Too much helical?
Equipment
I was watching a YouTube video of the guys at Elk Shape and they were shooting a TAC course. They showed slow motion video of some of their arrow flights to target. I swear their arrows were starting out flying very straight, then downrange the back end started to corkscrew. It appeared the arrows had a pretty hard helical fletch. Could that hard helical cause that? It sure didn't look ideal IMO. Thoughts? Maybe this has already been discussed???
I once watched Bow Dad's son shooting arrows with no fletching at all. He was shooting a long bow and said that is how he tuned it. The arrows, at 20 yards were in the target and straight.
I do believe the more helical your arrow has, the more wind, especially cross winds, affects the flight of the arrow.
I can’t prove it. Nor do I care too. I see no need for it with center shot bows and release aids. It only slows the arrow and creates more noise.
I shoot a pretty good helical and have never had a problem with them in wind or no wind. They do stabilize broadheads very well.
It's not the helical, the more helical the more stable the arrow, simple physics...
Could be crosswind are un-tuned arrows? 25 grs can change the way a arrow flies.
It’s the helical. Elkshape talks about “parachuting” quite often. He runs an EXTREMELY aggressive helical. And down range, the arrows will corkscrew from it. The added drag and twist will slow the arrow down at distance and make that happen. He also only runs a 425-440 grain arrow.
Just like Cowbell, never too much :>)))
"And down range, the arrows will corkscrew from it."......makes absolutely -0- sense that you would land on an arrow/fletch combination that would do that. That is the opposite of a well tuned arrow. I'm guessing that if the arrows are corkscrewing down range they are corkscrewing at all ranges, it is just more obvious at extended range because the arrow is slowing down and the radius of the movement is increasing.
It's pretty simple really. The more helical, the more rotation there is from point A to point B. The corkscrew look is from one of two things. Either it really is corkscrewing or it's just an optical illusion caused by the cock fletch color traveling around the centerline of the arrow.
If there is enough crosswind, the arrow will be pushed off line. The rotation will try to correct that, resulting in a slight corkscrew. If the arrow had no rotation it would simply drift off line without corkscrewing.
This is the episode. I also remember a Ranch Fairy (I know! Many don't like his stuff) video where he had an aviation engineer on discussing arrows and arrow flight and what impacts arrow flight, and the engineer said that too much helical can cause the corkscrewing. Watch around the 11:30 mark.
Here's the Ranch Fairy discussion.
Could this be a FOC issue - not enough weight in the front of the arrow? Maybe that would mean the back of the arrow would be pushed around?
That is definitely crosswinds in combination with helical spin at about 11:30 in that video causing that corkscrew.
In my opinion, FOC has very little if any to do with what you see in that arrow flight. Those are 3D arrows so all of the yaw is happening at the rear of the arrow. The rotation is trying to correct that yaw, which is what is causing the corkscrew.
This is exactly the reason long range target shooters use those super small profile vanes.
Ya - rocket man … something about the rotation frequency and paradox frequency creating a harmonic.
Aggressive helical will create a parachute effect, usually at 60yds and beyond it is a result of the back of the arrow slowing down at a faster rate then the point, and is directly related to drag coefficient with is related to vane size and helical
Quote: "the back of the arrow slowing down at a faster rate then the point"
Can you please elaborate on how that would happen...arrows that stretch?
"Aggressive helical will create a parachute effect, usually at 60yds and beyond it is a result of the back of the arrow slowing down at a faster rate then the point, and is directly related to drag coefficient with is related to vane size and helical"
Yikes... that makes no logical sense at all.
I've got too much helical maybe....my azz seems to go slower than my head these days.
For those that don’t believe in parachuting… go fletch three arrows with a 2 degree offset/helical and fletch three arrows with a 6-8 degree offset/helical. Same arrow weight. Same FOC. The arrows with the harder helical will drop more at distance than those with the lesser helical. And I’m sure someone is about to say “Well why not just do a straight fletch?” so I’ll tell you that a straight fletch will have a very hard time steering a broadhead. You need some directional spin for the arrow to steer properly.
