Best Arrow Rest for Improved Accuracy an
Equipment
Here is my 2 cents , I was using a whisker biscut and could not get my broadheads to fly. Even the pro shop could not do it. It ended up being my short axel to axel and my full 32" draw. A dropaway fixed the problem and actually had to change my broadhead . Yes by the way the bow was tuned and retuned . Its a QAD dropaway. In essence I dont think every scenerio is the same As bows differ , arrow spine , draw length . It took a lot of experimenting to get my new bow to shoot a fixed blade head. But all good now and laying down the venison . Good luck
Get a limb driven. If anything happens in the field, you can literally use a shoelace to fix it. Lots of great options out there.
I like my QAD as well. It’s been on my bow now for 12 years with no issues. I think at some point it will finally fail but that’s expected due to age and wear.
Curious, what is your axle-to-axle?
QAD has been solid for me for 16 years. Some will tell about the two booners they lost in one year because of it so you will get different opinions.
QAD gets out of the way and makes perfect arrow flight possible.
East of Mississippi, QAD , West of Mississippi, Hamskea. Kind of like Mathews East, Hoyt West.
Not two Booners but two 150 class bucks, one in Iowa and one in Kansas about 10 days apart. I loved my QAD until it failed to drop (twice). I'll never own another. Hamskea for me now, because of it's design it can't fail to drop. I always wondered about the magic that happens inside of a QAD that causes it to release from the locked up position and drop. In my opinion that "magic" is an additional mechanical function that has a potential for failure. It's hard enough getting on big bucks on public land, I don't need to go through that again...
I will acknowledge that while I’ve never had that problem. I have had a few over the years that got to the point where they wouldn’t consistently lock in the position without a couple attempts
You would need to click them a few times with your thumb to get it to catch in order for it to stay in the locked position. It’s not something that would happen in the presence of game because the only time you leave it locked would be when you were sitting and waiting for something
That’s happened on probably five occasions over 16 years across four different rests on multiple bows
In each instance, qad either repaired or replaced the rest
it is a bit spooky, even though they promised the functions that locks it up and drop it down are separate and totally unrelated meaning failure to consistently lock is not prone to staying locked up like what happened to Mike a couple times
So well, I’ve never had anything close to a failure. I do have examples of loss of one of the functions they tout as being fairly unique to that rest, which is the ability to leave it locked in the up position.
I've been using a qad for years, I had one that wouldn't stay up when it got wet and cold, and I had one that was a little sticky at the bottom, QAD replaced them both, they are my favorite rest, I currently have a qad hdx on my fortis 30 its old and i have a new MX2 that I will eventually put on when I change the strings, my other bow has a hamskea epsilon, great rest as well
Had a QAD for years with no issues but after trying a Hamskea drop away, I never looked back. Currently, the Epsilon.
And that’s why I suggested limb driven. It never locks up and should always fall down.
I was discussing bow hunting with an old Native fellow and he told me about the time his great grandfather was at full draw on a big buck when he noticed the sinew binding the flint head to the ash shaft had come loose and the head angled down. He went home empty handed, the broadhead and his head hanging low, and vowed to never use sinew again.
Did the old Native fellow ever say whether it was faulty sinew, or improper installation, Rod?
I had a QAD malfunction on me (twice on the same hunt). Fortunately, it was just a turkey hunt. QAD made it right and sent me a new rest, and I put it on my backup bow. I have a Hamskea on my primary bow, now.
Ambush, I'm not sure what the point of your fable is...? You can laugh off or make light of what happened to me but I think you'd have a little different perspective if it happened to you...
Limb driver for me. The most basic one they make. Simple…. Easy….
Mike, I’m not dissing you or your experience. I’m just saying that anything can fail. There are garbage products that fail often and even the best fail sometimes.
QAD makes good products , but their older Code Red rest was a real stinker and guaranteed to chew up inside and fail after so many shots. And like a good company should, they improved the design.
If I had two failures on the same rest, I’d be changing it out also, whether it cost me an animal or not. But if a product has a 99% satisfaction rating and I’m the 1% , I wouldn’t automatically call the product junk, though I might call myself unlucky and I might leave that product behind.
Coral as I stated I never was cost a shot. I was never unable To get it to Lock In upright position when I wanted it.
