Fred Bear mauler - should i upgrade to a mathews jewel

before evryone shouts yes at me please hear me out. I have only had the mauler for about 1 month. The bow is a nice bow however i have a short 26 inch draw length and pulling about 55 pounds. With the IBO of the mauler stating 327 i figured its not that bad but i keep reading posts by others stating the ibo of the mauler is more around the 306fps and when i shoot it does seem slow. WTF. I only bought this bow because it had some speed to compensate my low poundage/draw.

Now the jewel on the other hand is meant to fling arrows at ibo 325 using a 29 inch draw and on 60 pounds which would mean that this bow would be much faster than my setup now. Also its lighter which would suit me greatly. The draw back is that there is at least a 4 weeks wait for the bow (australia) and i have to buy it for them (archery shops) to get it in (i can't get them to get it in and than try and see how i like the bow - this is the same for every store i rang around australia) and it costs $1100. Normally this price woulldn't be to bad as i don't buy much often but i just dropped $600 for the mauler 4 weeks ago.

My question is would you upgrade if it was you in this situation (please don't use these brand names as a guide to your answer). Remember the only major factor why i want to change is because my arrows seem to be going so slow i really think i could out run them. I do want to hunt with this setup so KE does mean something and at the moment if the mauler really does only shoot at 306fps that means my arrows would be in the 220's fps My arrows btw are around 385 grains total before everyone says to get lighter arrows.

Has anyone here put the mauler through a chrono?

 

The bows they have today are a 100x better than the bows they had back then man, Any bow prettymuch now adays is good enough to kill a animal. I mean its like getting a caddilac instead of a geo metro lols. They are both going to get you to b from a, but one is nicer and better looking.

 

When it comes right down to it, your Mauler will kill most animals just as dead as a Jewel would. The extra speed is nice, but certainly not mandatory for effective hunting.

What type of animals are you hunting and how well are you shooting with the Mauler? If it's shooting well and you are accurate with it there's no need to switch. However, if you're having a hard time shooting it well at hunting distances, or plan on hunting bigger game and absolutely need the KE, then you may have to open your checkbook back up.

 

In your situation I wouldn't upgrade. Like Justin said that bow will kill about anything just as dead as the Jewell. Just get used to it get it dialed in and get your $600 out of it. I know it has faster speeds but you may get the Jewell and hate it. I know when I was looking at bows I was dead set on Z7X or at least something in the Mathews lineup. Finally got my money and went to shoot them all and guess what? I really didn't like most of the Mathews stuff. For me it wouldn't be worth the money lost on the Mauler deal to order the Jewell sight unseen and un-shot then end up not liking it.

 

Speed doesn't kill. Sharp broadheads delivered to point of aim do.


If the Mauler is accurate, don't switch. I know I wouldn't be able the tell the difference (visually) between an arrow moving 300fps vs 330fps.

 

How did you move from a 26 DL to a 29 DL?

I think I would deal with what I have and tune it and use it until next year unless you have an unlimited budget?

RC

 

That looks like the ASA patch. That might be a breach of security to put that here.

 

Hi Grits

Nope my NDA expired and we were not a very secretive organization. We knew that they knew that we knew

RC

 

Hi all

I was hoping to hunt large boars. If the mauler is shooting with the correct Ibo (327) than my KE is 49 which i think is good enough however if it is shooting with the slower ibo that some people have claimed, than it would be much lower (haven't worked it out) Does fred bear bows have a tendency to be rated with a higher ibo than what the bows are capable? Anyway it would be great if someone puts it through a chrono one day to test it CORRECTLY but until than i can only speculate what the true ibo of the bow is (does seem slow but who knows)

Rcowan i didn't mean that i changed my draw length from 26 to 29 inches (its still 26) i mean't that the ibo of the jewell is worked from a 29 inch draw and 60 pound weight. Anyway i have decided to use the mauler until at least christmas and see what i want to do than.
Thanks