Simple physics. More helical = more exposed surface area increasing drag coefficient. I'm not sure where the term "parachuting" came from but it wasn't in any of my physics books. There's a lot going on with an arrow hurled from a string, far too dynamic to get too carried away. The more you dissect the details the closer you are to pissing in the wind.
"so I’ll tell you that a straight fletch will have a very hard time steering a broadhead. "...not if it's shot on a well tuned arrow and the broadhead is mounted straight to begin with. I've never in my life fletched an arrow with anything but just offset fletching and have exactly -0- problems with arrow flight as long as I tune correctly to begin with.
I think everyone already knows that fletching's main purpose is to slow the rear of the arrow down in order to keep it from cartwheeling like a throwing knife. The rotation doesn't keep the arrow from cartwheeling. The rotation keeps the front wing(broadhead) from steering the arrow. (put your hand out the window of the car and point it forward to get an idea what a fixed blade does on the front of an arrow)
If you were shooting indoors at long range with field points, you wouldn't need any rotation at all, just rear drag.
If you're shooting feathers instead of vanes, a straight fletch mounted perfectly straight will still cause rotation from the natural curvature of the feather. A straight fletch offset 2 degrees will spin more and a helical will spin more. The helical will slow down faster at longer ranges because of more surface area exposed. At hunting ranges for most of us it matters squat.
""so I’ll tell you that a straight fletch will have a very hard time steering a broadhead. "...not if it's shot on a well tuned arrow and the broadhead is mounted straight to begin with. I've never in my life fletched an arrow with anything but just offset fletching and have exactly -0- problems with arrow flight as long as I tune correctly to begin with."
Straight offset is clearly not what the poster you replied to was referring to. Offsetting the vane causes the arrow to spin in much the same manner as helical does. If you want to understand his point, set your jig to 0 degree offset, fletch up some arrows, screw on some fixed blade broadheads, and shoot some 60-yard groups.
As for sticksender, x-man, and bluedog I’m no expert physicist simply citing information I have read by people in the archery world that make their living shooting a bow I may not have quoted it verbatim, however guys like Levi Morgan have probably forgot more about archery then most of all of us will ever know and that’s where the root of this theory comes from..
Look at the wind blowing the tree. Looks like the arrow hit a crosswind to me.
I’ve been pretty happy running AAE Plastifletch Max Vane 2, at high helical. silent and great at long range.
Low profile high helical seems to be pretty hard to beat.
Matt....I did that 30'ish years ago or more.
"Matt....I did that 30'ish years ago or more."
How well did straight fletch with no offset control fixed blade broadheads at distance for you? I know lots of guys who have inadvertently tried it because they bought pre-fletched arrows and they had nothing but problems.
“I know lots of guys who have inadvertently tried it because they bought pre-fletched arrows and they had nothing but problems.”
I think Frank is better at tuning than those guys. But FWIW, compounds used to shoot at about the same FPS as stickbows, and now they’re virtually twice as fast; that may have changed the equation a bit. Or it might not. Drag is an exponential function of velocity, but unless the fletching is unbalanced, fletching should cause an arrow to rotate ON its axis, not OFF axis.
Last time I hit the practice range, I shot an aluminum with the cock-feather fallen off, and damned if it didn’t corkscrew like CRAZY (like about a 1-foot circle) out to 30 yards, but oddly enough it did HIT down the middle.
Anyway, I can imagine that aggressive helical might amplify any imbalance in the fletching and MAYBE that could extend to (or be further aggravated by) a crosswind situation, but I would like to see that explained by someone who understands the laminar flow analysis, rather than some Me-Tuber…
“Aggressive helical will create a parachute effect, usually at 60yds and beyond it is a result of the back of the arrow slowing down at a faster rate then the point…”
Is it just me, or is that a poster-child example of a thought that sounds a lot smarter before you say it out loud? I’m not pretending that I’ve never had one of those Moments… maybe it’s my familiarity that makes it so recognizable…
Aggressive helical DOES cause parachuting at long distance, IMO. I've seen it in some of my setups years ago. I don't shoot that much helical these days, no need to.
So does a flu-flu fletch job. It can serve a purpose.
