Right, so you want some arrows.
You go online,
you pick the arrows you want, check out
and ta-dad-da-da!
Regardless of whether you buy online or in store,
getting arrows is as easy as picking the arrow you
want and choosing the colours of the vane and the nocks.
I've already made a video covering different types of arrows,
but this video is for those of you buying arrows
for the first time, especially online.
You will notice that most stores list arrows under
fletched or shafts.
Fletched arrows don't just come with vanes.
The whole set of arrows is pre-made with nocks and
points and they are ready to shoot straight out of the box.
Shafts, are just that.
The plain bare shafts.
You will need to buy the rest of the components to
make the arrows yourself.
But it can be more complicated than you think.
Certain arrows require more components than others.
Depending upon their type.
While a cheap Easton Jazz arrow
only needs a point, nock and vanes
other arrows require additional parts.
I won't go through how to put an arrow together in this video,
but for new buyers, this video will go through
the things you will need to buy, in order to
put your own arrows together.
First, you pick your shaft,
specifying the spine and length.
Keep in mind that you need at least 6 arrows for
most competitions and you
probably want to get a full set of 12 anyway.
Now, if you are buying in store, it may be possible to buy
individual shafts, especially for cheaper arrows
like these Power Flights.
This is especially useful,
if you are buying only a few arrows to tune your bow,
or if you are topping up a set from missing or broken arrows.
When you buy it online, you are usually limited to buying
either half dozens or dozens.
This is especially true for top end arrows,
such as Easton X10s or ACEs.
This is especially important because
they are bundled together from the same
manufacturing batch.
So there is less inconsistencies between each shaft.
Next, pick your points.
There is a fair variety and it mostly depends
on what bow you are using and whether you are
shooting field, target or hunting.
Most points allow you to state size and/or weight
but when in doubt, pick the smallest and lightest.
There are three types of points.
Screw in, glue in and glue on.
If you are buying screw in points, you will also need to buy inserts.
Most inserts only fit certain shafts.
For example, ACE shafts can only use ACE inserts.
You also need nocks.
Nocks are often sold in 12 packs.
Which makes sense given that you have 12 shafts.
Some nocks, also come in 100 packs.
In case you need lots and lots of spares for future arrows.
Some nocks and shafts, again, require special inserts.
Such as uni-bushings or pins.
For others, they go straight in to the end of the shaft.
Vanes usually come in packs of 50 or 100.
Each arrow uses 3 vanes.
So a full set of 12 will require 36 vanes.
Of course, vanes come off frequently, so having spares wouldn't hurt.
On a side note, it's standard for a recurve shooter to
have a different coloured vane on one side,
to indicate the right loading placement.
Vanes come in various lengths and widths.
But, if you are just starting out, it doesn't matter too much.
Then, there are spin wings.
Thin, curled vanes, stuck in a helical pattern.
These are meant to give more spin to the arrow.
Thus making it more stable in flight.
Most archers won't use these.
As they are fragile and can rip fairly easy.
Furthermore, they are only intended for narrow shafts.
Such as X10s, or ACEs or ACCs.
Mostly, they are used at competition level.
I should note that spinnys are only meant for recurve.
Compound bows, will shred them.
That's all, right?
Well, not quite.
You also need stuff to put everything together.
For inserts and glue in points, you will want a glue such
as hot melt, available in blocks like this.
Though glues you find in hardware stores, like Araldite are fine.
Hot melt however, is much easier to remove
if you have to replace things.
If you are using screw in points,
you may want to put a dab of glue on to the point itself.
It does have a habit of coming loose, during a shot.
For vanes, Fletch-tite is the most common glue.
They come in tubes like this and the glue is lighter,
making it appropriate for sticking on vanes.
Spin wings on the other hand, are meant to be
stuck with tape, not glue.
They come with double-sided tape in the pack
and additional black tape to fasten the ends.
If you are putting the arrows together yourself,
you want to get a fletching jig.
This will allow you to align the vanes perfectly
and hold everything together while the glue dries.
Now I won't actually put an arrow together right now
but just to quickly go through the steps involved
this is what you do.
You have your bare shaft.
You then use a block of hot melt to glue in the insert here,
and that goes in one end of the shaft
and you can push it in like that.
There we are.
Next, you need...
again hot melt over the nocking pin, if you are using a pin
and you put in the other end, like so.
You then put the nock on,
as such, you can get special nocking tools but
you can do it by hand as well.
If you are using vanes, then use Fletch-tite to
put glue on to the shaft and then put vanes on.
If you are using spinnys, then you will need to
obviously remove the tape and put spinnys on.
Now, there is a special pattern on how to put them on
and you will need a fletching jig and usually a coloured
marker, to mark it where you are putting the vanes.
But I will save that for a different time.
Lastly, you put on your tip and for this case it is a
screw in tip.
It goes right on
like that.
So, I haven't glued anything on, so things will come off.
So when I do this for real, I will either use hot melt and
glue to assemble the entire arrow.
Whether you buy fletched arrows or make your own
arrows is entirely up to you.
There aren't any huge advantages either way.
If you choose to buy fletched arrows, that means the
experts in the store will make it for you, so you don't
have to muck around and screw it up yourself.
However, it does tend to cost more and it takes
more time to deliver, so it may mean waiting in store
or coming back to pick up a different time, or if you are
buying online, it may delay shipment by two or three days.
On the other hand, if you buy your own arrows
you actually don't save that much money.
If you buy separate parts and you put it together in your
own workbench or in your own room, then the
cost is roughly the same.
Although, you do get more choice over what you put on
your arrows, as well as how you put it on.
The other odd advantage, with doing your own arrows is
often you don't usually buy exactly the number of parts
that you need, so if you buy fletched, then you get 12 complete arrows.
If you buy your own shafts and your own components,
then you often will get a pack of say 12 pins or
12 nocks, or 12 inserts, but you will also get a lot of
spare fletchings and spare points and so on.
So, while the cost is about the same, you do end up
getting a lot more in terms of stuff.
So if you need spares, then it wouldn't hurt to buy
spares and do it yourself.
The big part of doing it yourself is, that you get a lot
of experience in making arrows and especially
maintaining the arrows.
Eventually you break arrows
vanes come off, nocks get shattered.
So you will eventually have to fix your own arrows
or get someone to fix it for you
and there is a lot of fun involved, a lot of good worthy
time spent putting arrows together, it just generally
feels a lot better when you assemble the things yourself.
But, either way, it doesn't matter a whole lot and
if you really can't be bothered and just want convenient
arrows straight away then definitely get arrows fletched.
Otherwise, spend the time to put arrows together and
you have something that is worthy of your bow.
As usual guys, hope you found this useful.
If you did, please click the like button and leave a comment below.
Otherwise, I hope you stick around for more archery videos
and I will see you next time.