Self nocks on tapered woodies?

[bowhuntingrn]

I've been entertaining the idea of trying to put together some woodies with self nocks. I currently have some tapered sitka spruce shafts (with plastic nocks) that shoot well and was thinking of ordering more, but wasn't sure about trying the self nocks on a tapered shaft. So for you guys that have some experience with self nocks...would it really make any difference parallel vs tapered?

[Jeff Strubberg]

It does make a difference in that you have much less wood to become the ear of the nock.  If you're going to self nock them, I recommend that you reinforce them first with a piece of horn, plastic, etc set into the back of the shaft parallel with the grain.

[bowhuntingrn]

That's kinda what I was thinking. Don't know if I'm ready to tackle reinforcing yet...think I'll just pick up some parallel shafts for my first set and work from there. After I get the basic process down, maybe I can move on to a set of reinforced tapered shafts. Thanks!

[gringol]

I do it a lot.  I cut a groove, set a hardwood reinforcement, cut the nock, THEN taper.  I feel like there isn't enough wood to work with if I taper first.  You need to be careful that your taper doesn't get smaller than 5/16 or you may split some arrows.  I try to err a bit larger than 5/16.

[Jon Stewart]

I reinforce my shafts with an 1/8" piece of cherry then cut the self nock.  I also give the self nocks a couple of coats of super glue before I finish the whole shaft with wipe on poly.

[snakewood3]

Been shooting tapered sitka self nocks for years. If you are orienting the grain correctly and not cutting your nocks wider then .10" just give them a good tight thread wrap at the base then soak them down with very thin CA.
The only ones I've broken have been from taking hits from other arrows.