Crossbow hunters, including me have been eyeing the Burris Oracle X scope. Why?
The scope has a built-in laser rangefinder that adjusts for correct angles. And with a push of a button, the scope tells you exactly where to aim and how far. The key to this scope is in the setup. Once set up, the Oracle X can allow for target shooting to say 30 to 100 yards with unbelievable accuracy. For deer hunting, it is wise to keep your shots inside of 40 yards to prevent deer “jumping the string.” Cost on Amazon has dropped to $644 dollars.
Archery is great fun for young and old. Most backyards have enough room to shoot at targets or even balloons. We all need to get outside and away from cell phones, etc.
Interestingly, archery is a way to focus and merge your inner thoughts and outer self. It is a mental game of focus. Your reward is hitting the bullseye. Oriental’s used Zen archery to extend the arrow in one’s mind to become one with the bullseye at the moment of launching the arrow.
Some people shoot at a target, others shoot/focus at the bullseye on the target. In riflery, we aim small and miss small, a similar concept.
To accomplish this requires correct conscious awareness of breathing, body stance and form. A merged focus on the inner and outer self.
Success, an inner positive feeling can be achieved by focusing your outer self.
In the case of bow hunters, 3D Animal foam target archery is a way to walk an archery course with other like minded folks and focus on, distance to target, how to stand with bushes and branches around your feet, and recall breathing and focus to launch your arrow. I did this for many years with my son.
Today, I shoot my bows in my backyard achieving focus and success.
Today crossbow arrow vanes usually come as stock with one degree offset. Sometimes it is hard to see the one degree offset.
Offset fletching works fine with field points and mechanical broadheads that hide much of the blade. But as I have said before, not so well for fixed blade accuracy.
I was happy with the offset vanes and swhackers but I felt stuck in that nich with no flexibility. I pushed myself to break out of that nich and try some helical vanes. I own a bitzenburger fletch tool that was set up for right hand helical fletch, and had some slightly longer green Bohning vanes in my cupboard. I tried them on a single arrow, and boy did they fly well! Same POI as the one degree offset.
I used a magic marker to denote the downside cock feather like a barred feather. I shot at 20 and 30 yards and they had the same point of impact as my one degree offset but spun faster. My fixed blades flew a bit better but I am a stickler for accuracy.
UPDATE PHOTOS 20 and 30 yards
20 yard 1 inch group with field point and Swhacker 231 practice head
30 yard 2 inch group with field point and Swhacker 231 practice head
I get a higher level of confidence with the helical fletch as they spin a bit faster and allow fixed blades more forgiveness. As I said in an earlier article, experiment, experiment, experiment.
The bow has been with mankind for tens of thousands of years both for hunting, as a weapon of war, starting a fire, and as a musical instrument.
For hunters, the use of the English longbow and recurve for hunting held a special place in hunting big game. Many called it hunting with “stick and string.”
Today, there are still many archers that enjoy arching an arrow with a simple stick and string. I still do, for target.
Yes, I love rifles too, hence my magazine.
It was many years ago that I made several hunting weight self-longbow/flatbows and recurves from hickory staves that I freed from New Hampshire trees. To my chagrin, a house fire destroyed many of them. I gifted my twin brother one of my self-bow’s and he shoots it to this day.
I have made a few recurves from hickory staves as well. I backed one of them with deer sinew and diamondback rattlesnake skin. Disappointedly, I traded it with cousins and it disappeared.
But eurika, I own a stave that I originally cut into a longbow, and a work in progress. It sat in my closet for 20 years begging for me to finish it.
In 2018, I decided to make a hunting recurve with it, by steaming the tips and bending them. A scary process that can destroy many hours of work. Well, I was quite proud of my new self-bow recurve so I backed that recurve also with whitetail deer sinew to increase its strength and made a flemish string for it.
At full draw, it is around 50 pounds. See it below. It throws a fast arrow! It is a work of graceful art as it has literally no deflex to this day.
I still shoot target with these bows.
In the end, I owe it to wild game to hunt with the most lethal bow I can handle thus most of my hunting is with a compound bow, rifle, flintlock and scoped muzzleloader or crossbow.
Many hunters like myself, who cook, understand that frozen vacuum sealed game meat improves in flavor and tenderness over time. I call it “freezer aging” under vacuum.
Animal hormones and blood in the meat hold stronger wild tastes we know as gaminess. I have used buttermilk to aid in drawing hormone laden blood from meat and aid in tenderizing. It helped!