Wow ha I have never in 50 years seen a arrow cartwheel in flight. Stretch from back slowing quicker then front . Not even bare shaft, tuning. For helical fletch I never seen one to much. Look at some of the fletching used by Olympic shooters curled vans. Now a arrow can catch cross wind and stay on target, the front has nothing to catch wind and the heavy tip will help keep it straight. Now the back fletching will get pushed around . try shooting in heavy wind you will see. So hard helical trying to keep arrow straight and cross wind pushing it around its creating it to wabble. Fletch catching wind side ways and vans doing there job of trying to keep arrow straight. If that's not it then his arrows are out of spine not recovering very good. Have seen many guys use 200 gr tip for hunting with good turned shaft then come summer and throw 100gr in to shoot flatter at 3-d. The arrow won't be spined the same.
And I sure pray some of you guys don't build airplanes
Corax what in the f$@& does laminar flow have to do with arrow flight
I did notice the wind in the video and wondered if that was the cause. Good discussion.
For just a generality: the more "steering" you have up front, the more counter steering you'll need on the back. Any helical, offset or vane area beyond what will keep the front of the arrow on path is just robbing down range performance. So yes, you can have too much of it. Speaking here of modern compounds.
The dynamics between a stickbow arrow's flight and a 290 fps+ compound launched arrow are different enough that they shouldn't be discussed together.
Ambush. Somewhat. as long as it's field tips you can shoot with very little steering from the rear. But put the broadhead that will collect wind, and more steering is needed.
I finally learned something new on Bowsite, it’s been a while! So now I know if I shoot an arrow with an aggressive helical at long range my arrow will eventually stop moving forward and gently parachute to the ground. It might do it so gently it won’t even stick. Time to go give it a try :-)
Parachuting arrows. Check!
Well yes if shoot straight up ?
If the amount of helical with 3 vanes that is normally fletched, slows your arrow down too much before reaching an animal, you need to get closer to the target!
As far as crosswind goes, the real problem is not how far the arrow may drift. It's that the combination of arrow drift hitting a stationary target, and the fact that the arrow will be 'weathervaning' to some extent means the forces at impact are not aligned with the arrow shaft. Just like an arrow that is poorly tuned, it can significantly effect penetration.
I agree Ziek. I also agree with Xmans explanation, I really dislike the term steering when describing what fletching does. Kind of like nails on a chalkboard. If any component of your arrow creates steering, you have problems. Steering when discussing fletching, implies corrective action. All fletching can and is intended to do is keep th back end following the front end. If anything is causing your arrow to steer off course, your fletch won’t correct that.
“If anything is causing your arrow to steer off course, your fletch won’t correct that.”
I disagree with that. The very point of fletching on a broadhead tipped arrow is to keep it going in a straight line. That arrow flying without spin imparted by the fletching can definitely veer off course.
And some shooters can claim “… we’ll my super tuned bow/arrows…” all they want but it doesn’t trump physics.
How does it “steer” it back on course? Stabilize yes, steer? No. Steering requires a pre determined input
Steering probably isn't the right word, but when you spin an arrow it mutes the deviation from the intended path caused by BH misalignment Straight fletch which doesn't impart spin will allow an arrow to continue to deviate from the intended course.
bb, not sure if you’re serious or just toying with semantics. It keeps it from “steering” off course.
Take a big, two blade, three to one ratio head with a bend in the ferrule and shoot it with a straight fletch. Or no fletch.
Then shoot the same set up with a good helical to it. Is the impact on target consistently different?
Or don’t bother because most everybody can tell you the answer.
All the fletch does is stabilize the arrow, keeps the nock and the point from swapping ends. If it could prevent the arrow from steering off course you wouldnt have to worry about wind or mis aligned or bent broadheads. Again, all the fletch does is keep the back end following the front end
“Again, all the fletch does is keep the back end following the front end”.
We’ll have to just agree to disagree on this one.
For 99.8 percent of shooters and bows, if there was no helical (spinning force) then broad head accuracy would suffer.
I've shot poorly tuned unfletched arrows and then flerched them up. They flew considerably better than the unfletched, so I think "steering" is an appropriate word. It flew so good that I got bullet holes with it and could broadhead tune with a fletched arrow.
