I am new to bowhunting, as I have not bow hunted yet. I plan to start next year. I was given a bow recently and would like a bit of info on it. It is older, an Indian Hawkeye II 242. It has a Cobra site with 3 fibre optic sites of differing colors. Although I do not like the rest, it is just a peice of wire that is on some sort of swivel. The draw seams managable for me and the draw length suits me well as far as I can tell. It came with some arrows they are Wolverine 5060's With both 100 Gr. target tips and 100 Gr. broad heads. Any info or expiriances with this equipment would be greatly apreciated.
Indian has been out of business for quite a few years now. They made a decent bow back in the early 90's but nothing that really stood out in the crowd. The spring rest was a standard back then but there is a lot better gear available to upgrade with these days if you can find something compatable with your riser. The arrows I've never heard of. Get to a good pro shop in your area and have it gone through. You should replace the string and cables (unless they're steel) at a minimum.
Like Kodiak said, head for a pro shop. Make sure they double check your draw length. Alot of times on those older bows, they were easily adjusted. They also can check over the bow for safety's sake and then you will be good to go. The Wolverine arrows were a carbon express Walmart brand thing I believe.
I completly disassembled and cleaned it last night. It was quite filthy. Now I can read that it has 45-60# of draw weight with a 28-30" of draw length. I have been mesured before at 28" so this should work well. One potential problem I noticed is that the arrows at full draw, allow the head to come back nearly to the rest. I am not sure if that is okay or not but it seams like you would want the arrow head to clear the front of the riser at full draw. I really have no idea.The string looked fine, but the cables have seen better days. I used a bit of lithium grease on the cam shafts. Probably going to use some cable lube on the cable guides on the cams. I dont know what to call it, but there is a shaft hanging out of the back of the riser. It has a slider on it and seams to keep the cables from mucking about. Should this be lubed as well?
The cable guard keeps the cables out of the path of the arrow. It shouldn't be lubed but it should have a slider between it and the cables. If you're going to replace the cables replace the string too. They should be replaced as a set and after this many years I'd do it just to be safe. The arrow doesn't have to clear the front of the riser (unless the riser is older and has no cut away to clear a broadhead) but it does need to have enough room so that you don't draw a broadhead back into the rest and thereby un-nock an arrow at full draw (that can be REAL ugly; resulting in a dry fire at best and a bad broadhead wound to the hand at worst).
John, If you don't have a lot invested in that bow, I'd urge you not to invest anything in it, and go to a shop, shoot a few bows, and make a bit of a not on what type bow you like, short axle to axle (ata), long ata, single cam vs. dual cam, etc. For around $200 if you look closely, and shop well, you could hook yourself up with a "modern" bow, and build around that. I've sold several decent bows over the last few years in that price range, and bought several. The difference in feel between a "modern" bow and something in the age range you're talking is night and day. I wheel and deal, a fair bit, and I've found some great deals, and made some people some great deals on Archerytalk.com classifieds, and craigslist. If you don't have funds available to consider a newer bow, I honestly would look at saving the $50-80 you're gonna spend on strings for that "old" bow, and make that the start of your "savings" account for a newer bow.
Thank you all for the info. I have been looking around for some time. I will try this one for a season to get my feet wet and then I should have a better opinion about what I am wanting. After that I may get anouther bow for next year. I have seen the short bows. At first I was wondering whay they had so many Kids bows but the salesman at Cabellas quickly told me what was up on that one. You are very right about the differance between my bow and the newer ones draw and handling. Just better all around.
