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Main Boards => The Bowyer's Bench => Topic started by: Don Armstrong on July 06, 2009, 08:34:00 PM
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I have several bows I've made and need some string silencers for them. I want to buy a complete hide and cut strips for silencers. I bought silencers from e-bay in the past, before realizing I can buy a complete hide for little more than a couple of sets. Which type of fur makes the most effective silencers. I have used beaver, I think, and they worked well but would like to find the best for silencing a string. Thanks for any input, Don
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I've always used wool or rubber spider legs. But I've heard good things about muskrat and otter
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I've used Coyote, and Bobcat with good results.
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I use wool puff balls. Cheap and very quiet. I make them out of camouflage yarn that I bought at AC Moore. I have been known to pull a few fibers from them to check wind direction too. I like multi purpose! :biglaugh:
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Art Butner turned me on to strips wool fleece. I have used beaver, skunk, muskrat and a few others but I love the wool fleece the best.
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Where do you get the wool puffs or wool fleece. Thanks, Don
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go to the sponsor list above your first post and click on Bow Hush the "Hush Puppy" string silencers are top notch
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You can use wool yarn from any fabric store to make wool puff balls.
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Thanks guys, I will look for some wool fabric to make my own. I have heard good things on the Bow Hush but right now have about 12 bows to put silencers on, so I need a frugle sorce of silencers. Don
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Tandy's sells wool fleeces as would a saddle shop.
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Check out a used clothing store. Salvation Army or Disabled Vets Store. Shirts, jackets for a good price and lots of material. Bought a leather jacket last year and cut it up for arm guards and three fingered gloves for girl scouts to shoot archery with.
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Bought 3 skeins of ACRYLIC yarn (1 black ,2 multi-colored and doesn't absorb water like cotton or wool) 25 years ago for dubbing for fly tying.
Been using it for silencers on countless # of strings. Still have all 3 colors. Total cost back then less than $10
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Pat, I took your advice and made some silencers out of some wool fleese scraps I had. Man,they look good and work good,super quite.Thanks for the tip,I really like them......Dan
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If the fleece is too thick you can reduce the diameter with a pair of sharp scissors. The fleece doesn't seem to matte like other wild furs when they get wet.
Tandy's used to sell fleece scraps for dying leather and rubbing in mink oil. I've had a scrap for over 30 year that I began using with mink oil and now Montana Pitch Blend. It stays inside the container.
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My sister the knitting expert sent me some 3 strand wool camo yarn and a couple of little jigs they sell to make yarn pom poms in different sizes. I make the larger sized pom pom from the camo yarn and it'll really quiet down a noisy recurve.
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Ive tried muskrat,coon and coyote hides. all work ok, but I use yarn cause its easier.
mater
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Rabbit fur???
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I use musk ox budles sold on 3rivers. They shed water very well.
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WOOL is #1 good fourm is better.I shoot nothing on the string and off the wood.And have done so when I started building selfbows.
But long bows and recurves I had to have silencers and self padding of so kind.Strange
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I found out the best string silencer is shooting your bow with the proper alignment and back tension. Out of 15 guys at a shooting clinic all of us had considerably quieter bows when we got done learning how to improve our shooting. I now think that most add silencers to overcome the noise related to our less than good form. I guess it is easier putting a bandaid on than fixing the problem. I am not condemning or berating anyone...I am just stating an observation that I hope will lead to a better fix. If you can quiet the bow by fixing excessive string oscillation and vibration to the bow you are going to quiet the bow down. Then when you do add a string silencer you will have a much quieter bow then just adding a silencer.
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Snag,
Would you be so kind as to share with all us folks who may not know the exact procedure for doing what you learned at the clinic as far as quieting down your bow? Just a little run down I mean.
Thanks!
Charlie
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Hi Charlie, one thing I learned was the proper grip for my bow. Each bow wants to be held a certain way to "allow" it to do it's job unimpeded. I had mine too much in my palm. When I repositioned it the bow upon conclusion of the shot jumped forward in my hand, in line with the target. Another thing was NOT releasing the string. Instead pulling with your back muscles until the string just leaves your fingers. If you want an eye-opener try using the Formaster. That will tell you how much you thought you were using your back muscles but actually weren't! Just a couple of things that will help anyone.
There were some very good shots in that clinic. Everyone noticed how much quieter our bows became after Rod was done with us.
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Hey Brother,
Thanks for the info, I'm quite sure I don't use my back muscles near as much as I need to. I'll give these a try.
Thank You Very Much!
Charlie
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One of Rod's sayings was "you can't pull hard enough"! When you pull in line with the arrow and then all that energy takes off with the arrow it is a beautiful thing!
All this said....I put a small amount of wool yarn that I buy at a yarn shop in my string. Before the clinic I would wrap the end of the strings up into the loop...no more!