Enter Freezer Aged Meat.
Freezer aged meat (more than 3 months) loses much of this gamey flavor. Further, that vacuum sealed venison and moose meat become increasingly tender and flavorful past several months in the freezer. My wife and I love the meat from my 2023 Newfoundland cow moose but we noticed that it got even better after months in the freezer.
So If you have game meat vacuum sealed in the freezer, take heart, you can say you are “freezer aging” your game meat.
Soon, I will write more about my new found very pleasant experiences with my black bear meat.
I love my Swhacker 125g Broadheads and Practice Broadheads.
However, now I use my 125g field points in my Big Shot target to replicate the broadhead impact at bear hunting distances. How?
My field points normally hit 2 to 3 inches higher than my Swhackers at 20 yards. Perhaps minor aerodynamics account for the impact shift up.
Accordingly, I have tuned the arrow/fieldpoint with 5 grain brass arrow washers added to the field point and now have identical impact at that distance.
I do this to relieve the constant use of my broadhead target and make pulling field points from my Big Shot target so much easier.
I shot both the 125g practice broadhead and extra weighted 135g field point at 30 yards and they both grouped within 2 inches of each other. Wow!
Three Rivers Archery sells the brass washers by arrow diameter. Give them a try…
I am interested in the science of Swhacker Broadheads for my Alberta Crossbow black bear hunt. I am hunting with my Ten Point Turbo S1 which shoots 350 fps with Swhacker 231 broadheads and whopping KE of 140 ft-lbs at 20 yards.
I recently shot the Swhacker 231 practice heads out to 50 yards like field points with supreme accuracy. Wow!
Note: A separate practice head used to come with the package of three hunting broadheads but practice heads are now sold separately.
Remember, when shooting broadheads of any kind, “it is accuracy that kills” provided the blades are sharp.
There are several models of Swhackers but each follow the same concept of saving the rear deployed razor sharp blades for cutting internal organs and not the hide and bone on entry.
An accurate, sharp, big game broadhead shot from your bow is essential. Years back, when I was shooting new arrows out of my compound, I would paper tune the shafts with and without fletching. Then tune with broadheads with the intended fletching.
I’ve always liked feathers on my arrows as they are more forgiving than vanes. The downside of feathers in the hunting woods is rain. They lay flat and no longer steer the broadhead well.
Today, many new bowhunters have bypassed paper tuning by going for mechanicals that fly like field points. It is a shortcut that can create a less informed archer about his/her equipment and more reliance on mechanicals to forgive poor bow tuning.
In my crossbow, vanes make more sense. I advocate spin to all arrows. It’s like rifling in a rifle. The spin creates stability, and allows rotating broadhead blades from steering the short crossbow arrow. I like offset vanes. A slight helical may work too. Experiment! Experiment! Experiment!
When all your tweaking comes together you should have some understanding of your setup and limitations. As for me, my crossbow limitations with fixed blade heads end at 25 yards. I like muzzy 1 1/8 3 and 4 blade heads.
Big blades tend to plane, avoid them.
Accordingly, for me, a mechanical head like the Swhacker 125g 231 is a great choice for longer and accurate shots provided you have the delivered KE and lethality for the shot and shot angle.
One thing you may want in your bag of tuning tricks are brass arrow washers to add some weight to a broadhead or a field point. Three Rivers sells them. They are 5 grains each.
My new 10 Point Arrow Puller works great so I don’t damage my vanes when pulling my crossbow arrows
Swhacker Practice broadheads for hunting. Just tested them today at 20 and 30 yards. They fly like a field point and don’t drift. More tests at 40 yards soon. The trocar tips are cut-on-contact.
Swhacker 125g broadheads open to 2.25 inches .
I am shooting 350 fps out of my 10 Point Turbo Crossbow with my pro Elite 400 arrows. With the 125 grain heads the arrow and head weigh in at 535 grains. I calculated Kinetic Energy at 20 yards at 140 ft-lbs, at 40 yards Im still shooting a terminal energy of 134 ft lbs. More than enough energy for Black Bear, Moose and Elk. The broadhead was designed by a NASA Engineer. The head on left has two blades that cut a one inch hole and when inside game, it opens to 2.25 inches. Swhackers have been in the field for many years and proving their worth day after day. Yup, Amazon sells them!! I will make a video at some point.
