Ep. 43: Broadheads and Arrows with Bill Vanderheyden

absolute favorite. He's been a mechanical engineer for thirty years, with an emphasis on mechanical design and material science. He's developed products for other companies for many years, including high tech, aerospace and medical devices, before starting Ironwell Outfitters and focusing

completely on broadheads and aero components just recently. He's also an adjunct instructor of Mechanical engineering at University of Colorado, where he's currently sponsoring and directing projects related to science of bowhunting. So welcome to the show.

US archery hunters, and so I'm really excited. But like every episode, we're gonna jump in to listener questions or some questions that I was able to scrounge up that people had knowing that I was going to have you on a guest today. So like every episode. If you have questions for me or my guests, please submit them to us at CTD at Phelpsgame Calls dot Com, or send us a message on social and we'll do our best to get them included. So I've got five or

six questions here. Once again, I went to the is it September Yet? Facebook page group? You know, a bunch of diehard artrel hunters, and so I've got a list of questions I'm gonna throw at you here. Bill.

Those can those can be not so good. You know you've got you know, the blood's got to float on the sides of the animal. Also, you know you cut the top along with that kind of shrinks down. Not a lot of not a lot of bleeding coming from that. You shoot a gut shot maybe that you know, often the guts can kind of plug the hole and the stuff coming out might not be bright red, it might be kind of more brownish or something. So that can be tough too. So you shot place is probably number one.

But if you just get into the broadheads, then you know, the bigger and the more open the hole is going to generally give a better blood trail. So just a two blade slice can sometimes close up and give you a really poor blood trail, even if the slicing was kind of good through the middle. They can be good, but that's kind of a potential issue with just a straight two blade. A three blade can give you more of a hole then, because you know you don't it's

not a single slice that can close up. You've got more triangular shape inside, and I would put a two blade with bleeders in that same category. You get a cross cut there inside corners don't can't really stay tension, so they pull back and there's a bit of a hole there in a single bevel with a rotation, and I prefer single bubble with bleeders with that rotation that can give more of almost a square hole because of that rotation the way it cuts to the hide, so

that hole opens up holes nicely. But the other factor, and I would also say, you know, kind of bigger the better you know, our wide broadhead series gives a wider cut than our standard and in general is going to give more, you know, more blood getting out of the animal, more more tissue is sliced as you go through. But one other factor that a lot of people don't think about is that sharpness and edge retention is really

important as well. I believe I've done some testing where you just push the broad different broadheads through, say like a liver or a lung you know, of an animal after you get it, and you can see that with Ironworld broadheads that are very sharp with good edge retention, you get that complete cut of the size of the

head as it goes through, its slicing everything. It's not really pushing the tissue aside, whereas a lot of heads they're with cheaper blades, those edges are dull by the time they get through the hide and for sure rib and so they push a lot of tissue aside after that, don't slice it, so there's a lot less bleeding involved.

along a bone and it doesn't take very long. So that that that the initial sharpness, but then the ability to hold that through is it gets through the animal or out the other side, in my opinion, is one of those like very important aspects to have that exit hole bleeding and have you found or I mean it's very tough to do, but a lot of times we get more blood out of that exit side, do you

This is this is something I've always talked about. Your exit hole on a broadhead always seems to be bigger, and it's I'm gonna let you you clear up anything. I say that that may be a mistake here. But when you on you on your entry side, let's say you have a ribcage that's backing the hide, it almost guarantees that, since there's no stretch to that hide, you're going to get a hole that's the exact size of your broad head, unless you come in at an angle.

You know, but you're basically going to get a mirror of your broadhead that goes in. But on the opposite side that that hide will stretch a little bit depending on the sharpness and the angle and whatnot. And as you imagine that that hide stretching over the broadhead before it finally starts to slice, you typically will get that bigger exit side. And you know, growing up or everything, you always you know that the exit hole is always bigger.

They bleed more out of it. Have you found that to be true or are they very similar?

can get on the ground the better. And then one other thing I was going to touch you'd mentioned like a high lung shot, you know, and the result of bloods we've We've hit a lot of animals high lung and I will say once again, they die maybe faster than other ones because it does fill up their lungs with blood very quickly and stuff, you know, does the does the killing through that mechanism, But yeah, very very

little blood. Now, it is a great shot if you know to to, very quick and ethical, but doesn't yield very good blood. And so it's that balance of you know, hitting them there versus getting a blood trail. So I'll diverge on that topic. We're going to get into penetration and some of the other things I personally look for on big Western big game. But no, thanks for answering Derek Klein's question there on blood trail sharpness two three or four blades. I think we covered it all there.

