This is not directed at you Mathews shooters so don't get all up and growl at me. This is more toward the expansion blade shooters. This past weekend ( all names will be kept out ) I took some boys out deer hunting . They all handled a bow very well on targets so I was comfortable with them. I was not at all at ease with the one setup. The guy was using a Mathews ( no model here ) and expandable Blades ( again no model ) and he told me that was all he used . To make a long story short all three hunters got a shot and all got hits. Two of the hunters where using fixed blade ( and again no model ) and got kills. My third guy with expandable heads also got a shot. He said his shot was right on mark and he was waiting to give it time ( a good idea on every bow shot ) . He took me to the area he shot his deer. Two feet away was blood. The blood was bright red and I started to look for the arrow. He asked me what I was doing and I said "looking for your arrow". He says " Its in the deer Jackass". Oh well...... Lets start tracking . Five yards in I found his arrow and it has not penetrated more than 1/2 inch. I turned and asked him again on the location of the shot. He said He had hit it good and he only shot once. I guess good is in the eyes of the beholder. I knew I was a jackass so I told him to go back to the truck and I would meet him in a couple of minutes . I wanted to see if I could pick up "his deer's" trail. The trail was a book and said he had hit high and in the shoulder. I would have to come back later to check on its wound. I got back to the truck in about 15 minutes and informed him that we would come out after dinner and track some more. He was totally pissed and complained the ride back. I walked over and told the one guy that I was a Jackass and couldn't find the gentleman's deer . I then Informed him that said Jackass would go out after dinner and try to find this deer. Long tracking story later I lost him. I went out today and found what I believe the deer to be laying on the side of the road. I checked him a he had a two plus inch wound in his shoulder but had been kill by a car. I new this because the poor lady that hit him was still there. This was a real same .
If you are going to use these things only shoot lungs.
It time for the jackass to go
Back To The Stove
Turtle

Bum deal, i hate to hear stories like that. I hope you gave him some brief instruction after this all took place! Was this guy a friend of yours? Id never take being called a jackass. Your alot kinder than I it seems. Good luck and shoot straight.

Sounds to me like poor shot placement more then anything.

It could be alot of things that caused this
1)poor shot placement
2)poor head design
3)dull blade
4)poorly tuned bow
5)arrow could have been deflected

Their is alot of things that go into a secinaro like this , BUT , it seems like he totaly expected the arrow not getting full penitration.
If he was shooting slow or low KE this might have caused the head not to open properly , some makers call for higher speeds to ensure their heads open correctly.

I use and trust expanding heads fully , but me setup is tuned perfectly and has what it takes to drive big heads deep. I have seen alot (and I meen probably most guys that shoot expandables around here) of people shoot expandables because thay could not get their bows tuned correctly and had bad arrow flight with fixed blade heads , so their fix is to be lazy and "patch" the problem instead of correcting it.

As for being called a Jackass , I believe we would have gone back to the truck and "discussed"
that a little further. I once saw an Elk guide take a fellow back to the airport before we got to camp because of a problem they had right off the bat , the hunter lost his hunt and his money. I don't know if these guys were paying you but it doesen't give anybody the right to abuse you.
I also went on a hunt and the guide had a problem with me using expandables , after some discussion , we went to town and got me some fixed blade heads and I wound up shooting alot more than expected before the hunt , but , I was the visitor their and obviously the guide knows best. I managed to shoot a small cow at 25+yds and had to track her for about 200yds , a perfect lung shot,the guide was pleased and she was just as dead as if I'd shot her with a 2" cutting head , the guide just had to work a little more.

I shot a deer yearstarday with my 100gr muzzys at 20
yards she was qurtering a way for some reason the arrow did not exit this is the first time this has
happend to me useing a fixed blade muzzy only found blood a bount every 100 yards and when i found blood it was every where never found the deer. To day i shot one with the same type of muzzy it exited the deer like all the others i shot be for the deer never even run it just walked off like it was never hit and at 40 yards it just fell over dead. GOOD HUNTING.

Story sounds familiar to my weekend. I spent the weekend hunting with my cousin, an expandable blade shooter.

Saturday evening, a doe walks by at 10 yards and he supposedly hit her middle of the ribs angling forward, perfect placement. Saturday night we track for 100 yds and lose the trail. Sunday morning we pick up the trail and track for another 3/4 of a mile before losing the trail.

Was it poor placement, head failure or something else? I don't know but, my educated guess is low KE causing poor penetration with less than perfect placement.

