Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Bowhunting Heaviest point?

It is interesting to see the passion that folks have for their personal shooting methods. I have bow hunted for many years and have seen pass through shots with light arrows and heavy arrows. I have also seen arrows stop inches into the animal, most likely due to shot angles striking the bone or the arrow leaning at impact. I don't know all the reasons, but I know not "always" will they shoot and hit exactly like you want. I have, in the last few years started elk hunting and know the body of an elk is twice or three times the width of deer. Therefore, penetration is the absolute focus on good shot placement. No doubt in my mind that a heavy point will have better penetration. Maybe not needed for whitetails, but why chance it on a trophy elk. I was really curious how heavy of a point can be shot from a compound with carbon arrows, or at least what you guys/gals have used. Here is an interesting link showing penetration with primitive equipment on whitetails...enjoy and thanks

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsqrlaIef2o&feature=channel_video_title

Really want to fire up the discussion....

I"ll never shoot any POS mechanical ever again no matter how many strides they've made to perfect the iffy POS heads.

WHAT....... You pouring gas on the fire? <grin>


The marketing geniuses have really roped in the masses with them!

I've never shot a mechanical and never will.

You can't read to well there lawdwaz, I didn't say 1 out of 100 perfect broadside hit. I said I have only had one deer give me a broadside shot. All have been quarting away to one degree or another. I try to position my stand for a slight quartering away shot. Reason number one is that way they are not looking in my direction (usually, hopefully most of the time). Reason number two is because out of the 100 or so deer taken with a bow, I would say that 90% turn and take-off for where they came from. So I have a pretty damn good idea where they will be found. I also don't shoot alert deer as I know they are more then likely to jump the string.

You seem to confuse yourself, easily.

I understand what you said.

Quote "I have shot 1 deer with a perfect broadside out of well over 100"

So you killed 99+ (well over 100) deer with a quartering away shot? (Your not shooting quartering on, are you?) That's awfully good.

How in the hell do you get the deer to follow your script?

And you know where they will die, buy your stand placement?

NOW I'm scratching my head............................

No confusion that means (I will spell it out for you) That the deer was pretty much perfectly squared up 90 degrees.

I don't get the deer to follow my script, I follow theirs. Sorry you don't/can't grasp that.

I know where they are coming from and going to. Hint its called good scouting.

Yes I have a fairly good idea where they are heading after they have been hit. No I can't perdict where they will fall but I can say with confindence where they are heading. Hint its called good scouting.

Stop scratching and buy some shampoo for your condition.

>>I will also add that Pass Thru's are overrated. Once the broadhead is out of the animal it no long does any cutting or damage.<<

Counterpoints to consider:

1. no mammalian thorax functions properly with holes in it. it functions even more poorly with multiple holes in it.

2. more holes equals more opportunity for blood on the ground

3. this is more subjective but my hunting buddies and I have found that an animal with an arrow hanging out of it's side will run further after the shot simply due to fear/adrenalin from the arrow slapping around like a riding crop.

I have seen animals after a pass thru shot simply take a step or two and just look around and drop dead (I've got a very quiet longbow). I have not seen this happen if the arrow is hanging out of its side

4. a pass thru arrow gives valuable info on the shot and how to proceed in trailing the animal

I'll take a pass thru every time.

Yep.

I have bowhunted for many years (compounds only) and shot as much as 80 lbs draw weight when hunting and shooting 3D archery tournaments in the past. I don't think we thought as much about arrow speed until the 3D tournaments grew in attendance and bow companies found out that they could sell more bows if they made them faster. I'm in my 40's now and because of shoulder problems have been hunting with a 62 lb. bow for the last 4 years. At one point I had to drop down to 55lbs in order to draw my bow without pain.

I was worried about arrow penetration on my setup and also was trying to help outfit my friends wife with a bow she could hunt with. She can only draw 40 lbs. A quick study of traditional archery showed me that low poundage with heavy for poundage arrows, 10 grains per/lb of draw weight or more still produce adequate penetration. In Alabama, whitetails seem to be more high strung than the ones on the tv hunting shows and 20-25 yards is about as far as I'm comfortable shooting at a live animal where I hunt, so speed is not a big factor. I don't shoot that heavy an arrow but I do shoot a heavy carbon arrow more on the 8.5 grains per/lb side and haven't had any problems with pass throughs.

Adding a heavier head/insert will affect the front of center and cause spine changes in the arrow. Which makes a difference depending what rest and release style you choose. A finger shooter, or a release shooter using a shoot around rest will have more problems with changes in spine than a release shooter using a drop away or shoot through rest. But an overall heavier arrow will make the bow more quiet and are usually more forgiving to shoot in my experience.

The drop away rests, while adding another moving part, have been far and away the most accurate rest I have ever used, especially with broadheads. I just wish I would have tried one when I was shooting tournaments.

I don't chronograph my arrows because I don't want to know how fast they are going, or how slow.( If I knew, I'd probably be tempted to up my poundage for a few more fps, that is not needed where I hunt.)