Now there was one thing I'm going to add to this. Do you find any difference in blood blood trails single to double bevel?

that rotation there, it does. I mean, if you look at the holes through the high on both sides, they are more open with that rotation. I would say that I've seen good blood trails with both. Really our double bebble with the bleeder and then our single bubble with the bleeder. There's a lot of cutting going on and the holes are opening up both sides. I think they

both do really well. I might give a little advantage though, to the single bubble with bleeder, just because of the way it opens up those holes, especially the entrance hole.

had and what really got me started in this. And after many years of different steels and heat treat processes developed the steel and then in the feral material as well, there was high strength to where I could pump through the heaviest of bones and have no damage to the broad head. So, you know, because of that and the cost of our heads a lifetime, you know, guarantee you

ben or break it, we replace it. We had enough abuse initially with people shooting them into you know, concrete blocks or into heavy wood over and over and you know, bending them getting them out that we kind of change the warranty a bit to say any shot you know, at or through an animal, we it's warrantied, will replace it if it gets damaged shooting at or through an animal, even if it hits rock on their side of the animal. But you know, in a hunting situation, but we don't

want people shooting them. I mean some people would shoot groups into target it's all summer long, until all the blades were damaged and then you know, want to replacement three packs. So we just kind of limited it doesn't cover target shooting or you know, intentionally shooting it you know, rocks or concrete or steel, but anything in a hunting situation, we do cover warranty.

after after couple, but you can keep using them. And that's the intention there is that when people know that once you buy the you can use these for many years. Just take some care with the you know, target shooting and things to not shoot them into something like a steel plate or anything like that.

shooting into the target. I could feel, you know, throughout a summer, like these things are getting dull when you switched over where it's you know, the iron wheel, I can just keep shooting and the thing never it's you know, whatever you do to the edge, whatever you've got done with the sharpness there. It's like a foam target really doesn't mess with that. And so I love like being able to get an aerow dialed in with a specific broadhead, knowing that however it's set up is a great combo

and it's flying. Well, I don't have to mess with it. I don't have to worry about sharpening it, you know, because I've shot it one hundred times into foam.

difference to that edge sharpness. And that's because our hardness is sixty rock well. See, so that's a very hard strong edge. And then we do a multi stage grinding and honey, get it very sharp and it retains that edge edge really well. And that's why you can generally shoot your an animal and one pass through of you know, hide ribs exiting into you know, just say dirt, you can typically clean it up, see if it's still kind of shaving hair and put it back in your quiver,

keep using it. And if it does get dull to the point where it's not shaving hair pretty quickly, you know, touch it up and keep using it too.

We looked at the the sound from the shot to you know, passing through, which would basically be when the animals hit, and I looked at the frequency content as well, and you know what we what I would say is that our saw blade heads are very quiet similar We saw similar to field point type sound amplitude on those, so they're excellent, and our vent and blades are a

bit louder. Our original V series with the small events are probably our loudest head, and then our wide series with the larger vents, that vent is a bit quieter. It's kind of like blunted through a whistle versus a tube a bit there. But we saw in both cases though, And that's this is why I don't think it's as

big of a deal to some people do. Is that you get the sound of the bow going off and then the arrows, and really that bone noise is still there's still vibration noise coming from that bow, and the arrow is five to ten yards down range already, and then it gets really quiet until the arrow gets pretty close to that animal or the target, and then it flares up. So and if we looked at the segment that was say fifteen to ten yards from the animal, it was very hard to pick up a difference between

different veins, different broadheads, anything. So I think I think it's a bit. I don't think it's a big of a concern that some people have. I think that sound from veins or brighthead blades or vents, it doesn't really flare up until it's so close to the animal. That's probably not as big a factor as people think.

And so it's like, in my mind, just comparing the speeds, it's like, all right, that the sound of my bow going off and with any reasonable archery distance, that animal has been made aware of my bow before he's ever going to recognize the arrow making a whistle.

a quarter of the way there. Maybe when he hears it, when he hears the bo go off and and that bon noise continues, you know, for another five or ten yards of that arow travel yep. And now he's looking that way, and you know, deer and animals in general have excellent vision for movement, so he looks over that way, maybe he sees movement of the hunter or whatever, or maybe even sees the arrow in flight, you know, And then I think with that movement, with that sound, they're

deciding am I gonna bolt or not? And they start moving and you know, and there's a little bit of time just to register from the sound to when an animal can react. So my feeling is, yeah, maybe he moved when the arrow was maybe start moving when the arrow was halfway there, but it's still that initial sound of the bow, him looking over him, maybe maybe something he saw with his vision it's making him react that way. Yeah, that's kind of my feeling, not so much the sound

of the vein or the that head broadhead. But you know, that's that's not the general thinking and industry. I'm just trying to apply science and what I've kind of learned so far.

