Footing arrows

[RBLusthaus]

I have been playing around recently by four footing arrows to learn the process.  Once glued up, how do you reduce the footing to the same diameter as the shaft wo reducing the size of the shaft.  I keep ending up with a taper, so I taper the nock end as well as call them barreled, which of course I tell people I intended, but . . .

So, how do you guys do it?

Russ

[Pat B]

A small bloch plane or thumb plane will do the trick. I guess you can reduce it with a belt sander also.

[Stefan]

No taper, but I use a lathe  Because the lathe is intended for turning metal I use a small plane and a board with a v-groove (very helpfull) in it to reduce the size of the footing. Then I put the arrow into the lathe and sand it down to the right size.

All of my 4-footed arrows are parralel. They would be even nicer if they were barreled but I find that making half a dozen of 4-footed arrows is work enough for me (without a front and nock taper)

English is not my native langauge so please don't use too much abbreviations. It took my a while for me to figure out what wo (without??) stands for...

greetings,

stefan

[RBLusthaus]

Stefan - your English is just fine and your work is more than just.

I have been using a small block plane to get them as close as I dare, then I chucked them up in a drill and span (is that a word) them with sand paper circles to reduce them further - but kept going to far into the main part of the shaft - which results in a slight dish when you run hand along the length. 

Exactly how do you use this v board and plane combo together on a spinning shaft? 
 
Russ

[Stefan]

Hi Russ,

The board with the v-groove is used to lay the shaft with footing in, I then plane the shaft from the wings of the footings down to the point, I rotate the shaft by hand. The is no combo, I now see that I haven't made that crystal clear in my last post.

When I am working on a 5/16 shaft I plane the footing down to lets say 11/32 then I put the shaft in the lathe and use sandpaper (keep it moving along the shaft and footing) to make an all paralel shaft. I cover the shaft with masking tape where the footing ends, this prevents the slight dish when using sandpaper

When I started making footed arrows I also used to put the shaft in a drill, I mounted it on a board, put a bearing over the shaft (inside diameter of 5/16), the nock end of the shaft in the drill, ball bearing an inch before the footing, the ball bearing was fixed into position on to the board.

To make a long story short (this is how I do it)
- Plane down the footing from the wings of the footing to the point end (use a sharp plane! don't take to much off with every stroke, set the plane before starting on footing because the wings are delicate)
- When you spin the arrow to reduce the footing always put the nock end in the drill and not the footing, the footing needs to be in line with the shaft

My first set wasn't perfect but you learn everytime, maybe I should do a buildalong sometime but I still have 6 footed arrows lying around to be fletched...

[Bevan R.]

maybe I should do a buildalong sometime

Sounds like a great idea!!

[RBLusthaus]

Sounds like the more I do, the better they will get - and if I practice long enough, maybe someday, I will get to Carnegie Hall. 

I will try the masking tape.  I second the request for a build along.

Russ.