Hey folks. Quite a while back, I made a post about these shafts and was interested in trying. It was too close to season to mess with arrow setup, so I had to wait until our season wound down before getting a few to play with. So, I just wanted to give those who may be interested in a shaft like this a bit of an update. For those that don't know, they're a .166 micro diameter shaft, almost identical to the Victory Vaps that gained a following a few years back. This is Gold Tips first in that area. I grabbed a half dozen, cut them down and built them with Vanetec HP 2" vanes. The Good: Fit and finish of the compenents, the nock collar, halfout and ballistic collar are outstanding. Very tight tolerances here. The ballistic collar, I hope, should add quite a bit of strength to their outsert system. As we're all aware, outserts have been prone to bending in other shafts. So far so good. These arrows just feel precise, almost surgical like, and unlike anything I've toyed with in the past. The inserts accept Gold Tips FACT weight system in 10 and 20 grain increments. Total weight for the halfout insert and ballistic collar was 44gr. Nock collar (2.5gr) is identical to the Carbon Express bulldog collar. All in all, they come together beautifully and produce a promising looking arrow. The already front heavy insert and collar system adds FOC easily and as mentioned, the weight system can further add weight as needed. Wall thickness on these is noticeably thicker and should prove to be the legendary Gold Tip tuff we have seen from them. The Bad: This is where the wheels fell off a bit for me. Gold Tip rates these at .025 straightness. Now, being a Gold Tip guy forever, I have always been aware of some run out on their shafts. In fact most Carbon arrows experience a bit of runout on the ends. For this reason, I always cut a bit off the nock end of the shaft, reinsert nocks, then cut to length. This produces a straighter arrow. I do this on .001 Hunter Pros as well. Even after this, 2 arrows were completely unacceptable, one is marginal and three are very good. The two bad ones, I honestly don't know if a field tip would shoot that well on them. Talked to my shop and we're going to have Gold Tip replace them. Also, my shop is at the ATA and spoke with them about the issue on that shaft. Aparently I am not the only one who saw this and Gold Tip revamped the construction process and also added more lasers to check straightness. So I'm hoping the new ones will be much better. Shooting: So far, they seem very accurate and shoot very well. Now, shooting into a layered foam range target isn't a good indicator of penetration, but they also have consistently buried themselves 10" deeper into the target than my standard diameter Pro Hunters so it is promising and something I will further experiment with. I'll update more on these as I continue to test.
Interesting. I thought you were doing some Western hunting with such a pile driver of an arrow setup. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
It's on the table too. I just want as much penetration as I can get. I personally believe in building a setup for the not so great shots we may make. Pretty much anything will blow through the thin skin of elk and deer rib cage areas. Last year was one of these for me. But the fixed head and 450gr arrow broke both shoulders and bailed me out. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