check sharpness. You'd be surprised at how many aren't sharp out of the box, especially like a one piece solid construction, you know, two or three blade Often a lot of times those just have a milled edge, mild bevels to them. So just to note, first off, when you get heads, check to see if they're sharp, make sure they're sharp, or sharpen them when you get them. RGI shouldn't need to do that. And then it kind of depends on how much that edge is worn away. Generally with ours,

it's kind of like a high end knife. The hardness, the sharpness is very good to start with, and you can typically go through you know, hide meat, even a rib and have that edge would be pretty good. So I would first just clean it up, check and see if it's still sharp. Shaven hair, or you can see if it kind of cuts paper. If it's good, just leave it. If if the edges still look good you don't see any flats or rolled edge or anything like that,

but it's not quite shaving hair cutting paper. Then I just and there's videos on our YouTube channel that show this, but I just start with like an extra fine stone and by hand, kind of hold hold the bubble, kind of match the bubble, just tip it slightly so I'm contacting the edge and just you know, a few strokes back and forth, over and over, and then lightning pressure and really it's about a minute minute and a half of doing that on edge, and I'm typically able to

shave hair again if it's if it's if it's been dulled, I guess more than that, then that's when I tip.

I guess. The full proof kind of way to do it, I think is to remove the blade, clamp it up, clamp it into a knife sharpener or a broadhead jig, but you know, mark put a marker on the beveled edge, and then I like the knife sharpeners where you can set the angle and have flat stones so you can adjust the angle until just one light light kind of scrape against that stone is removing removing that marker that

you put on all the way to the edge. So you know, you're kind of matching the babble cleaning up to the edge. And then you can you maybe just start with a with a fine and then extra fine, or if it's a bit more beat up, you might go medium fine, extra fine. But you're you're taking strokes on one side and then the other back and forth and kind of regrinding that edge all the way to

the tip. As you can go to finer stones, you can get a finer, sharper edge, and you know, we can get in more details on this, but as you're as you're doing it, initially you want to clean up that edge to where you can feel a bird all

along that edge coming out through the other side. That then you know, you clean up that full edge you and you're doing it back then on the on the other side to bring it back and then as you go to the finer stones, you're kind of working a smaller, smaller bird and then at the end it's it's you know, you're just taking a completely off and it's dead sharp.

one hundred and eighty. You can set the exact angle you want, So I just kind of look at the side, make sure that you know, yeah, I'm contacting the tip, but I'm almost so kind of maintaining that that angle, so I'm getting a real smooth and then just you know, run it down the blade. It holds it at the perfect you know, twenty two twenty two and a half whatever it may be for a double bevel or or you know, whatever that angle may be, and then yeah,

you can touch them. It really good. I do notice that, like you know, the the sense you do get it to a hardness of sixty. Sometimes can be a little it more difficult than I would say, like a cheaper steel. To get that you have to work out a little bit more. But I I found that that that works sharp lets me get those things dialed right. Back in without removing too much material and kind of maintaining that angle really well.

stones or equipment to sharpen. I'd say it's it's definitely doable with with standard sharpening stones. But yeah we take a little bit more worked and say a soft you know four twenty.

any asymmetries. You know, if your your insert or broadheads is pointing a little bit off to one side, and then as you shoot the arrow without rotation, it's just going to drive the arrow off to that direction, whereas if you have rotation, it might open up your groups a little bit, but it's going to keep it much closer to you know, on on the bullseye. So you want rotation, and I think two to three degrees is

a pretty good amount. I think on a vein to relatively quickly spin that arrow up, so you get the accuracy advantages. But I don't really see a need to get a very high rotation. I don't I think at impact, you know, super high rotation, it seems could probably be a negative thing. But what I've tested from you know, I've tested like two and a half to three degree helical with our current single bubbles, and that seems to

do a really good job. We've got high speed video on our YouTube channel actually of passing through a deer and you can see that that the arrow is rotating at impact and it just keeps rotating right through that animal, doesn't doesn't really doesn't miss a beat there. It's a single bubble head. So yeah, I like the two to three degree range for shooting really any fixed play broadhead, but definitely seems to work well with single bubbles too.

certain direction. So we take those three things that could all work together, could work apart from each other, or you know, you could have two working in one direction, one and the other. What's your opinion on that should we go to? Because it's something I've never thought of,

nothing I've ever went through. You know, when when I was grown up bow hunting, it was always about you don't want to spin the arrow so that it wants to loosen your broadhead, you know, or the feral from the insert and so you always, you know, everything spun to the you know, you wanted the erro spin to the right, kind of kept your broad head locked in. What's your take? Your opinion? Is there any research that supports those things should all match? How do we figure

it out? I know it's it's a lot all one question, but if you can kind of elaborate on that whole idea, Yeah.

want that. You want that rotational momentum that's providing some of the torque to go through the animal, which which is kind of needed with single bubbl. You know, a single bubbel, all that pressure on that bebbl causes the rotation as you go through the animal. But you don't want it to like stop that rotation and have to change the direction and go back to way. They lose energy and penetration there. So that's the most important part

of this whole thing. The other question is really the kind of the clocking they call it on the bow or if you shoot a bear shit aft out of your bow, which way is that arrow going to rotate? And this isn't really done by design. I mean, ideally the arrow would just come straight out of a bow. You know, the bow manufacturers aren't doing something in particular

to make it rotate left or right. There's just kind of an imbalanced force on it that might go left or right, and generally that's due to the string twist and the serving and how that NOx just kind of releases from it. I first heard about this maybe twelve years ago or so, and I when I first tested on my boat at that time, I was getting like

a quarter inch rotation left over twelve feet. Well, I knew from high speed video that my era was getting like a full rotation right in like ten inches or something from the veins when they're at two and a half to three degrees. So, and you know from engineering some of the torque sequels I alpha, it's you know that rotational, rotational, you know, angular acceleration. I guess, so to me, like that little bit of torque left and all this torque right from the vein, don't worry about it.