"For 99.8 percent of shooters and bows, if there was no helical (spinning force) then ""broad head accuracy would suffer." No argument from me there. But that's not steering. Stabilizing and steering are not the same thing. If fletch had the ability to correct a track the arrow takes when shot, there would be no need to worry about making perfect releases. If your arrow tracks left the fletch isn't going to prevent that, it's just going to follow, it will stabilize by dampening vertical and horizontal oscillations. fletch will help prevent minor imperfect releases and outside forces from affecting the track of the arrow, but only minor, that's why you strive to make perfect releases is it not? That's still not steering. Arrow rotation is also a stabilizing force, that I'm not going to get into now. That was beat to death many years ago and I'm not up for a re-do. But none of that is steering.
bb, I’ll just give up so you can think you won.
"I disagree with that. The very point of fletching on a broadhead tipped arrow is to keep it going in a straight line. That arrow flying without spin imparted by the fletching can definitely veer off course." Agreed.
" It keeps it from “steering” off course." Sure it can, but it's not doing so because it's steering it. I'm not in disagreement with any of your arguments on the fletching doing what you're describing. I am in disagreement on the fact that you are calling it steering. Your fletching is not steering. It's stabilizing. It has no ability to make corrections. If you create stability it helps minimize the effect of forces that would ordinarily act on the arrow in flight to cause it to track a different path, other things you can do to minimize that effect is to have good releases, a well tuned bow good form, so when you do release an arrow the fletching has a chance to minimize any effect of a less than perfect launch But once it does track off course, the fletch isn't going to correct that. You have drag on the fletch causing the arrow to track straight. You add a broadhead to the end, you add helical to create spin , to prevent the broadhead from steering...see Matt's explanation of that above. you can consider it prevention, but it's not doing so by steering. If you shoot a bare shaft and release poorly, the arrow may still track relatively straight but it may hit the target sideways, that's the ends trying to swap, that's what your fletch is intended to stop. It does so by creating drag, someone mentioned parachute effect previously, I've never heard that term before, but no doubt drag is what they are describing. creating rotation is another matter altogether, which bye the way also creates drag.
Fletching steers, shoot bareshafts and you'll find out real quick.
Rattling if your bare shaft isn't flying true your not tuned . You should be able to shoot it just fine with field tips.
Well I can't agree with the conventional wisdom when I can get fixed heads flying great out to 70. I've tried all the conventional wisdom, I'll just stick to what works for me.
"Fletching steers, shoot bareshafts and you'll find out real quick." Explain to me how it manages to do that. If it in fact make corrections to a track an arrow is taking, why would anyone care to make a good release or even tune a bow? Fletching will keep an arrow going in a straight line, but not necessarily on the track intended. If the arrow takes a track that curves to the left, the fletch will keep the knock following the point but it won't change it's course.
“If the arrow takes a track that curves to the left, the fletch will keep the knock following the point but it won't change it's course.”
Seems to me that you have completely overlooked bare-shaft planing.
My everyday shooter is not very fussy, but I had some new shafts to play with, so I took 2 500s and 2 600s, fletched 1 of each spine and put 200 gr field points on the 500s and 175 on the 600s. As a rule, this bow shoots them interchangeably to the same POI.
At 20 yards, they all grouped together. At 40, the fletched arrows shot right down the middle without a wobble. Bare 500s hit a foot to the right. Bare 600s hit 2 feet to the right.
Funny thing happens when a shaft starts flying a little bit Off: it gets worse over distance. If my nocking point is too high, my un-fletched arrows will take take a sharp nosedive at about 35 yards.
They fly seemingly perfectly for 20-30 yards, then Bad Juju sets in. It’s not a broadhead steering it wrong. It’s the whole stinking shaft.
The drag on the back end keeps the nose in control; more helical, more drag. Spinning probably prevents a small imperfection in your broadhead alignment from steering hard in any one direction. And then there’s the same kind of stabilization that seems to work OK for bullets.
Corax both shafts are week spine.. trim them down are lighter tip.
Yup. I cut them 1/4” longer than I usually shoot, just as a test. And also so that I can be sure that I don’t cut them too short for my recurves. My Regular 500 arrows will hold the line (bare shaft) to around 65-70 yards….
"Seems to me that you have completely overlooked bare-shaft planing." No I haven't.
