Main Discussion Area > Flight Bows
Local conditions, drag and distance
willie:
Steve, increasing your sample size never hurts if experiments don't go as planned. your intuition just needs more information. ;)
avcase:
There’s some really great info here. There is always something new to learn. In the 1960’s and 1970’s, one popular theory was that it was best to shoot in very cool and still conditions. Flight shooting would commence early in the morning.
Here is a bit of an article from 1977 in the Freemont Argus newspaper. It was about George Alavekiu, who was preparing for the US Flight Nationals. George was describing the role the atmospheric conditions played in his first mile long shots.
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George had hit a "weather window," as flight shooters call it. "At these speeds the air is practically solid, like water when you jump into it from a high place. If things are off just a little then your arrow will jump and roll and lose all its power to wind resistance." Looking for the "weather window", flight shooters every year converge on the Bonneville Salt Flats (where high-speed cars are tested) for the national flight tournament. The next one is scheduled for September. Before the shoot the arrows are registered. Actual shooting begins at dawn in order to take advantage of the still winds of early morning. Everything is important -- the temperature, the humidity, wind velocity and direction. Even shooting at higher elevations makes a difference because the air is less dense.”
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It is kind of funny that the article mentions the still winds at dawn as being the most desireable conditions. There may be other reasons for this belief at the time. Perhaps it was because the bows simply held together better in colder temperatures. Unfortunately, George never did make it to Bonneville that year.
A couple years ago I did some practice shooting at Bonneville during the winter and the temperatures were not that far above freezing. My distances seemed to be much worse than usual, although it was hard to know if it was influenced more by the temperature, or if it was due to the strong unpredictable winds that were blowing that day.
Alan
avcase:
I am not sure how much arrow shaft drag can be exploited to get farther shots. It seems theoretically possible and I have made efforts to see if I can get something out of it with my footbow arrows. What I have observed is that these arrows land the softest. In contrast, my high forward balance arrows seem to punch a lot deeper hole in the ground and fall short. My longest shots have been with the arrows where I have tried exploiting this concept of using shaft drag to keep the arrows in the air longer, but that may be due to a lot of other factors. I just haven’t been able to do enough shooting to draw any conclusions.
Alan
joachimM:
--- Quote from: Badger on December 11, 2017, 05:47:34 pm --- I notice that one of the problems we have is dealing with the lighter arrows around 200 grains or less. They come of the bow very fast but the slightest sideways motion kills the speed right out of the bow. Arrows around 300 grains from 50# bows can pretty regular hit the 300 mark but not good enough for records. I am moving my arrow weight up to about 250 or 260 this next year and see how it does.
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Good info. The other day I tried shooting 25” 160 gr stiff carbon arrows that gave me 220 fps and I expected or rather hoped they would shoot more than 300 m. They didnt even make it halfway... but it was pretty windy weather though. I hadn’t expected the effect to be so dramatical!
Marc St Louis:
--- Quote from: joachimM on December 11, 2017, 11:48:59 am ---
--- Quote from: Marc St Louis on December 11, 2017, 10:44:47 am ---I tend to stay out of arrow discussions as it seems to me that there are too many variables to take into account to make a definitive conclusion. That said I would be inclined to think that heavy moist air would be detrimental to distance shooting
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Actually, moist air is beneficial, as it reduces drag. Counter-intuitive, but it's neatly explained here https://fogmountaintennis.wordpress.com/2014/06/05/atmospheric/ (under the heading "humidity")
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So then shooting an arrow during a rainstorm should produce great distances :)
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