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Jesse's Hunting > Hunting Articles > Hunting Articles Archives > Building a Better Broadhead
Building a Better Broadhead
Brian Kirksey - JHO ProStaff
- SF Bay Area, CA
October 06, 2006
From hand sharpened obsidian to precision-machined broadheads created on state-of-the-art machinery, broadheads have been evolving since man first created the bow and arrow. As technology has advanced, so has the broadhead.
We have seen all kinds of materials used in making broadheads in the last 100 years. Points and blades have been made of stone, bone, sheet metal, plastics, aluminum, steel and stainless steel. Not only have the materials evolved, we’ve seen broadheads go from two blades to multiple blades, and from fixed-blades to replaceable. Somewhere along the line, somebody got the idea to keep the blades closed until impact, heralding the creation of mechanical broadheads.
So what’s new today?
The latest advance seems to be a shorter, stout broadhead with steeper angled blades. By making the blades steeper, they require much less material and weight. The smaller blades have additional rigidity due to their shortness. This savings in size also allows the manufacturer to use stronger heavier metals like stainless steel throughout the broadhead construction. The benefit of this design is a small profile and cross section in flight which reduce wind-planing. The industry has taken notice of this improvement in flight characteristics, and now several manufacturers are offering their version of this broadhead technology.
Four broadheads illustrate the evolution.
The author tested several of the newer broadheads and found that although the newest style looks smaller, the cutting diameter is almost identical. |
Obtaining accuracy and not giving up cutting diameter has been a feat worthy of notice. Due to increased confidence in the improved flight characteristics, some broadhead makers have even increased the cutting diameters of their heads to deliver some of the most hemorrhaging wounds.
I ran three of the leading broadheads through paper, along with one of the new, small heads, and reviewed the cutting circumference left in the paper. For skeptics who doubt the small size of the hunting tip, the tears were almost identical.
I like what I am seeing in the latest broadhead trends. Anything that aids the bowhunter and makes his arrows fly truer and more accurately is a positive thing in my book. The benefits of a better, almost tune-free broadhead are colossal. Those benefits include less time spent tuning finicky, broadhead-tipped arrows and arrows that fly with unheard-of accuracy. The result is less wounded animals and an increased probability of a short recovery with better placed broadhead hits.
Broadheads have really come a long way in their development and it looks like they’ll continue to evolve.
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