"At 20 yards, they all grouped together. At 40, the fletched arrows shot right down the middle without a wobble. Bare 500s hit a foot to the right. Bare 600s hit 2 feet to the right." You attribute that to the fletch steering? I suppose it depends on how you define steering. I don't define that as steering. I'll just agree to disagree.
Stabilizing is a gyroscopic effect, like rifling spins a bullet with no real aerodynamics involved. At the inset of rifling they found FAST it made round balls much more accurate. Arrows really don't spin at a fast enough rate to have much stabilizing.... the aerodynamic effects are far greater.
Fletching does IMO steer as it is an aerodynamic effect, same as the broadhead surface "steers" the flight from in front. Same as control surfaces in airplanes "steer" them. Rudders and elevators very much steer aircraft. All control surfaces "steer" or effect direction. Straight is a direction.
Fletching makes arrows more accurate mostly due to aerodynamics (steering) as well as drag. Helical helps control broadhead planing. Rather than "plane right, more right and more more right" spinning the arrow makes plane right, plane down, plane left, plane up, repeat.... The arrow may indeed "spiral" down a "pipe" of controlled flight downrange rather than continuing off into whatever plane the broadhead tells it to take. FPs not so much. FPs don't really care and lie as to arrow launch and flight. It's the most popular reason for mech heads, the lie that they "tune" better. They don't "tune"..... anything at all.
Most "spiral" folks see is optical illusion with the odd colored cock vane catching the eye. Fletch the same arrow with all the same color out of the same bow and look again
If you've tried to make flu-flus out of vanes you find out fast it's not easy to glue up large vanes to thin carbon shafts in a strong helical.... maybe a "too strong" of helical. Feathers are easier but it really busts up the feather. With vanes you usually wind up adding more vanes than adding more helical. But flu-flus are more about drag than the helical rotation.
Rudders and elevators move to "steer" the aircraft. The vertical and horizontal stabilizers that they are attached to, which are more like unmoving arrow vanes, do what their name defines, stabilize. Steering is an action to change the direction of something. Stabilizing is a force to keep the direction from changing.
Yup. I cut them 1/4” longer than I usually shoot, just as a test. And also so that I can be sure that I don’t cut them too short for my recurves. My Regular 500 arrows will hold the line (bare shaft) to around 65-70 yards….
Some of you just don't get it.... Let me slow this down so everyone can understand.
The "reason" for needing spin/rotation is to keep the arrow closer to it's original flight path [if/when] the front of the arrow wants to steer the arrow off line due to a miss-aligned front blade.
Imagine this, you have a large two blade broadhead oriented 12-6 that is bent two degrees left... When that arrow is launched, that head will steer the arrow to the left. Without spin/rotation, that arrow will continue left until it hits the ground.
That same arrow with offset or helical fletching will keep/stay closer to the intended POI... As the arrow rotates, the pitch of that front wing/rudder will change. As the front blade spins the arrow will steer left, then up, then right, then down, and so on. This is the corkscrew we see from the rear..... Arrow shafts with a lot of flex will also cause that front blade to veer off-line as it catches air, even if its perfectly aligned to the shaft.
In conclusion, technically, the front of the arrow steers, the rear stabilizes. My suggestion has always been to use "just enough" spin/rotation to stabilize your arrow. Any more than that is wasting speed/energy. Also, even field points can and will catch air and steer if/when the arrow shaft is in a yaw position or flexing. Which is the main reason I/we recommend shafts that are on the stiff side... Well tuned stiff shafts require much less fletch stabilization. FOC has nothing to do with this so long as the dynamic spine is stiff enough.
I think everyone e gets it. I just think everyone is munching words. And, as usual, we can depend on you setting it right with tact and grace.
X-man, thanks for the summary...couldn't have said it better. The only thing we're missing now is Quail to interject and tell you you're wrong that the reason they spin an arrow is to create drag:)
Agree with x-man except about FOC. The greater the FOC, the greater the lever arm of the fletch, so the greater its effect. This means you can get more stabilization with the same amount of fletch, or use less fletch.
Also, once the spin of the arrow is stabilized, the amount of helical has much less drag than as it spins up. I would be curious how far from launch it takes to develop much rotation. I'm just guessing it's much farther downrange than most think.