I have started using rage expandables as they shoot exactly like my field points without having to do any special tuning to my bow. Something I have never been able to do with traditional/fixed blade heads, and have not had any penetration issues on whitetails shot through the ribs. Shoot one in the shoulder and you just take your chances with any of them. They would not be my first choice for elk sized critters, probably go back to a Magnus cut on contact for that.

I definitely agree with #3 from LostArra above, and it has been my observation as well.

Bob.

as with Roost, LostArra and others, Put me in the two holes crowd. Try hunting the low country in the SE or the thicker timbered areas with poor tracking conditions where you cannot see past 5-6 feet infront of you, especially at night. Not all of us hunt in areas where a deer can lay overnight either from varmits or temperature concerns.
Two holes, especially if you hunt from a treestand can be very important. A high hit angling down from a treestand that fails to pass through can be a very hard tracking job particularly in the conditions stated above. Anyone who says different has not tried it very often.
The best way to get two holes, besides shot selection, is the right well sharpened broadhead, enough weight in the shaft, and enough poundage in the bow to propel the arrow at enough velocity to exit. Change any of these variables and the results will suffer.

Mechanicals can be great broadheads in the right conditions. The problem is they are not the best choice for everyone, as they are advertized to be. The other problem is people watch super hunter X on such and such show and blindly follow "the experts" advice with out understanding their individual needs to make their own setup work at the peak of it's harvesting potential. I have used them to take several animals and have enough reservations to not try them again.

I hunted in an archery only club for six years in South Carolina where we would routinely take 100+ deer per year by 33-35 hunters in camp. The setups would run the gamet from the most high tech modern setups to selfbows and flint heads. Trailing deer after dark in standing water swamps will make you appreciate an efficient killing set up.

The most successful of us used heavier than average shafts with well designed fixed blade broadheads, either Cut on Contact, or good penetrating heads like Muzzy's or Thunderheads. This was at the rise of the Punchcutter mechanicals and light weight carbon shaft combinations that flew great but came up short on all but the best of shot placements. There were a lot of deer lost that year from poor penetration and broadhead failures.

Time and Time again, penetration, well made scary sharp broadheads, medium to heavy shafts per poundage, and shot placement are the keys to bowhunting success. If you take a shortcut on any of the four variables your success rate will suffer as your loss of game numbers increase. These are the basic fundamentals of a good bowhunter. The rest is just the meaningless background noise of mental masturbation on the part of the feeble minded, uninformed, unexperienced, or misguided masses.

Lots of comments here I agree with. BTDT on a lot of things, coming back to the old it works almost all the time, still seems like the best ticket at this point.

Of course I"m not a fan of one hole with bullets either that there is a huge following of.

I still sit in the worst case scenario fan club, even if its a perfect shot as you release, what if the animal moves?? I want the ability to run it through stem to stern and break any bones in the way if at all possible, or at least as close to that possibilty as I can get...

Jeff

I agree with you and was trying to make that point last week. You never know when a deer or any animal is going to move, where they will come from, hit a little twig, pull a shot, buck fever etc. The weight in your shaft/broadhead CAN give you a penetration advantage and hopefully, get you an exit hole to aid in blood trailing. For some, YMMV.

I dunno that YMMV in that situation, as much as folks are stubborn, believe all the newest hype, and tend not to pay attention to what has worked for decades. They eventually all give up, don't give a flip or learn the hard way unfortunately.

Its much my take on magnumitis... my BIL has it bad, I guess I do too, to a point... but if going mag you really want a bigger heavier bullet than you want in say your 06.... but the BIL goes the other way.... and its bit him a time or two.

I just tend to try to have as much respect for the animal as I can.

That does NOT mean I haven't screwed the pooch now and then.

I only use 100 gr magnum Slick Trick fixed blades.

Solingen steel.

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I used 300gr points when I was doing some bow efficiency testing. Shot just fine.

I was measuring KE and momentum as arrow weight incresed. I started at 275gr and went up to 1300gr. Pretty interesting, albeit, predicable results. As I increased arrow weight in compounds, recurves and longbows, KE and momentum increased.

As I plotted KE and momentum vs arrow weight, there was a noticable increase right around 400gr of total arrow weight.

CRS, was there a point where it appeared to be too much weight or just more than what is needed?
What did you shoot into for a target?

This is an interesting video for primitive arrows..
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LsqrlaIef2o

I just shot the arrows into a bag target.

I did the study because the state was implementing new archery regulations. Minimum arrow weight was a very contentious point. So I thought I would see if there was a common weight where compounds, recurves and longbows became most efficient.

What I found was that as arrow weight increased, so did KE/momentum. There was no limit. When I graphed arrow weight vs KE or momentum all bows shows a bigger increase once the weight hit 375-400gr. So I proposed 400gr hoping to get at least 375gr. They went with 275gr I believe as that was the lower limit of arrow technology at that time.

I did not shoot for distance, and think that the extreme heavy arrows would be limited by trajectory.