Question on Building Wood Arrows: Part 3

[msubu21]

Looking at the various options available in raw shafting...the thing that is confusing me is the tapers of the different shafts.

Some shafts are labeled as parallel, some labeled as Tapered stating that they have a 10' taper to 5/16 at nock end, and some are labeled as barrel tapered with 5/16 taper on nock AND point end. What is the advantage of having your arrow tapered at the nock end or at the nock/point end?

[tpoof]

The different tapers pretain to the amount of bending (archers paradox)of the arrow you will have. A rear tapered arrow gets the fletches out of the way of the shelf sooner and could help with tuning, same as for the barrel tapered shafts, it is tapered to help cut down on the paradox and is somewhat quicker.
I just use the parallel shafts and have good luck with them! And they are cheaper as well.
Traditional archery,,,where nothing is carved in stone,, just chipped out of them.

[AKRuss]

I agree with tpoof, parallel shafting is standard, works just fine and is quite a bit less expensive than nock or barrel tapered shafting. Barrel taper was popular for target shooting a long long ago and is making somewhat of a comeback with those silly enough to want to play that much with their arrows - OK, like me. I believe the target shooting popularity was due to making the shaft substantially lighter while maintaining spine and not for hunting purposes. I like the nock end taper but generally don't use them unless I'm buying shafting from Rogue River, which is not a bad idea, by the by. RR has been kind enough to send me a variety of shaft spines for experiemental purposes (bare shaft testing). You can do the long nock and point taper yourself with commercially available tools or do it yourself tools. Sorry for the long posts - I'm just a gabby guy ...

[msubu21]

Thanks for clearing this up. I will stick with Parallels. tpoof....I love the quote....Traditional Archery-where nothing is carved in stone, just chipped out of it. I'm sure I will be quoting you on that in the future. AK-the long posts were greatly appreciated.

[John49]

Just a quick comment, Rogue River sold out to Wapiti Archery. As far as I know, same great shaft though. www.wapitiarchery.com