I posted a few days ago that I was playing around with three under. I have grown to really like it. I have noticed (as some of you pointed out) an increase in bow noise. How do I tune my bows to quiet them down and get the maxium perfomance out of them?

Just good string silencers to start. What type of
bow are you shooting?

It'll cost you.

There's no such thing as a free lunch.  If your bow is noisy it is exchanging speed for vibration.  If you add string silencers they add drag and cost even more speed.  I just went from beaver fur to wool for added quiet and the speed drop was noticable - maybe 5% or so.  Now I'm gradually trimming them down to see whai I can get away with.

For quiet you either need to increase arrow weight (more speed cost) or increase your brace height (lower impulse force from bow transfered to arrow - some speed loss again).

Play with the nocking point also. 3-under sometimes requires a higher nocking point to adjust the tiller slightly so as to offset the new finger placement. I have shot both ways and once properly tuned, I notice little to no difference in noise between split and 3-under.

Play with your brace height also since your arrow is now coming off the string a bit different. Some bows it makes a difference, some it dont........

I just made the switch to three-under and found that raising the nock point was the ticket on my old Browning recurve. I'm sitting at like 7/16" above center now and she works pretty good. Work hard on a smooth release, too---it seems easier to "pluck" the string shooting three-under(at least for me it does).

Im shooting a couple of different bows right now. My new Samick Lightning, a Bear Super Kodiak and a Dryad Windtalker. I'll try replaceing the beaverballs on the strings, changing the nock setting and see where that gets me. I'm not to keen on changing the brace height thou. I feel like I have them set pretty high right now.

My ideal nock point is at 3/4" and I shoot 3 under. You must experiment with brace height and/or nock point placement if you want to quiet things down a bit.

I had a Beeler hybrid that was noisy at first because I had a string that was too short, causing a way too high brace height. I put the correct length string on it and, voila, that bow became the quietest bow I ever owned. Never, ever had to add silencers on it at all and I could hardly hear it. I have to use silencers on my Predator though, but I use trimmed down wool silencers and it's worth the minimal speed loss.

According to Ishoot4thrills too high of a braceheight will add noise to the bow. That is a new one on me. I was always told to quiet a bow down increse the brace height. Does anyone know why there is an increase in the noise to begin with?

For me, I've owned alot of bows and no matter how it's tuned, shooting 3 under is louder. It just is, I do drag alot of ring finger, so that don't help

I hear your pain. Was once there too.

Try a skinny sting! It made the biggest difference for me. I struggled with tuning, silencers, brace hit, nock point, etc. What finally made the biggest difference was the string. I shoot a Black Widow PSA Recurve, which I consider to be a loud bow. I use a 8 strand halo loop flemish string. The string material is 8125 low creep string with double serving.

Besides the string (and this may be obvious) you can quite things down if you shoot a soft glove and be sure to pull through your anchor. Relax your sting hand. Makes a big difference with the sound as well. Try snap shooting a couple and you'll see how much quieter it is when you pull through the release. Theres my 2 cents (i.e. no sense).

I am always amazed at how high I have to set my nocking point shooting 3 under, but it quiets down when it's right.

QuoteOriginally posted by Sherm65:
According to Ishoot4thrills too high of a braceheight will add noise to the bow. That is a new one on me. I was always told to quiet a bow down increse the brace height. Does anyone know why there is an increase in the noise to begin with?

Actually, any extreme in either direction can cause excessive bow noise. Generally, lowering the brace height will make a bow louder, but there are always exceptions. If you go too far in either direction, you will have a bow that is out of tune and an untuned bow often will make itself known with a loud report at the shot. That's why it's important to find that "sweet spot" that your bow likes the most when it comes to adjusting the brace height.