That was kind of my initial thoughts on it, and I've still kind of tell people in general it's that it's not the big of a factor. I mean, if you want to really dig into the details and the weeds, I mean, I do see with high speed video that if the boat tends to want to make it rotate a lobal left, there's a little bit more of a hesitation there before the rate rotation starts. So I'm not going to say that doesn't matter at all, but I'm

not I'm not so sure that it. I don't think it probably matters a whole lot in accuracy, at least not for the average guy. And I'm not even sure for the pros. You know, I've talked to pros it started doing it, but they said they don't really seeing a difference in accuracy. So I'm a bit on the fence on that whole thing. But it's it's one of those details that there's a lot of other things to worry about, bigger factors than that.

blade with bleeds over a three blade as well. If you think about hitting a scalpula with a two blade head, it just has to make one split through it, and that takes quite a bit less force than like a three blade, where you're splitting in three different directions at once. It's a lot more force, and we've got some force

testing data on our website that shows this. But just pushing down through hide muscle and scalpula with our two blade with bleeds versus a three blade, I think our force was I think the force was like five times as much with that three blade trying to make that split out three ways. And I hear about this all the time, people shooting a three blade head into scalpula on an elk and not penetrating through, where artist penetrates very easily through. So well, I ever make a three blade,

you know, I'm I might. I considered it. You know, there's a lot of people that are just stuck on shooting three blade heads and want me to make a better one, and so I might, But I actually think a two blade with bleeders is a is a better option for still getting a nice entrance exit hole cutting a similar number of similar amount of tissue. If you look at the total cut, we yet penetrates bone and hide and everything else much better.

you kind of get that that middle open. So yeah, thanks for thanks for taking that one on. And now the last question, and you know, the question we had got from a few guys is why are they so expensive? And I'd like to rearrange this question, ask you why are iron wills worth what you charge for them? And you know, if you can go through the manufacturing process QAQC materials, finishing, hardening, all of that and kind of give us a look into why these broadheads you know, cost what they cost.

it's prone to failure. And I really just decided, well, I first, you know, research and test a lot of other heads out there, but then at the end decided to really just start from scratch and not think about low cost manufacturing, but think about how can I get the highest possible performance out of this broadhead to for sure get to an ELK, should bone get through the vitals, make that a successful hunt instead of you know, a heartbreak.

And you know, I'd also had a background when I when I first graduated from engineering school, I went to work for three M company at the time with development engineers. They'd have you spend like twenty percent of your time on a technology development project. And coming out of school, I kind of had an emphasis in kind of mechanical design, machine design, but then also advanced material materials engineering and

steals in particular. So the technology development. Program they gave me was tooling development, tooling technology development for the corporation. So I was digging heavily into steels, tool steels, heat treats, codings, you know, other things to try and improve tools that we're doing, you know, cutting materials, cutting metals, you know, really kind of all the different tooling things that are

used in big manufacturing corporation. So you know, I dug deep into the steels, worked with different steel suppliers and things like that, so I had that background as well, so you know, I just knew there was that. You know, most of the blades out there were using like a four to twenty stainless steel, which is not really even a good blade steal. It's it's kind of a nice compromise of being very cheap and doing doing okay. But anyway, I went through five different steels before I settled on

a two tool steel. I used S seven as well, which is a great impact steel, and really they're both used in metal stamping, dies and punches. S seven is generally used to punch or form metal. A two is often used if you're going to cut metal. And so even though I liked S seven and used it, for a couple of years in development. I say A two is kind of a better because I could get it harder, sharper, retain the edge better anyway, and that you know, I process it like you would a high end knife blade.

We start with you know, steel plate, blank that out. We do SENC machining, multi stage grinding, honing. We do a heat treat process that includes a cryogenic treatment and triple tempering to just get the best possible we can geek out of why do that? But you do just

cryogenic treatment. You make sure all the you know, it's basically making sure the microstructure is perfectly you know, changed goes from austinite to martinsite and it's a very hard dense structure and to make sure it's all uniform, and

then the tempering has the toughness. Anyway, we spent a year just working on the heat treat once we chose the steel, and so all these steps in that process, you know, add cost versus typical blades are they're done on a real real there's a reel of metal coming in one side, and you can do that when blades are you know, twenty thirty maybe even thirty five, forty

thouve thick. You can just have a roll of steel coming into a stamping machine to where it's feeding through on a strip it's stamped, and a lot of these machines they grind it right, they servent right there too. They stand up run through a one side grinder, you know, it comes off the other side of the machine. And these parts cost. These blades cause dimes to make versus dollars to make. So anyway, that's kind of why ours more expensive, and that's you know, kind of explain the

blades are farls. We use a Grade five titanium for our lighter heads, and that's really the best strength to weight ratio of any metal. So I think that's the best metal to use on a Farrell on say one hundred grand head. We used on a summer one hundred hundred twenty five grand heads when you really want the best strength to weight ratio. And then as we go to our heavier weights, we use a hardened steel, which is you know, you can all steels aren't created equal.

