tapered arrows

[steve58]

Originally Posted by ramshead

I saw the guy where I get my arrows from last night, he runs an arrow making business called Hi-Force Arrows,

http://www.hiforce-arrows.co.uk/index.asp

he doesn,t sell bare tapered shafts normally, he just did a few for me as a favour. Having said that if you buy made up arrows from him, he charges an extra £1 per shaft if you want them tapered.

Next time he his doing some tapering he is going to show me how he does it, so watch this space. But if Boyton Pine is going to be doing them a £6 per dozen extra, thats the same as 50p each isn,t it?

I have just made up a set from bits from Hi-Force and he tapered the shafts for me for 75p per shaft (11/32" down to 5/16"). I have just shot them for the first time, in a very strong wind, and they were fine at 60Y, much less deflection than my plain 5/16" shafts, although that could have been down to the smaller fletchings as much as anything else. Not sure they give a lot of advantage at this distance (my biggest, heaviest arrows with 125grn points and 4" feathers on plain 11/32" shafts seemed to do best today), will be very keen to see how the new ones go at 100Y and 80Y, roll on the better weather!

[ThePinkOne]

Did you foot them? I found the full barrelling works better on footed arrows, maybe the heavier/stiffer hardwood behind the pile helps. Taering/Barrellign your own isn't too bad, amazing what you can achieve with a little model plane, a set of calipers, rule, pencil and some care.

They look the biz too...

P.

[steve58]

Hi ThePinkOne!
No, they're not footed. I have tried tapering shafts using a drill, a glove and sandpaper... it worked well enough to convince me that tapered shafts made a difference and that it would be worth paying to get them done properly. When I did it this way I spoiled several shafts and some of the resulting ones broke rather easily or developed cracks after being shot a couple of times. Maybe I was too rough with them, although it was an old set that had already had a lot of use and been re-fletched a couple of times.

[jb.68]

[quote=steve58;105131]Hi ThePinkOne!
No, they're not footed. I have tried tapering shafts using a drill, a glove and sandpaper...

If you are gonna do it this way, I would recomend using a cordless drill on a lower speed, giving you a more even finnish, and less likely to whip so much and therefore less likely to injure you.

[steve58]

Now... would that be an acceptable reason to spend money on a cordless drill? Better check the local rules ! It did all seem a bit violent at the time!

[ThePinkOne]

I've always just used a little model plane (about £5 from a local model shop, disposable blades, very sharp) and sandpaper. An arrow board can help to hold it. Even when tapering footed arrows that is enough. I do have a belt sander but it removes too much too quick on the POC or pine shafts although it can be handy on footings made of wood with interlocked grain that no plane well. If you have a lathe that will take the shaft that would be the most consistent way to do the tapers- I guess that's how the commercial ones are done.

I haven't tried spinning them with a drill, although when I (eventually) get my motorised cresting jig up and running I may use that- the sewing machine motor does give fine speed control via a foot pedal. Problem is though, once you motorise it, your ability to make BIG mistakes increases whereas with my little hand plane although it takes longer it does come out OK most times- and if I have just spend time doing a decent footing that is important.

P.

[hawkeye]

Cloutman360, you are very right in what you say, if you are prepared to spend a little time working on your own arrows then the results are greatly rewarding.

I have spent a lot of time building different arrows for myself and for other people and I know what an arrow should do when in flight and there is no better feeling than when you loose an arrow that you have worked on yourself flies as straight as a dye.

The last lot of arrows I worked on I started with a 23/64 shaft and I barrelled them down to 5/16 at each end and from my longbow they fly just like my recurve arrows. In my experience it is worth working on your own arrows instead of paying someone to do it for you, however I do like the idea of the tool that barrels them for you as it does take some sanding!!! In addition to this I tend to use lighter piles as they seem to fly better and still bury themselves in the target, but I do use an 80lb bow.

I made up six tapered arrows recently using my metal lathe. I had to centre drill the ends so that I could support each in turn on a live centre during turning. I tapered the shafts in sections of varying degrees leaving a 5 inch centre section at full shaft width. See the following - scale exaggerated:


After painting and fletching the arrows looked like this:


I believe the shafts were the standard 23/64" dia shafts but I'll have to give measurements in mms - sorry. The diameter at the nock was: 6.5mm; centre diameter was:8.7mm; diameter at point: 5.5mm. As you can see the tapers are quite marked. I could see much point in tapering just 1/32 " at each end. The tapers I ended up with were about 1/8" at the point and a bit over 1/16" at the nock (for greater strength).

They fly very well and gave me nearly 40m better range than the untapered shafts, which surprised me a bit.

I believe, however, that the Pink One's way of doing it is better using a tpered channel and small wood plane, followed by sanding. Easier to control things this way and probably just as accurate.

[SVL]

I know I am bringing up an old thread, however I finally had a go at making a tappered arrow today, using a drill. The final tapper came out well but I ended up with a 14inch arrow having started out with a 20inch arrow. My method was to use a drill chuk to put the arrow between two blocks of wood with sandpaper on one side. The drill chuck bites into the wood,and kept snaping off so I was wondering if I should be putting the pile on first. Also should I put sandpaper on both wood blocks and what would you suggest the best sandpaper to be. I have quite a few old shafts to play with I am going from 5/16 to 1/4 inch shafts. All suggestions to improve my tappering method would be appreciated.... even I cannot shoot 14inch shafts no matter how well tappered they are.

[jaselpool]

Originally Posted by SVL

I know I am bringing up an old thread, however I finally had a go at making a tappered arrow today, using a drill. The final tapper came out well but I ended up with a 14inch arrow having started out with a 20inch arrow. My method was to use a drill chuk to put the arrow between two blocks of wood with sandpaper on one side. The drill chuck bites into the wood,and kept snaping off so I was wondering if I should be putting the pile on first. Also should I put sandpaper on both wood blocks and what would you suggest the best sandpaper to be. I have quite a few old shafts to play with I am going from 5/16 to 1/4 inch shafts. All suggestions to improve my tappering method would be appreciated.... even I cannot shoot 14inch shafts no matter how well tappered they are.

I usually use a shooting board and hand plane as others have suggested here but if you want to go down the sanding block route and you are using a drill here's a little tip for you to save both snapping the shaft and also to stop it hitting you if it whips. Use a small piece of shaft in the drill chuck. Push on a small bit of surgical tubing and then insert your shaft into the other end of the tubing. The tubing will twist and come off and will stop your shaft from snapping yet give enough hold to help you spin the shaft through your block.

Hope that helps!