Building the wood arrow pt. 6, wood recovery

     By now we're all getting anxious to build some wood arrows and we've researched the different arrow woods and want to get some shafts on order. Perhaps there's been some wood arrow experience in the past, but it didn't yield arrow flight as good as those aluminum or carbon arrows did.  Here may be the explanation why:

     Wood is a natural material and each arrow shaft will have it's own grain structure characteristics that allow it to flex and return to straightness as it moves downrange from the launch of the bow.  Certain woods have different levels of elasticity, and also the rate at which they can spring back from being flexed.  Back in the day, certain arrowsmiths researched what wood species gave better results and better arrow flight and rated them according to each's ability to flex and straighten.  Roy Case, Robert Elmer and others determined that at the top of the list was a couple of varieties of Spruce, followed by Cedar (Lawson's Cypress), Pine, Douglass Fir and bamboo among some lesser woods.  Elmer said the debate between Cedar and Douglas Fir for arrowmaking was akin to the debate between Yew and Osage for bowmaking.  Each was very good and very available and the other woods remained in the background for popularity.

     So too, we have many of these same arrow woods available today.  Cedar, Fir, Norway Pine, Chundoo (Lodgepole Pine), Spruce, Hemlock, Bamboo and Poplar seem to top the list of all around good arrow making wood species, followed to a lesser degree by Hickory, Maple, Birch, Ash, and Ramin.  Depending on what the species is, and how it's grain orientation is, and whether the grain is interlocked or not,  or whether the species is a hardwood, or softwood, can make a difference in how fast the arrow recovers from the archer's paradox flexing and flies straight to the target.  But there will be some flexing. This flexing rate is more variable and more unique to each arrow, than say an arrow made of aluminum or carbon.  This feature is intrinsic to wood, but what's also intrinsic to a wood arrow is its ability to overcome radical flexing and give forgiveness of some shooter errors or deflections.  A common theme of wood arrow testers and shooters is that they can be more forgiving than other arrow materials due to the interlocking grain structure of wood.  This being said, a spine range of 5-6# in wood arrows is totally acceptable for good, consistently accurate arrow flight and most archers cannot shoot the difference.

     However, some wood arrows recover better than others for various archers.  Howard Hill said he preferred Cedar.  Fir and Norway Pine were also available to him, so there was obviously some inherent tendencies in Cedar that he liked better.  For about 100 years, Cedar has held the distinction of being a top arrow material for straightness, recovery rate, and all-around mass weight.  Old growth, seasoned Cedar, which makes the best arrows, has been getting more and more difficult to produce, so Fir has soared to the top of the list for most wood arrow users.  Fir has a unique spiraling grain structure that helps it recover quickly in flexing and also gives it an extra amount of toughness that Cedar does not have.  Fir is a softwood, albeit a harder softwood. It recovers slower from flexing than Cedar does.  Pine is a softwood as well, and recovers really well but it can be a little harder to keep straight.  Good Poplar can perform about as well as Cedar. Other white hardwoods are extremely tough, but may recover more slowing from the flexing process and therefore for some shooters will not shoot as consistently accurate.  They can also be a little harder to straighten...these woods are Hickory, Maple, and Birch.  Hemlock and Spruce are very good arrow woods, they recover very well and are nice and tough, and also easy to straighten, but are hard to source and in short supply usually, so I won't discuss them much.

      So where does the flexing recovery come into play for most archers?  If we are trying to build a balanced arrow, not one that is frontloaded with an inordinate amount of point weight akin to a dart, we need an arrow that has sufficient overall weight to balance well for the desired total arrow weight.  If the bow has a 40 pound pull, we don't want arrows that are 400 grains raw shaft weight.  Conversely if we have a 65 pound bow, we are probably looking for arrows that are heavier than Cedar to keep our arrow weight up.  But Cedar for the 40 pound bow will recover more quickly than Fir or Hickory out of the 65 pound bow because Fir has a slower recovery rate than Cedar.  So in each case, the archer's shooting tendencies will probably allow one species to out-perform another species out of various bows.  But this can be tweaked in how we approach the building of the arrow. More on that in future blogs.

     For example, if we are using an arrow that is overall, heavier in mass weight for a given spine...it will push the bow a little more to the side because there is more mass weight thrust against the arrow shelf.  This means that a little stiffer arrow can be used to counteract the thrust and keep the arrow shooting the line.  My own experience has shown that if I'm shooting Fir, I can get away with stiffer arrows as those stiffer arrows are not flexing as much and will shoot the line better.  Overall, I think the softer woods can allow a stiffer spine to be used, than an arrow made of Cedar or Spruce which are faster-recovering woods.

     I've found that if I have arrows that are the same overall weight range...say 525 grains for example, I can shoot Fir or Pine arrows of 72# the same balanced flight as Hemlock or Cedar of 68# and the Fir arrows in the stiffer weight will fly better than a Fir arrow that is softer spine.  This is experience from shooting long ranges over 40 yards on a consistent basis.  Another archer that has a different type of release which may be more static than dynamic, may find Cedar shoots better for him/her.  This is all subject to the shooting form employed by the archer.  But it is all worth trying and seeing for oneself what arrow material shoots better for them.  

    Within the arrow material spectrum, each arrow will probably be different from another.  You don't know when buying the shafts or arrows, if all your shafts in your spine group came from the same tree, or even was grown on the same side of the mountain and each one will probably have a little different flight characteristics if you are very analytical of the flight.  However, our shooting form can vary enough that we would never realize those differences in arrows.  On any given day, a batch of arrows can fly perfectly or not so much, completely based on how good our release is, or how steady we hold our bow arm or how we grip the bow.  My recommendation is to not be too overly critical of arrow wiggle as it moves downrange before discarding any particular arrow wood species.  If you are trying out wood arrows for the first time, or maybe trying another arrow wood species, make a few arrows to test, of various spines and weights and shoot them on different days at different times, temperatures and humidity levels before deciding which arrow material works best for you. You may find that you can shoot various materials all pretty much the same, or perhaps one species works better for you, or maybe tweaking the spine ranges makes them all shoot alike.  That's part of the fun of wood arrows and wood arrow building.

     Once you get a good arrow species (or several) that works for you, you'll enjoy a very forgiving arrow and along with your Hill style of shooting and tackle, it will help you to...

     Shoot Straight.