Side Plate & Fletching Flight Problems

[Jared Hooten]

#143870

Howdy all! I’m having some trouble getting my equipment tuned up. I’m concerned about the wear on my side plate…I can actually see and feel cuts from the fletching into the plate. Then of course I have one fletching with frayed ends. So what I suppose my arrows are not getting around the riser? My tune is so so close and it’s driving me crazy that I can’t flatten these arrows out. Tried bare shaft tuning for the first time and no matter how much I cut down, I continued to have nock left every time. Just kind of at a loss right now…I’m shooting a 48@28 Bear Grizzly early model I’m told, and using Hunter Bloodsport 400 arrows with 145 tips. This is my first post so excuse me if it’s not too neat but I need the help. Thanks

[Stephen Graf]

#143881

How much have you cut off the arrows in your efforts to stiffen them up?

How much arrow sticks out in front of the bow?

Have you played with the brace height?  What is it?

Sometimes we blame our equipment when we should look to ourselves instead.  A fault with the hands can cause as much trouble as a tuning issue.  Twisting the grip, or a pluck of the string can cause the arrow to look weak.

Generally, a weak arrow will get around the bow without leaving marks.  It’s the stiff arrows that clack and bang on the strike plate.  Since your arrow is flying weak, and you are getting damage, maybe its a “combination” problem.

That said, even shooting a perfect setup well will leave marks on the strike plate.

[richard roop]

#143882

Couple of things you might try;

When you remove the fletching from the end of the shaft you’re removing 10 to 15 grains of mass. I added lines of glue up and down the fletch area on my bare shaft until it brought the weight up to match my fletched shafts.  Balance point & all that.

I don’t change shaft length. I do change point weight and fine tune with those 5 grain brass washers from 3 Rivers.  You mentioned 145 grain points. Try setting up with 100, 125 & 175 grains just to see what happens.

Try building your side plate out a bit to see what happens. As always, if the problem gets worse go the other way.

One last thing to consider is your nocking height.

And powder !!! ……………… Don’t be afraid to dust the rest area with powder while you tune to really see what’s contacting what.

Remember; Tuning Induced Madness is a valid medical condition !!!!  Change only one thing at a time and check the results.

Good Luck !!!!

[Jared Hooten]

#143884

Thanks to you both. Brace height is at 8in. I cut the arrow down so much the top lies on the hair rest. I’m pretty confident in my shooting form and had great season on 3D courses this past summer. But just reading your replies give me some hope!

[smiley1]

#143946

JMO. A 400 spine with only 145 up front is too stiff for that bow. Don’t worry about nock left or right. On a vertical line are your arrows impacting right or left of the line?  Since you didn’t mention it I’m assuming your draw length is 28″. Maybe try a 500 or even a 600 if you have access to them to rule out arrow spine being wrong. Again JMO. Good luck

[Raymond Coffman]

#143959

Jared

Ditto what smiley1 said – I think 400spine is probably too stiff for your bow with 145grs up front .

Scout aka Ray

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