Most steel, you know, all steel, say ferals. Our heads out there are generally three oh through a two stainless, which is not hardened. You can harden. You can use martin ciitic steel, harden it and get strength. It's you know, maybe three two to three times the strength of those austinitic you know, three hundred serious steels. So we actually harden them and machine them in the hardened state. So it requires that we machine them slower. It takes longer

to machine and the material costs more. So that's why those costs more as well. But we can get very precise there's no distortion or discoloration from a later heat treat and it's really it's really kind of the best way to make the parts that you can. And I'm all about performance. I'm a development engineer, and I want to use the best process to make the best product, and you know, kind of let the cost fall where they do. And that's really why why I broadhads cost quite a bit.

But for me as a user of your product, uh, you know, you spend all year for the most part planning, thinking, you know, setting up for these hunts. You know, you're you're one or two archery all counts because you're only you know, maybe three max. The squeezes in. You know, you drive potentially all over the country, you drive across your state, or you drive you know, you're driving into

your unit and you've bought knew this or that. Like when it comes down to it, like do I want to risk the chance that you know, when I'm at full draw knowing you know, the last thing I want to think about is if you know, this broadhead going to perform or if I make a slightly less than perfect shot, like is it you am I still covered? Like is the broadhead going to be?

your broadhead perform, you know, on impact. So it's you know, our heads are probably twenty bucks more per head than the things you're going to pick up at a department store. But it's yeah, to me, it's is is worth it at that moment of truth there get that animal and have the best chance for success. Yeah.

cutting the distance. We're all about tips and tactics, and I think it's important to kind of, you know, and to become successful. But I believe it's easy to kind of roll broadheads into you know, finding success and you know, being able to you know, technical data surrounds them, you know, the lethality of the broadheads. And so yeah, glad, glad to have you on here. I got a few of my own, and I love when things are based on

science and data. You know, we're coming off a few interviews with biologists, Like I just love being able to look at the data and and you know, figure out does this correlate with what I've seen? Are their anomalies? Are there reasons why what I've seen are different than the data? And just like let the chips follow where they do, and you know, go with that. But you are,

you know, similar to me. We've got the engineering side, but then we go out and test all of our products, and I want to see those real world results that support back up what's found and you know, and what I believe what I've been able to find, and I think you and what you're doing with Iron will broadheads kind of you know, encapsulates that whole idea. You know, design the best broadheads on paper, do a bunch of testing,

and then go out and confirm them on animals. So yeah, I you know, gonna gonna jump into our conversation with you here. So can we dive a little deeper into your work that you're doing with the University of Colorado. You know, I think there's a lot of just generalities or ideas that have you know, come from many many years of bow shop owners or in industry stuff, but you're actually going back and kind of proving that or

you know, coming up with data that supports that. So give us a little bit of what you're you know doing at the University of Colorado. You know, you've got new veins that you're looking at, new arrow setups. Kind of give us the full rundown of of you know, lab testing and new products.

applying them to improve products. You know, engineering is really applying science to you know, solve problems or develop better products. But at the companies I work for, I always you know,

really drove highest level engineering improvements. And through years of doing that, I was leading engineering teams and you know really kind of mentoring and driving other people to do the you know, apply science, do the analysis, but then also do some lab testing to kind of prove that you know, computer mo model is accurate and this what you know, the annalys shows will be an improvement actually

does make an improvement. And then in the final you know, final assembly testing, you know, prove out that you did make make it better. And so you know, I was involved, you know, in different companies doing that. And then companies I worked for started sponsoring university projects and then I was placed as kind of the company you know, industry client over those projects. And then about eight years ago, the university asked me to be one of the faculty directors.

So I became adjoint instructor of Mechanical Engineering and it was one of the faculty directors for the Senior Design Project for Mechanical Engineering and that's a year long project where seniors mechanical engineering are required to do it, but they take an industry project and spend the year doing you know, analysis, design, analysis, prototyping, testing, you know, iterating,

bring it, bring it to manufacturing typically. So I've been you know, teaching students kind of best practices for mechanical engineering and trying trying to kind of bridge that gap between Okay, you have all the school knowledge and you know all the tests, you've taken, all the information is there.

