homemade $1.25 spine tester

[Grunt]

After seeing the $170 dollar price tag on spine testers and getting 500 bamboo shafts I made my own spine tester. I used the 26" across and the 2lb weight so I could use known spine shafts to mark my scale. All I want is to get into the ballpark with this little tool. Hopefully I will learn to spine by feel. I learned one thing right off. If you have 3 or 4 foot boo shafts you can change the spine by moving the shaft laterally back and forth across the rests. Larger diameter stiffer spine, small weaker spine.

[attachment deleted by admin]

[El Destructo]

     Should work just Fine...you friggin Redneck......... ......... ......... Just jealous I didn't come up with that Idea........

[Justin Snyder]

It should work fine. If you wanted to get a $10 dial caliper to put under the shaft and measure the deflection exactly, you would have a precision spine tester that matches what many other guys around here have.

[sailordad]

Grunt i like primitive and that my friend is PRIMITIVE
i love it,and the sign that goes with it is perfect

[rockhound34]

  Hello grunt I like your spine tester alot,but I got one question for about that cane arrow,is the arrow you have in the picture still green? Cause if it is than you wont have a true spine. It looks alittle green to me.It should be tan to brown. Just curious ,not complaning.

[FlintWalker]

Rockhound, unless cane and bamboo are exposed to direct sunlight they'll remain green. The sun changes it, kinda like how it makes osage darker.

[rockhound34]

Thanks saw filler,all this time I thought they had to be competely tan,I got about three hundred shafts i cut last year.I could have been making shafts all this time.

[mullet]

 Grunt, I've used a plastic 20 0z. Coke bottle with a hook glued to the top. If you want to get closer, sand your nodes and boo real good first. And like you found out, if you use 4' shafts instead of 3' ones, you have more varience to play with. If you rotate the  shafts a quarter at a time, you can also find the stiff side of your cane.

[Grunt]

Grunt, I've used a plastic 20 0z. Coke bottle with a hook glued to the top. If you want to get closer, sand your nodes and boo real good first. And like you found out, if you use 4' shafts instead of 3' ones, you have more varience to play with. If you rotate the  shafts a quarter at a time, you can also find the stiff side of your cane.

Mullet, thanks, it makes sense that final finish on the boo will alter the spine a bit.

[boo]

Hey grunt thats exactly what i use except i use two nails in a wall 28'' apart. Not mobile but works good in my arrow room.

[stickbender]

     It works for me!   I like it.  I had thought about doing something like that.  I have some old wood arrows, I got for Christmas with my Fred Bear Grizzly 45# bow, from my Mother, when I was about 14 years old.  I thought I would make a set up like that, and then mark the distance it goes to, and then judge my boo by that.  Then I saw a thread on here that used dial caliper, and stand, so I went to Harbor Freight when they had a sale on them, and bought a dial caliper, and magnetic stand.  Haven't put it to gether yet though.  But as for simple, and efficient, what you have there is quick and easy.

                                                                              Wayne

[Stoker]

I like it. I've had my expensive one for 10 years. it does work great
cool sign on the front sometimes we have to remind ourselves about the simpler things in life.
Thanks Leroy