Pennsylvania Game News - February 2013 - 59

IT’S CRITICALLY important to continue the tuning process by installing and then shooting the broadheads with which you expect to hunt. The ﬁeld tips may be ﬂying to the point of aim but the broadhead may not, and this is especially true when using ﬁxed blade broadheads.

be damaged or bent slightly. It’s critically important to continue the tuning process by installing and then shooting the broadheads with which you expect to hunt. The ﬁeld tips may be ﬂying to the point of aim but the broadhead may not, and this is especially true when using ﬁxed blade broadheads. To get the broadhead to impact the target the same place as the ﬁeld tip, move the arrow rest one graduation at a time in the direction you want the arrow to go. Be sure to move the rest in very small increments because you don’t want to overcorrect. I’ve found a mechanical broadhead, such as the popular Rage head, ﬂies very close to where my ﬁeld tip impacts the target and, for me at least with my set up, I’ve found no need to adjust anything. My shots at deer are usually less than 20 yards, but if longer shots are anticipated it might be wise to make any necessary small adjustment. The same holds true for many ﬁxed blade heads, such as the Ram Cat, Tru-Fire T1, Grizztrick 2 or the Carbon Tuner by Innerloc. These short ferrule, ﬁxed blade heads are very accurate and ﬂy close to where my ﬁeld tips impact, so only a slight adjustment may be necessary to get them to hit where the ﬁeld tips do at longer ranges. Another important thing to consider and something of which many shooters fail to take into account when tuning arrows is the percentage of the Front of Center (FOC) balance point. This percentage of forward arrow weight is critical when longer range shots are expected. The basic deﬁnition of FOC is the percent difference between the physical midpoint of the arrow and the arrow’s balance point compared to

its total length. The concept of FOC is best understood in terms of a paper airplane. To make the plane ﬂy efﬁciently, weight needs to be added to the tip. With the additional weight, the paper airplane ﬂies farther and straighter than without it. Anyone who’s ever thrown a dart knows darts are heavily weighted toward the front to make them ﬂy true, and this principle applies to arrows as well. To achieve maximum penetration on game and perfect accuracy, arrows need to be weighted toward the front of the shaft. Some manufacturers like Carbon Express boost their arrow FOC by offering a dual spine/weight forward design in their premium hunting shafts. To determine your arrow’s FOC take an arrow with hunting tip installed and measure the length of the arrow from the valley of the nock to the cut off point and then measure and mark the exact center of the arrow. The next step is to ﬁnd the balance point of the arrow by balancing it on a sharp edge and then marking it. Finally, measure between these two marks and divide by the overall length of the arrow. Move the decimal of the resulting number two spaces to the right and you will have the percentage of your arrow’s FOC. To make this calculation even easier there are several websites available that

Pennsylvania Game News - February 2013

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