Now how do you solve the problem and you have all the information that's generally what happens in the university tests to where you get in the real world and develop a project and all the information isn't given to you. You have to figure out what is a science here, what is a physics? How can I apply it? How can I analyze it? Test it? So, you know, I've been teaching students to do that, and then this past year, I finally I got approval from the university to both

direct and sponsored projects. So iron Wellfater is just sponsoring a sponsored project on improved aero van design for bow hunting, you know, with fixed play broad hits on the front. So it's been a great project. You know. It was five seniors in mechanical engineering that had no background in you know, archery or hunting, which I kind of like they come into it with with no you know, preconceived

ideas of what works or doesn't work. They're just using designing, analyzing, collecting data and really kind of making day in the driven you know, decisions or showing the results based on that. So this past year we tested six of what I considered kind of the top hunting veins in the industry. Did you know a CAD model of those at a three degree here local on the arrow with the ironld broad heads on the front. Did a fluidynamic model, so

it's really very sophisticated. One has you know, airflow gone over the arrow even as it's rotating through the air. We were able to model that we're looking at, We're looking at really accuracy, stability, wind drift, drag and sound from that. So we can we can we can model all that here. We can and if I said, spin up as well, so we can kind of model that how these different veins will do a better job of

that than the other. You know, we tip, we can tip the angle let's say five degrees to the wind, like as if it's coming out of your bow and your bos little untuned, and we can see what is the restoring torque that quickly brings that arrow back back on track to get it straight at the target. And so we studied six of the veins in the industry

and then studied some different prototype veins. But we took it from the analytical computer modeling to then also to do the empirical testing, the actual testing with a shooting machine using a high speed camera to kind of vary to verify the spin up and then the stabilizing and then the max and then the max rotation. We used lab radar to look at the velocity from the bow to the target to verify the drag and the drop

that we calculated through the model. We had this very sophisticated sound recording system placed out there that was recording the sound with these omnidirectional microphones, and then we analyze that through through Matt Labs, so we could look at the frequency content and we looked at you know, the frequency kind of peak range for humans, which I think was two to four killer herds and then also animals

which I believe was four to eight kill herts. So we said, okay, is this arrow sound you know, errow broadhead vein combination sound loud to a person, and also does it sound loud to an animal? Is it more likely to make an animal react or not? So we took all that data. We just kind of finished up the project. We're planning to put out some kind of white papers to summarize that. But that's that's kind of

just the overview of the project. And really the reason I wanted to sponsor that is I feel like with the broadhead development, I have a broadhead now that is you know, penetrating really well through high bone. It's getting in that pass through. And some people, a lot of people, I wouldn't say a lot, but some people their problem with shooting fixed plate heads is that they struggle to

get good aeroflight with fixed blade heads. So I wanted to dig more into the science there and kind of be able to show people, hey, you can definitely get create long ra in flight with fixed plate heads. You just need to do a few things here, you know, get some rotationary arrow tunebo the right veins on the back and you're good.

swing too far? Doesn't matter? You know, we we've went to this, you know, all your weight in the first two inches, Like, just give me your take on that and what you've found or what your your opinion is on if there's a compromise where where we don't have to chase these huge FOC numbers.

as a direction and momentum is mass times velocity. So really the way to to maximize your penetration is to maximize that mass times velocity industry line, so having good aerowflight so that your arrow is going straight as it impacts the animal, and then you know have that increased mass and or velocity can give you that totally increased mass times totally increased momentum at impact. It's going to translate into how much force can that really aerosystem apply

as it cuts through and for how long? So it's that product enforced time's time. So there's no FOC that in the math of the physics. There there's no center of mass in that calculation. I think it only comes into effect if it's somehow changing how how well your arrow is flying or what it's doing at impact. So I think the advantages with FOC the improved stability. As you move your center mass a bit forward, you're going to prove your stability. But I personally don't go to

any extreme tames. I think, say twelve to fifteen sixteen percent is great. I've seen excellent penetration. My aero setups are usually in that twelve to fifteen percent range, and I can tell you throwing my testing with the right broadhead on the front, you have excellent penetration. So I don't see a need for this extremefoc. The physics doesn't really justify that, you know, I think that doctor ed

Ashby's testing I've talked to him about this. He saw now going from a nineteen to twenty two percent FOC, saw thirty percent improvement and penetration. I really think that's because he's shooting a longbow at close range and there's a lot of flexing in that row, and it probably improved his aeroflight or how straight that arrow was on impact, and that was probably majority of the factor for penetration.

I think it's it's unfortunate. I think a lot of people have tried to apply that to modern compound bows, and the negative that they do is to try and get extreme foc. They're often underspined, but a lot of mass out in front, and you don't have the arrow stiffness to support it. You get massive flexing back and forth. And I see this on YouTube videos of people that are extreme foc, you know, advocates. You can see in their aerowflight it's that thing's flexing back and forth like crazy.

And in my arrow setups, I may be getting like a half inch a vertical flex of the arrow, and then it's it's almost going perfectly straight, you know. Ten feet later, I don't. I don't have that massive flexing back and forth all the way to the target that's going to reduce penetration because of a mentum. It's not in a straight line anymore.

