My 4-year old girls saw the movie "Brave" and talked me into ordering them some beginner bows.  It dawned on me that I've never really done archery ever in my life but would like to be involved in learning alongside my girls.

I am really drawn to the longbows, but I like the fact that with takedown recurves I can start with low weight limbs and work my way up.  I tried to find longbows with takedown limbs but all of the ones I have seen are pretty pricy.

If I break down and get a takedown recurve, I am leaning towards the Samick Sage.  It would be nice, however, to find a comparably-priced 3-piece takedown longbow, does anyone know if a decent one exists?

Consensus with longbow beginners seems to be to go long and light.  Is the same true with recurves, or is shorter better?  I'm about 6'0" and my draw is about 28" going by the divide by 2.5 rule.

I prefer shorter recurves but something in the 58"-62" range is pretty safe/standard. I don't recall seeing too many takedown longbows and the one I've seen have been on the high end of the price scale. A takedown recurve is probably the cheaper option. I don't know about the Samick specifically. I did see a folding "survival longbow" that looked interesting though I have no idea on the quality. The recurve will generally be smoother to shoot with less stacking at the end of the draw. I have an old Bear Grizzly (40lb) that shoots very nicely.

Folding Bow

1st - find out what eye dominance you and your daughter are, if you're left eye dominate, shoot a left handed bow.
































































 

Ok, ordered the Snake and a dynaflight bowstring.

I downloaded the arrow selector; I punched in all the stuff for the snake, measured my wrist-to-shirt-button length (28" on the dot), but I am a little confused on the arrow selection.

It seems the field for shaft length is user editable.  Should I select a 28" length, or go a little longer and then adjust the point weight as needed?

I see this is going to become very much like BRD soon

registered on AT, so far no one's responded to my inquiry there.

Fewer users there ..  Just wait a bit more than  a few hours.



 

OP, so how are your kids liking the sport so far?

Liking it pretty well, thanks!

I started them on a kiddie bow just to see if it would take.  They can keep their arrows on a target block at 3-5 yds which is more than I can ask.  They're not real strong in the arms yet, perhaps when they turn 5 I will get them something heavier.

I ended up getting the snake for myself and im still working on getting the fundamentals down.  Looking to upgrade to feather fletchings and helical fletching, considering getting a jig.  I can keep my shots within the red on a fita target at 5 yds, im thinking I need to extend my shooting distance or switch from straight fletched arrows or both.

Already I'm shooting the bow a hell of a lot more than my guns.  Reusable ammo ftw

Sounds great.  Welcome to the lifelong obsession (or witchery) of archery, lol.  You'll get a thousand opinions on this, but I would keep everything simple until you're at least a few months in.  That means straight feather fletching.  The more simple and consistent your setup is, the better you are going to learn and diagnose any problems that come along.  

5yds is ok to start off with if you aren't confident of your groups, but I always did 10yds starting out and still do when I'm shooting trad.  I will do what's called "blank bale" and close my eyes before I shoot so I can really get a feel for what my body is doing at draw and release.  

What kind of arrows are you using?  Alum, Cedar, or something you made yourself?

I bought some cheap wooden arrows (not sure if cedar) from Academy.  I tried to eyeball them for straightness in the store and got a dozen of the straightest I could find, otherwise they were a real crapshoot in terms of consistency in construction.  I also shaved down the "detents" in the nocks as they were a bit stiff to nock on the bowstring.  I figured this probably isn't advisable, but I went slow and as evenly as I could with an emery board.  Now they nock easily and come loose with a sharp tap of a finger.  Anyway those arrows shoot pretty well.

I downloaded the shaft selector program mentioned above and for my draw, bow weight, etc I found a few in the "green" range and selected Easton Tribute XX75 aluminum arrows, straight plastic vane-fletched, full-length 1616's with I believe 56 grain nibb points.  Those shoot pretty well but the Easton nocks that Lancaster put on them are a bit stiff.  It seems as though the plastic of those nocks is flexible/gummy and thus probably not apt to being sanded down; I think I'll just leave well enough alone for now.

If I do another made-to-order at Lancaster I'll most likely get some more Easton 1616's but I just wish the nocks were a little looser.  Everyone says "oh get G nocks" but they don't fit on the 1616s or so I understand and the arrows that they do fit on aren't of the correct spine according to the shaft selector program.