Huntress13 wrote:EllieTheChubb wrote:Aaron1987 wrote:Redman232 wrote:Aaron1987 wrote:EllieTheChubb wrote:Dewey wrote:You guys are WAY overthinking this stuff.
My local bow guru's take on adult arrows: "how far do you want the arrow to stick in the ground after it goes through the deer?"
The main reason why THP switched to single bevel heavier arrows is because of all the ground hunting they do. For the average stand hunter its just not necessary. That said its fun to play around with your tackle. Am I going to do an arrow overhaul? No. That said anything that gets people thinking about their gear and shooting more is good for the sport.
Actually we switched because of situations that happened from a tree. We’ve seen multiple deflections on broadside shots with light arrows and mechanicals. Obviously this doesn’t happen every time but on 3 separate occasions in the past 4 years arrows have deflected either off the scapula or a rib. We also have seen footage of many similar issues with light setups.
To each their own of course. If it works for you, don’t change. These are just our experiences. All issues came on fully grown mature bucks with heavier bone structure.
This is why I switched, a 120 lbs field dressed doe, is a completely different animal than a 200+ lbs dressed out buck. The weight difference is all muscle mass and bone density. I hunted with a 375-425 gr setup for 15+ years. I never ran into any major issues with does or any of the small bucks I killed (a few slight deflections that i can recall). I arrowed 5 mature bucks in that time frame. 3 died, 2 were not recovered. None were pass throughs. All more or less broadside shots(Slight quartering to angle on a couple). Seems like everyone blasted out of the gate like their hind end was on fire. The last one was a 10 yard shot, slightly quartering to me. I hit the front side shoulder blade, got 8" of penetration and never found any blood after 50 yds. I only picked up my arrow that night and to my knowledge did not jump that deer. I looked for 4 days afterwards and 2 full days that winter. Never found that deer, and I'm not convinced my broadhead ever entered the body cavity. That winter i made the change to a 550 gr setup with 17% FOC. I wish the Ranch Fairy channel was around then, it would have saved me a ton of tinkering.
Since switching, every shot has been a pass through and into the dirt on the other side. 4 of the 5 have mule kicked and trotted 20-40 yds and dropped. I realize this is all anecdotal evidence. Arrow trajectory was not effected much, I still only shoot 2 pins, 30 and 40 yards. If you're running up past 600 gr maybe then it's like throwing an axe, but I haven't seen any downside to the change I made. Generally I feel like all the tinkering with equipment is wasted effort, when a lack of focus on deer behavior, scouting and setups is why most people aren't successful (In my opinion anyways). But this is one that I've personally seen and feel has made a big difference for me.
Your experience is almost identical to ours. Most of us shot fast setups with mechanicals for a long time as well before switching to this.
So for someone already shooting a mid weight arrow ~500g like me. Do you guys think that is still too light? I dont have much experience on big bucks but have seen some compelling results on does. As an example this fall I shot a young doe on a steep angle and shot through the spine and actually penetrated into the heart with no deflection. I know thats a much softer target compared to a 175#+ buck with denser bone, more fat and muscle but that still seems like a heck of a wollop.
I really think it depends on all of your specs. Somebody with a 26" draw is going to be a lot different than somebody with a 30" draw. And somebody pulling 70 lb is going to be different than somebody shooting 50 lb. So you have to factor in more than just arrow weight. I'm shooting 25" draw at 50 lbs, so a 650 grain arrow would not be practical because the arrow speed would be about 150 fps and about 32 foot pounds momentum. A 500 grain arrow gives me about 200 fps and 42 foot pounds momentum. I can tell you from experience when I was shooting a lighter arrow, 32 foot pounds is only enough to get the job done with perfect shot placement on a larger size deer. So, all that to say, you need to look at your setup and figure out what your acceptable speed and momentum is going to be. You can get a general estimate by looking at "grains per pound" instead of simply by arrow weight. 10 grains per pound of draw weight is a "middle of the road" arrow for traditional archers, and would be considered heavy for modern carbon compound shooters.
Ranch Fairy does several tests with a youth bow and heavy arrows on pigs. All those videos are on his channel. There are some interesting findings there.