And then you also factor in what you saw from you know, maybe some of the female bow hunters you've hunted with that got perfect pass through? Is it fifty two you know pounds in a four hundred and twenty grain arrow or whatever it is, And you're like, well, what am I doing as a as a guy shooting a you know, a seventy two pound bow in full length arrows five hundred and sixty grain. It's like does it does it all matter? Or do we just need to be able to shoot our bows better, you know,

and it hit the animal right where we want. And you know, I build my arrows somewhat backwards and I fall into that same twelve to fifteen percent foc like you do, just kind of naturally. I've got a fairly

long draw. I shoot full length thirty two inch arrows, and then I just kind of keep stuff and weight in the front until I get my bow to what it says on paper is going to shoot about two hundred and eighty to two hundred and eighty five feet per second, and just confirm that I'm spined right, and then I move on. You know, I'm not chasing a weight. I'm chasing more of a speed. What does that weight

and that tip weight you got to do? And then make sure my spine is still, you know, is correct, and I'm not going to be you know, under overspined and just kind of leave it there, like I build backwards to a speed that I like to shoot, and don't chase foc or a crazy weighted arrow, you know, just just by my size, I end up with a five hundred and fifty to five hundred and sixty grein arrow, but you know, it's it's just because of the thirty two inch draw length and heavy arrows.

maximize penetration. Well, I think you do continue to see improvements with penetration with mass especially, And you know, the technical reason for this, I think is because as an animal tissue and everything probably asks the like visco elastic material, where it's like, as you increase that shear rate, it takes more four So a light fast arrow is going to take more force to go through at that higher speed, and it's going to slow down easier because there's light

versus versus a heavier arrow, and so but it's it's not a huge of a factor. So I think I kind of calculated in my setup. I thought one hundred grains, say, going from four to fifty to five point fifty might be a maybe a ten percent improvement and penetration maybe not quite that much really, but but then there's a drop off in trajectory as well, and that's why I'm typically end up around five hundred grains. But It's why I'm not going six hundred plus because I just get

way too much drop off in the trajectory. And having good arrow flight and hitting where you're aiming are really number one for sure. As far as where to put the weight, yeah, upfront's better than putting it. You don't really want to put it at the back. And upfront's better than having just a heavy arrow with a light

light head up front. You know, I wouldn't go with the heavy arrow and then I have only have one hundred grains or one one sixteen up front, like some people will do with just an aluminum insert in a hundred grade head, and then your FOC's down at ten percent or below, I think, I think, say, you know, the recommendations out there in the industry are maybe ten to twelve percent for target setups and like tell to

fourteen for hunting aeroseeps. I think that's what like Easton has said before, I don't like going all the way down to ten or below. You add the possibility for instability you to fix it light had So that's really the reason for having some mass up front and having a decent FOC. But there's no need to go extreme in my opinion, it's more likely to hurt aeroflight in trajectory.

whatnot because I wanted the ultimate penetration. As I mentioned earlier, I've always been in that camp that I want a hole on both sides. I also, if I do encounterbone, I've always thought that a one inch cutting diameter is easier to push you that bone than an echine, you know, an eighth or an inch and a quarter. Do you have any data on cutting diameter in relation to penetration And if my thought process is right or if it's incorrect.

my elk head. And you know, I'm zipping right through that it takes such low force to cut through with their heads that often they're going twenty yards and looking around or sometimes not even moving. You know, it's zipping through, and they're dying quickly if with the right shot placement. So I don't really see a need to go with

bigger heads. And for years I kind of fought it, and then we had enough people that really just wanted a wider head for white tails, bears, things where the shots are closer and long range flight isn't so important, and just to get a bigger hole. When I first started making those and doing all the lab testing, I expected to see a higher quite a bit higher force to penetrate with the wider blades, and I was a bit surprised that I don't measure much difference, and it's

really kind of helped reinforce. What I learned prior is that sharpness and edge retension are huge factors in the force. It takes to penetrate, especially in high and you know, muscle and tissue, but it seems to be in scoplics gapula as well. Now I might say, if you know, bigger, heavier bone I do, you probably gonna have less force to cut through Without my head, it's not quite so wide. But if I just measure the force to go through, see it through say hide muscle and like thin part

of scapula. Man, I have a hard time measuring a difference between our standard head and our wide which is inch and three. It's wide main blade three quarter inch plater for two hundred eighth inch total cut. So I've kind of changed my thinking a little bit, and I don't see any problem with using that head on you know, deer and elk. I use it a lot, but I also start using it on elk when I have a setup where it might be over water or I know the shot is going to be relatively close. It penetrates,

you know. I put one through a bowl last year, exited the opposite side shoulder bone, and then buried into a log eight inches on the other side of the elk. So even though it's wide, it went through. You know, it wasn't the thin part, it wasn't the knuckle. It was kind of in between part of the shoulder bone.

