How do I fletch a Soar's Battle shaft?

[OlaP]

Hi all,
I'm a newly registered user on this forum, but have nevertheless been following your discussions for a while. You may have touched this topic before, if so please tell me and I'll be happy to read about it, if not well... tell me your opinions and I'll be happier!

I've recently started to make my first battle shafts and I've reached the fletching stage. I reread Soar's "Secrets of the English War Bow", chapter "Battle Shaft", pp. 97-100. And to give you a short re-cap:
First he tells us how to insert a 2" horn slit to strengthen the nock, and after that a descrition how to make a 1/4" deep string groove.
Then on to the fletching:
"We will settle on 6-inch-long fletchings, so cut a strong piece 7 1/2 inches long"
"...you must now draw a line extending from 1 inch below the base of the groove for 7 inches parallel to the shaftment"
"...remove the barbs for 1/4 inch from each end of the rachis."
"...carefully place your fletchings, their barbs angled toward the string groove, along the datum lines and hold them fixed for a minute or two."
Then follows a short description of binding the with silk thread.

Now the questions;
1. Am I misunderstanding the description, or will this not give a 7" fletching?
Pictures of fletchings in this chapter, e.g. on p. 99, shows fletchings starting at the lower end of the horn slit, so
2. Will not "...1 inch below the base of the groove..." give a rather small space to place your fingers?

Well, that's my questions. If you find any interest in them, please let me know, and if you could tell me where you approximatley start the fletchings on your battle shafts would be greatly appreciated!

/Ola

[stevesjem]

Hi Ola
A 7" Fletching is much closer to the MR and the Westminster Abbey arrow, these were just under 7.5".
The fletching would start about 1/8" from the base of the horn insert. this will give you 1 and 5/8" space for your fingers to go.

I hope this helps

Steve

[adb]

Something like this...

7" feathers, silk wrapped
31" bobtailed poplar shaft, 1/2" at head, 3/8" at nock
2" horn re-enforced self nock, 1/8" wide X 1/4" deep
hand forged short bodkin head
900 grains total weight

[attachment deleted by admin]

[D. Tiller]

At what weight of bow should you start using the horn insert? I am now up to 80#'s on my bow. Can one get away with just wrapping the shaft up to the base of the nock for added strength?

[Nick]

Nick Birmingham uses wrapped nocks including horn reinforced nocks on his arrows and his bow is 123lbs.

[D. Tiller]

Yeah, but at what draw weight should I start to use them?

[stevesjem]

I suggest using them on bows over 70lb, If Nick Birmingham is using arrows with no horn inserts on his new 123lb Self yew bow then he has just lost his warranty on it, it is just plain stupid to endanger the bow by not making reinforced nocks on your arrows, Arrows are cheap, Broken Italian Yew bows are not. thanks for the heads up Nick.

Cheers

Steve

[Yeomanbowman]

A note to all, buffalo horn can split right down the grain as easy as wood so cow horn is much better for the reinforcement.  Don't forget when you make a replica war arrow that you are using a design for something that was not meant to be shot repeatedly.  Plastic is much tougher for roving/target arrows (if not very primitive it is strong) and a binding helps as well.

[adb]

Steve is right... why risk your bow? It is a bit of a pain in the arse making re-enforced nocks. I have also used hard woods, such as cocobolo to re-enforce nocks. Perhaps with tough harder woods like ash you might be OK without re-enforcing the nock, but I do it for all my arrows with selfnocks for bows above 60#.

[D. Tiller]

I've been shooting self nocked arrows in bows up to 75#'s with no problems. I think it is when we get up higher than that that we can have trouble. What I do is I wrap the arrows up to the groove and glue up the wraps. Seems to hold together pretty well. I've shot these arrows repeatedly with no splitting even in the shoot shafts I have made.

I don't think warbows were just being shot for war. There was practice, in the medieval ages, every sunday after church for two hours. So they must have been shooting there own arrows more than just a couple times. Are the Mary Rose arrows reinforced? We should take into account also that the Mary Rose was the flagship of the fleet and probably had the best equipment onboard.

[stevesjem]

I've been shooting self nocked arrows in bows up to 75#'s with no problems. I think it is when we get up higher than that that we can have trouble. What I do is I wrap the arrows up to the groove and glue up the wraps. Seems to hold together pretty well. I've shot these arrows repeatedly with no splitting even in the shoot shafts I have made.

I don't think warbows were just being shot for war. There was practice, in the medieval ages, every sunday after church for two hours. So they must have been shooting there own arrows more than just a couple times. Are the Mary Rose arrows reinforced? We should take into account also that the Mary Rose was the flagship of the fleet and probably had the best equipment onboard.

All the arrows on the MR were reinforced with cow horn, all the arrows show the grooves that were cut in the shaft for the horn, also they have about 12 horn slivers that survived and these fit perfectly into the grooves in the shaft and they even show the remnants of the nock slot.
The Westminster abbey arrow also shows the same groove cut in it.

Steve

[Yeomanbowman]

Are the Mary Rose arrows reinforced? We should take into account also that the Mary Rose was the flagship of the fleet and probably had the best equipment onboard.

Only with the horn not with a binding.

[youngbowyer]

After I had mad 12 arrows for my 35 pound horsebow only 4 remained because my nocks split. Now i always make horn reinforced nocks.

[D. Tiller]

Did you wrap them up to the notch? If not, try it. The wrap acts as a strengthening agent like the horn. Native American arrows and others have been made like this for centuries with heavy weight bows. I've been doing this and never had one split on me.

[youngbowyer]

I wrapped em tight with cotton thread.