Samson is right that mechanicals are a patch for poorly tuned bows.

I believe in the KISS method.

A little back ground now.
He was paying for the hunt so being called a "jackass" doesn't bother me as much as someone calling me their "best friend". Hell most of my close friends call me a Jackass . This guy was a good shot and his equipment was all in great shape. The shot placement was suspect because of the shoulder. It was like the shot you would do to drop one with a rifle. The blades were all intact but were bent a bit. The bucks shoulder bone was scared to 1/4 inch and had little chance of going in the vitals. The shot was taken at about 35 to 40 yards and I think this was some of his problem. His bow has enough ass to do the trick but he was shooting a lite arrow with a lite tip. I would now think a combination of low KE and poor shot placement was a factor but a Fixed blade ( I believe ) would have done the buck in.

Now to be a "jackass" again
Back To The Stove
Turtle

I also previously encountered a problem with expanding heads and a strong quartering angle. In my case,the angle was enough that as the head opened, only one blade was in contact with the ribs. This caused the head to be deflected slightly. The end result was the arrow sliding under the skin but not entering the chest cavity. I have never had this type of problem with fixed blade muzzy's. Expanding heads may be fine for some shots, but I will not use them anymore.

MFH

One thing I was wondering reading this is how much KE does this guys bow have? this is very important when using expandibles. I use shockwaves 100 and steelforce Heads and i love both of them. I have penetrated both shoulders with my expandibles shockwaves 100's. But my bow is also very ample in the HE department too. I am shooting a Darton Maverick 70 LB 32" draw and shoot 400gr carbon force arrows at 300+ fps. So I was just wondering what energy he is shooting.

But he sounds like a Jack@$$ to me.

Well good luck

Brian

This has been a problem with expandable heads from the begining they have to penterate the length of the head before cutting, NAP has tried to solve the problem by coming out with the Scorpion XP with a tip blade. I love their accuracy the Spitfire's but switched back to SteelForce and the new Razorbak heads.

A lot of people pick on expandables, but I think most of it has to do with the misconception that they will work well with any setup. Last night I shot right through a deer at 30 yards with a 100gr Shockwave, but then again I have lots of extra KE. Also, lots of people think that its only the poundage that they shoot that determines penetration, but a little heavier arrow, in my experience, punches through better than some of these really lite one especially once you sart talking 30+ yards. Expandables have there place, and work really well, its just there not for everyone.

It has been a year since I have been on this website and nothing has changed. Presently, there are two different posts about mechanical heads vs. fixed blade heads. It's true, some mechanicals are junk and fall apart when hitting bone, but so are some fixed blades. Since it is almost impossible to tell if a broadhead will effectively kill animals before several animals are wounded, why not impose certain criteria which a broadhead must meet before it would be legal to sell? I mean, you can't just go deer hunting with a full metal jacket bullet can you? We need more government intervention!! Well, maybe not government, but why not some sort of "Whitetail Institute of Killology"? Why can't someone just shoot a whole bunch of deer in a cage, with different broadheads at different angles and then time how long they live and record how much blood runs out of them? It would sure save a lot of trouble weeding out the junk heads. Of course, shoot all of the caged deer through the vitals, not the back or high through the shoulders. Gut shots should be kept to a minimum, however frontal quartering shots through the shoulder would be interesting.

P. Steve, Sounds good!!! I think we should use your deer on your property for the expariments. Just messin with ya. I think you are headed in the right direction though. My brother and I always cringe when we talk about guys like my neighbor(Todd) who says he the big bowhunter and gets his bow out for the first time every year a week before he starts hunting. He never gets his bow tuned let alone practice with anything other than field points if he practices at all. He only makes it out 2 or 3 times a season(you all know guys like this)and has no clue as to how is rig is going to shoot. Thank heavens he never sees any deer!!!!! I think there should be some sort of qualification you should have to pass before you can hunt with a bow only due to the fact that WE all know bowhunting isnt like gun hunting. I really am not a bring in big brother kind of guy but sometimes I wish there were some type of class or test shoot people had to pass with broadheads before they could recieve their archery tag. I dont know maybe Im sounding stupid but I hate to know that these people are in the woods wounding deer on a regular basis. Im not saying I havent wounded some deer in my bowhunting career but some guys I know loose more than they get. Let me hear your thoughts on this guys.

[ 11-07-2003, 01:05: Message edited by: chuckduster ]