But it really slow down. I think once the tip starts cutting away and maybe I'm on bone split it's kind of split that far ready and maybe on the highe and once you start cutting it doesn't take that much to keep cutting it a little wider. But I do think in general in the industry, if you look at broadheads beyond ours, you know, the more cutting, the wider cutting you do, takes more force, it is probably going to give you less penetration in general.

the middle of the scapula before and broke through. But it's that instance I maybe have to go through there or I miss just a little bit and go through there. I feel like it just gives me a little more margin of error, but you know, as you're saying, maybe maybe not as much as we thought due to the you know, the construction of the tip and how everything's working on those iron wheels.

I went right to the knuckle on that hog, and that was probably two and a half inches of solid bone, and it was a loud crack, and I thought, oh no, I had something really hard. This would be a real test for that wider, wide single bubble that's trying to rotate you know, through the bone too. But it made it through the bone and got, you know, all the

way through the animal. The arrow didn't completely pass through, but the broadhead made an exit on their side and that bone just cut clean into where you could just kind of pull or part like a puzzle put it back together. It was a slice holler through And so that was with our wide and so again I feel like it's gonna you know, you know, you need the right steal, the right hardness, strength and everything to be

able to cut through that bone. But it was good to see that even with the wide, we went through probably the thickest bone you're going to see on a on an animal in North America.

Does that single bevel just have the ability to kind of torque its way through and rotate its way through bone better than double bevel or is that tonnel point on the double bevel able to break through bone similar or is there an advantage of one to the other.

three to one ratio head. He had a very slow, longbo setup, and he was saying where a double bebble could kind of just kind of wedge wedge into that bone and take more force to penetrate versus that single level. As it started rotating, it was kind of popping bone

and reducing the force for him to penetrate. It was an improvement, and I think we've I've talked to this with him a number of times now, and I feel like with my set up being a modern compound bow, I had so much more energy that when the tip of in our tanto tip shape, when that enters the bone starts piercing that bone, it's popping it apart. It's cutting it apart very quickly, you know, and doing a great job penetrating in that single blevel as it's cutting

in and popping it apart. You know, it's hard for me to see a difference in in that at least with my setup and my my levels of energy, it might be more of a factor with a low you know, lower energy set up, thicker longer, you know, thicker bones. But I'm generally not seeing it. I'm popping through. You know, I do a lot of testing on you know, cattle femurs, things like that, and I'm seeing them both are popping through with no problem.

angles and all of that. Do you have a recommendation for that or is it just typically you're wider wider angles.

And you know, if you shoot a mechanical, hit them where they're soft, and you're probably fine. But with ours, if you know that animal ducts and turns into it, and you ad they go through the shoulder blade, even the thickest part of the shoulder bone, it's going to penetrate and it's it's going to get you through the vitals or if it's a downward shot through the spine. And really has to say that about any of our heads that we make, they're all going to be able

to make those shots. I'm generally personally using our wides now more on white tails. It's just that the shots are you know, typically twenty to thirty yards, rarely are they over forty in a white tail woods. And so I know, I know our wide are going to penetrate, great, why not get a little bigger houle if there's a more marginal shot let's say you end up hitting you know, one long liver guts. I've done that a number of times.

And with our wide, our wide belvel with that twoe and eight inch total cut between the main blade and the bleeder, you know, often they're going maybe sixty seventy yards and dying even with a single long liver shot. It's just doing enough trauma of it. They're going down quickly. So that's kind of the advantage of why shoot Maybe a wide over smaller one is just more you know,

more bleeding, quicker potentially quicker kills. So that's why I generally recommend on white tails, our wide series, and that's what I generally recommend on bears as well, which are similar culture shots and and yeah, and bears, especially with all that hair, it's important to get an exit hole there.

That's talking to the outfitter again. In Canada a few weeks back, a lot of guys are coming up their shooting mechanicals and if they're if they're a little bit quartered away and hitting the oppositized shoulder, they're not getting passed through and then they got a high entrance hole, no exit hole. And on a bear, that's that means no blood, no blood trail because it just soaks up that that blood so much. So. Yeah, white sails bears. I I generally recommend our wide heads for those shots.

we we came up with. We found the best thing from the study was this hybrid hunter vein which is the Max Huino profile and a new hybrid material that we had a make for us and worked with east End to machine flesh is at three degree helical. So that all the people ask that ask me, you know what aero set up should I used to with your broad heads. I can just say, hey, the one we sell right now kind of did the best overall in the study. And you know, we know this is going

to work well to make our heads fly. Well, it's been really a few you know, have a bowton, so your arrow's coming relatively straight off of it, you're properly spine, and then you have enough vein on the back to you stabilize that fixed plate head on the front should have good air flight, and we have great tech support. If people are having any problems with our broad heads in flight, we're happy to help you get that set up.

But I want to throw it out out there too that we're I want to help the blow hunters be more successful and we're happy to help you do that.