolerances, but what about spine tolerances?

That could potentially be a more important span difference within a dozen than how straight the shafts are.

silentassassin

And that' s because it' s a moot point. If people were shooting on an Olympic level at 90 yard targets then yea it' s makes a difference. What we are talking about is making mountains out of mole hills. Deer can only get so dead. If I can hit a golf ball size object at 30 yards with an inferior arrow then what ******* difference does it make? This ain' t rocket science. People are talking out of both sides of their mouths. " I think the sport should be simpler" " The sport needs to go back to the traditional ways" blah blah blah Then on the other hand " I want the straightest most technically perfect dozen arrows that has ever been produced" but wait a minute when I say I want the same thing out of a bow then I am not a traditionalist(" it' s barely even archery anymore" " you might as well be shooting a crossbow" etc.). Everyone needs to step back take a breath and realize it' s just bowhunting and it' s suppose to be fun. Sure some of the fun is in " over analyzing" but let' s be for real. The friggn Indians were better archers than any of us and they didn' t have any way to test the straitness of their shafts. Number your damn arrows and shoot the ones that group together and put the rest of your effort into the important stuff (i.e. scouting, treestand placement, & talking your wife into letting you buy more stuff)

(Jeff that " rant" was not directed at you)

Arthur P

What do you mean ' us' , paleface?

AKDoug

S.A. I have typed a similar post about a dozen times today but it kept coming up short....so thank you for making an extremely valuable point.

Quite frankly, out of the 18 arrows that fit my current bow I don' t have a single one that won' t group with the others at 30 yards WITHIN MY ABILITIES. I shoot baseball size groups all the time and I' m happy with that. The fliers that I do have are random amongst the arrows, so I know it' s always my fault. I would bet that 90% of the users of this board couldn' t tell the difference between a shaft that is .002 out and one that is .010 out when shot at their ability.