The issue was at times getting it to lock upright it took a couple lifts with my thumb.
Code Red was Rip Stop, different from QAD. I think.
I look to the pro 3D guys and the experienced guys I know for advice on this.
I don't know that there is any one thing that is 100% perfect.....but many are 99%.
whisker can be bulletproof....at least until it wears out a little. QAD has been excellent for me...but then I 've had those wear out too. I've also had good luck with limb driven...but always go back to QAD.
"A dropaway fixed the problem and actually had to change my broadhead . " What am I missing here? A dropaway did not fix the problem if you had to change your broadhead.
Pretty hard to shoot anything over a hamskea. I’ve seen launchers break on the QADs and can’t believe anyone would shoot a WB these days
Ambush, I hear ya. If you reread my comments you'll see that I never called QAD junk and I never criticized anybody for liking them or using them. In fact I stated that I loved mine until it failed. I shoot quite a bit and I made thousands of trouble free shots with mine. I may be in the 1% group and people may ask "what are the odds of that happening?" but I would respond that the odds are 100% because it happened (twice). Regardless of how much I liked my QAD, there's really no way that I could ever buy another one after what happened. But that's just me...
anything mechanical can break or fail. Want simplicity shoot a traditional bow and carry an extra string. I have used a QAD for many years and never had a failure in the filed. But to be safe I have a Whisker Biscuit and Allen wrench in the pack to throw it on if need be. Not ideal but can save a hunt.
How many people that dont trust mechanical broadheads use a drop away rest of some kind? Im using a QAD currently, but I have had it fail to lock up, I dont like my arrow rattling around on the shelf and for that reason I have avoided limb driven drop aways. (Tried one and hated it)
Bottom line is its a constant battle to get fixed blade heads to hit with field points, I go through it every year. As your arrow speed and broadhead size increases it becomes even more difficult.
What head did you end up going with, and did you try it before switching to the QAD drop away? If not, how do you know thats what fixed your issue?
I shoot a Hamskea epsilon now days but did shoot a QAD for about 15 years. In 2013 I bought a new bow and with it a new QAD rest. After a couple of months of summer shooting it started acting up. It wouldn’t drop all the way. I took my bow in and they put a new rest on free of charge. QAD warranty is great. With that said it’s man made so like everything else it can fail. It just sucks when it’s in the heat of the moment when it does.
As mentioned the Code Red rest was made by Rip Cord not QAD. My dad shot one for a while. In my opinion that rest wasn’t even on the same playing field as a QAD.
I’ve used QAD, Trophy Taker Smackdown Pro, and Hamskea. Only had one problem with a QAD out of the box with a slight clicking noise. Put on another one and was noise gone. IMO I think they all work fine. Just once in a while you might get a lemon like a new vehicle.
Smtn10pt, why would your arrow rattle around? It sits perfectly still and raises up as it slides back silently when you draw. Even if the rest “failed” it would still drop out of the way because your limb is pulling the launcher down. I don’t mean to sound condescending, but if you have a tuned bow and a good arrow setup, you shouldn’t see variances with a fixed head until you get to about 50-60 yards (and that’s a slight drop from added wind resistance of the blades). Thanks again.
I like it being contained in the "up" position for when Im stalking an animal with a nocked arrow.
I would be willing to bet if you took 10 bow hunters less than half would have their fixed blades fly with field points at 40 yards. Im talking in the same group not, "well they are 4" left so I will move my sight."
I have Hamskea Epsilon now and it works great. But only cause I couldn't get my biscuit to tune this last time. Until now I've always had a biscuit and if I could I would still. Nothing at all wrong with the Hamskea I just like simplicity of a biscuit. Seems like I can still shoot grapefruits with broad heads at 60/70 yards with both rests, so it's not like the Biscuit was inhibiting accuracy as many drop away fan boys like to proclaim.
I’ve never shot a biscuit but a lot of great bowhunters love them
it just seems strange with all of the rests the objective is to have as close to no arrow rest / arrow contact, but with a biscuit It’s nothing but contact.
Yeah. A guy can theorize away but there's no arguing results.
I have used a QAD drop-away rest for many years with absolute zero problems. I would be hard pressed to change.
