Cutting those turkey feathers! ??

[soy]

Cheapening them would be making them outa duct tape and magic marker!

Sir how dare you belittle duct tape like that! !!!shame on you 

[kevinnator11]

Well I got the wing and got a few good feathers out of it.  This bird had a rough life.  Most of the feathers were all screwed up.  I bought some 18 ga and 20 ga wire to try to make a burner out of and it looks like doing the conversion on .025 diameter music wire that 23 ga would be right.  I'm gonna try the 20 with an old battery charger. 

I have plenty of feathers to burn first.  Thanks for all the help on here.  If all else fails I do have duct tape and sharpies.

[bowtarist]

I have always used scissors, make sure you cut against the grain, from nock end towards point.  I bought a feather chopper @ the classic and love it.  I still plan on working up a burner too.  Don't worry about using the pattern, it's not chepening when you are doing it yourself.  It's all about having fun, not frustration.    Reread first sentence, that's why I posted. good luck, dpg

[kevinnator11]

I have always used scissors, make sure you cut against the grain, from nock end towards point.  I bought a feather chopper @ the classic and love it.  I still plan on working up a burner too.  Don't worry about using the pattern, it's not chepening when you are doing it yourself.  It's all about having fun, not frustration.    Reread first sentence, that's why I posted. good luck, dpg

Thanks, that's probably what I'll be using first.  The burner just seemed like something fun to try but I'm needing feathers now so probably go the scissor route initially. 

I was thinking of coming up with something that can burn the feathers and could be easily removed to be used as a straightener and maybe even a heat gun holder for straightening shafts.  Gotta love those little projects.   I'm tired of using the knees to hold the gun.  I would say that laziness causes ideas.     At least for me.

[bubby]

when i cut mine with scissors i put a piece of masking tape on one side it makes it easyer to get a straight cut, Bub

[Pappy]

I usually cut to the length I want and glue them on full height,then cut with scissors,just be sure to use sharp scissors and try and make it in one long smooth cut. Sometimes chop them and sometimes burn them but most of the time scissors.  The only problem I see is you don't get but 9 primaries out of a wing
 on a grown Tom and 8 on a Jake so depending on 3 or 4 Fletch you can't do many arrows with 1 wing. you don't want to mix left and right wing or secondaries with primaries,at least I don't.
   Pappy

[kevinnator11]

So I tried the 20 guage wire and it didn't get hot enough to burn the feathers wing the pistol grip soldering iron.  I've ordered some ribbons from 3rivers so I'll update when I get those.  Wire guage must make quite a bit of difference. 

Ended up making a template from cardboard and putting masking tape on the feathers, transferring the template with a sharpie and using scissors.  That worked fine but I've got to work on my grinding skills.  Ground a few down to far and they didn't hold up well when I shot them.

[Scowler]

When cutting feathers I use either a feather chopper or a cardboard template and a sharp pair of scissors.

[bubby]

you need piano wire for a homemade burner, and i use a battery charger on 6 volt, Bub

[gutpile]

I pull or split mine no need to grind then, trim with scissors...gut

[kevinnator11]

I tried the splitting method but had better luck just using scissors so far.  Ground some last night and was more careful and got a lot more usable ones. 

I never knew that I would learn so much about bird feathers.  Now I've been splitting and sorting them into left/right in baggies then just picking 3 I think look good together. 

I made up around 10 last night and didn't use a jig just eyeballed it.  Will that cause me issues later?  I just placed the cock opposite the spine and sort of split the difference.  They look pretty good so far.

[Prarie Bowyer]

I haven't read all responses so this may be covered already.

One of the videos I saw on primitive arrow making showd a Umi maker in Japan making arrows for his bows.  He hammered them.  So I tried it and it works like a charm.  It realy helps to keep the knife running straight.  This is what I do.

I think about my fletching shape that I want in cluding length.  I'm cheap so I make it small which help get more from each feather and faster arrows.  Also i sometimes save all the "other sides" of the feather and use that as is.  Looks kinda neat and I feel like it respects the animal by not wasting as much feather.

I hammer the feather with a small wooden mallot down the spine, against another piece of wood.  i prefere a carvers mallot because it's curved and ther are no edges or corners to accidentaly bang through the feather part.  You just want to crush the structure of the quill.  Some times the feather halves will seperate by pulling them apart but I just use a box knife and insert it into the feather as far as I can toward the skinny end of the quill and slice it down toward the fat end by pulling on the feather and pivoting the knife.  I mad e a6" 50 grt sanding drum that I grind laminataion and do some rough tillering with but they make 3" ones that you can get from a hardware store.  I hand sand the quil flat and grind off the excess flange. 

Then I use some Coats and Clark heavy duty thread and hand fletch the feathers on.  I Now have a feather burner so it makes sense to do it this way.  however before getting the burner I would coat the feather in masking tape and lay a pattern on it and trace around it.  Then cut it to shape and peel the tape.  There is a video on Youtube called "fletching medieval arrows". 

Once the feathers are tied in place I go back with a coating of TB3 and a BBQ squer and work a bit of glue around the wrappings and the feather quil parts where they contact.  Let edry and it's done.

[kevinnator11]

I'll have to try the hammer thing.  I usually don't have any problems splitting them.  Does the hammering help with the larger ends of the quill on the primaries?  That's my least favorite part of the feather due to the thickness of the quill.  It's when I grind them that I've had some issues just from going to fast and taking them down to far.  Last time I just went slow and made sure to leave more and use a razor to trim the flange while I had the feather clamped into a jig and that worked fairly well. 

I bought two 6 1/2" X 1" pieces of flat aluminum that's probably 1/8 thick and drilled two holes on the ends and put a bolt with a wing nut through both ends and clamp my feathers in that.  Works great to grind them and then put fletching tape on and then I put them in a box until I'm ready to use them.  At that time I just peel the plastic off the tape and stick em.  Plus the clamp cost me around a buck. 

[Bear Claw]

I see that most everyone on here splits and grinds the feathers but does anyone here peel the veins away from the quill?
It eliminates the need to sand/grind and has the added benifit of the vein fitting closer to the shaft.
If anyone is interested in info I could start a tread or post some pics. For those of us that never seem to have enough time for all our projects this is a definite time saver.  Aaron

[Prarie Bowyer]

I've tried the peeling and I don't like it.  Sometimes it breaks and it's all curly and almost structureless which I find difficult to work with.  You don't need power to grind.  You can make two thin boards with a hinge or pair of hinges to hold it and use an agressive (50grit) sanding block and a razor knife to trim them up.