I seem to remember seeing slow motion photos of an arrow launched and it seemed like the rotation started almost immediately.
Thanks for slowing it down, I read it slower.
Ziek,
Actually I believe the opposite is true. [IF] your point gets off-line due to a miss-aligned BH or some other reason, an extra heavy front will be harder to correct. It may not corkscrew as much, but it will miss the intended POI by a wider margin, unless an extreme amount of spin and rear drag is used.
To use your analogy, moving the fulcrum of the lever farther from the middle, it now takes more energy to move the entire lever by only using the rear. Imagine a ten foot pole with a 50# weight on front the end. It's easier to pick it up and move it around while holding it in the center than it is holding it near the back.
Again, proper tune is essential. The straighter the arrow launches, and with the least amount of flex, the less work is needed from the fletching. And, the less work the fletching has to do, the less rear drag is needed, resulting in more retained speed and energy down range by comparison.
And don’t forget, I think TBM said it best - an arrow speeds up as it passes through an animals chest if it’s breathing in at the time of impact. Lol ;)
The Elkshape video is evidence that you can have too much helical. The rocket man does a good job of explaining why too much spin will cause instability. “Enough to stabilize” is probably the best advice. MFJJ doesn’t believe in heavy arrows or E-foc, but by the look of those arrows, he does believe in E-helical. As with most things, when you take a good idea, and attach ‘extreme’ to the front of it, the idea just got worse. … kinda like his E-hair.
First, it's hard to get a lot of "helical". Helical is simply straight fletch that keeps the base of the vane in contact with the shaft for a better glue bond. It does this by "twisting" the base and making the jig slightly concave front to back. It's really hard to get much offset on small diameter arrows and still get adequate glue contact. It's also really hard to curve a vane around a shaft very much with a helical jig because vanes don't stretch that way. Just hold one, base down 90º to the shaft and try to bend it around the shaft.
x-man, you lost me. You can apply more force the closer the fulcrum is to the object you want to move and the farther from the fulcrum you apply the force. In the case of an arrow in flight, the fulcrum is the center of gravity - what we determine as FOC. All rotation - pitch, roll and yaw, centers around that point. Even straight fletch will help stabilize a BH. More so the greater the fletching's force compared to the BH's force. Even better, the more FOC you have the more stabilizing force you get while at the same time decreasing the force of the BH. The only downside to increasing FOC is, it's really hard to do while considering other factors of arrow design. If it were possible to obtain materials that would maintain acceptable arrow weight and arrow spine, ALL the weight at the tip would be best. This would also maximize the dynamic spine and minimize deflection forces that few consider. The one at impact. At that point the fulcrum is the tip of the point. The entire shaft is attempting to increase any deflection, and there are always bending and deflection forces at impact.
Wow Ziek, you have so many things backwards it's hard to know where to begin.
"All rotation - pitch, roll and yaw, centers around that point." yes it does, and the closer that is to the middle, the less drag is needed at the rear to correct yaw caused by the broadhead front-steer.
" If it were possible to obtain materials that would maintain acceptable arrow weight and arrow spine, ALL the weight at the tip would be best. This would also maximize the dynamic spine" Okay... do you know what dynamic spine is??? Have you any idea how difficult it would be to tune with that amount of FOC? Here's an example: take two sets of arrows with the same dynamic spine. One set at 10% FOC and one set at 50% FOC. Now try to shoot those [bare shafts] without fletching at 20 yards and let me know how that works out.
Ziek, your points would be mostly correct if we dropped arrows from a helicopter. But since they need to be launched by violently pushing them from behind, the closer the balance point is to the middle, the easier that launch is to achieve.
Experience has taught us that the most common "happy-medium" is in that 12-16% FOC range. Less than that can cause deflection on impact. More than that becomes a tuning and arrow launch hindrance.
How do we explain an 18” crossbow bolt with a 200 grain head that launches much more violently. And has zero flex
Ziek, here is a pic of Elkshape’s helical. It’s extremely aggressive. There’s not many that put this much twist on their vanes. There’s a point of diminishing returns, and I think this could cross on the other side of the line for performance.
