While out shopping for my niece and nephew, I came across a Bear-brand children's bow and arrow set. I thought to myself "Self, your niece has been wanting one of these, you ought to buy it for her." The set was on sale, and I figured that it'd be a good gift.
Unfortunately at the time, I was easily distracted by Magellan's new line of GPS units, and did not pay attention to the fact that the shrink wrapping on the bow and arrow set was so tight around the product that it had bent down the cock-"feathers" on the two arrows. They were tightly-bent down into little rolls.
Once I noticed this, I opened the package in order to try and fix the arrows before I gave them as a gift to a little girl who would be terribly disappointed if they didn't fly right. Well, three weeks later (of trying a hair dryer, and C-clamps and rolling them back), the cock-"feathers" are still bent all out of shape, they even catch on the arrow rest on the bow.
So.. long question short, any ideas on how I might go about getting these fletchings to unroll themselves and straighten up like proper faux-feathers?
You can strip them and fletch some real feathers :)
Otherwise, I think maybe holding them over some steam from a teakettle perhaps.
Yeah, that was pretty much my plan if I couldn't straighten them out.. gives me a reason to take the arrow rest off of the bow too!
In any case, I'll give the teakettle a try, would at least be good to file the information away under "stuff I hope I never need to know".