49# recurve, 30” arrow, 350 grains up front. 1.5 “ feathers with more helical than needed.
Most of these I have are straight fletch
Blood - thats too much mf-helical.
Here's another analogy... Race car engineers strive for a 50/50 weight distribution or as close to 50/50 as the rules will allow. Simple physics wants the center of mass as close to the center of the object as possible for easiest stabilization. The same physics apply to arrows.
Xman - r u saying we want center of mass at the centre of the arrow? I don’t think your analogies are helping.
Damn good thing the fletch makes a parachute if we’re dropping the pace car from a helicopter.
The FITA guys tested vanes years ago and learned too much helical was a bad thing. Target arrows obviously.
Obviously I said the sweet spot for an arrow is 12-16% or you risk poor performance on impacts. The physics remains the same for an object in motion though, center mass is easiest to control. Moving the weight forward improves impact performance but, it hurts the stability while in motion. That's why the sweet spot is 12-16% not 70-80 %.
Yes as always though, more cowbell please.
“ Moving the weight forward improves impact performance but, it hurts the stability while in motion.”
So Ashby is Not Wrong and Flight shooters aren’t crazy. I can work with that.
So maybe what X-man is saying that it’s unhelpful to put too much drag on the end of too long a lever?
Because I see Ziek’s point about leverage; X-man’s point about a #50 weight on a 10-foot pole, though…. Depends entirely on where the fulcrum is located. And of course, leverage does go both ways.
I should ask my BIL about this one. A guy who has landed a plane after losing half a wing at 500 knots would probably have some perspective….
Why not just do your own tests? I think then we could actually see what works for our setups and shooting styles. Of course all fletching configurations would have to perform well with broadheads.
Corax, “ Moving the weight forward improves impact performance but, it hurts the stability while in motion.”
Specifically on the stability piece …. Who, besides x-man, ever said that??? Ever? Random NASCAR analogies probably not the best comparison.
Centre of pressure Vs centre of gravity. There’s a THP video on YouTube where the rocket man explains it well.
Yep, at long range it'll cause the arrow to parachute and corkscrew.
"I should ask my BIL about this one. A guy who has landed a plane after losing half a wing at 500 knots would probably have some perspective…." Yeah, he might. You could also get Zieks perspective, I'm pretty sure he has several bazillian hours in Heavy Aircraft.
I read you on the stability thing. I believe that falls under Nose Authority. Big forces in direct opposition. That kinda thing. I’ve been known to say that a high FOC bare shaft acts like it’s about half-fletched to begin with…
I think I allowed myself to get wrapped around the axle thinking about how Flight shooters do not embrace high FOC…. But that’s about Efficiency, not Stability. Have to chalk that one up to sleep deprivation….
That's exactly what I've been trying to say Ohio. Thanks for doing it better than I could. I keep making the mistake of relating every post comment to the actual original OP question. Too many posters here read other things into it and then we all get off-track.
I mean, the title of this thread is "Too much helical?" and more FOC isn't going to require less helical.
I'm not sure what this parachuting phenomenon is, however I guess the helical of a flu flu is probably the most extreme example. Relating FOC and fletch drag may prove a difficult task, especially around here. They are 2 different stabilizing forces, both acting independent, but (presumably) synergistic. The seemingly abstract nature of this dynamic topic makes deviation and interjection rather easy.
You'll always be on thin ice when you try to use extremes to illustrate moderate affects.
Same as trying to compare a 160 FPS feather fletched, large and heavy broadhead tipped, finger launched cedar shaft to the modern compound set up. Too many dynamic differences at play.
Hows this for an answer to the original post. Yes, too much helical is possible -flu flu-, but under normal circumstances; no. In that, one must put forth quite a bit of effort to "over helical" their arrow. I don't think your bitzenberger, jo jo, or AZ tool will produce a detrimental helical.
Flu.flu arrows work off feather hieght and longer surface area and 4-6 feathers . not the offset. If you trimmed them all down to standard hieght they wouldn't work to good at slowing the arrow quickly .
Spiral wrapped flu flu is what I am referencing as the extreme helical, but you're right regarding a regular flu flu.. didn't stop to think or even consider different flu flu's. Large surface area creating a lot of drag, I guess thats parachuting?
