Yes Cody the tool will taper Douglas Fir but Fir is prone to splinter. For best results get the tool spinning at a good speed and ease it forward. You'll get the feel for how much pressure to use after a few shafts. The most important thing with this tool is to make sure your wood shafting is correctly sized. An under-sized shaft will produce a poor taper. It's very common to have your shafting come oversized or "fat". If so, chuck the shafting in a dill motor and sand it down with 220 sand paper to fit the extensions. These tools are made with tight tolerances at only a few thousandths oversized from what shafting is supposed to be.... If the shafting is oversized on the nock end, temporally apply a field point on it's respective end and use this to chuck up the shaft to sand the nock end to fit the extensions. Wood arrows are not all created equal and vary in size regardless of what size they are supposed to be... I have had customers call and tell me they use them on bamboo shafting by using a high speed and feathering the tool into the shaft..
Hi Gary! It took you a long time to design and build this new taper tool, i guess this is exactly what traditional archers have been waiting for, easy to use, accurate and made to last a life time. An arrow can't fly well if the nock taper isn't perfectly in line, and tipped with a twisted broadhead. This is definitely the first tool to consider when making wood arrows.
Three month after leaving my first comment, i have purchased the scorpion, the blade, and a table saw. First i thought it’s « a little pricy » but after studying many different ways to build the 4 darts footed arrows, i have seen many different jigs, sometimes making a good job, but often making only an « almost good job ». it’s true those tools are very well made, adjustable, and made to last a life time, and i hope to shoot footed arrows as long as i can pull my bow. When you purchase tools from Gary, you get much more than tools for making grooves in your shafts, you get all the instructions, advices and service to help you to save a lot of time to make perfect footed arrows very easily without mistakes. If you can afford it, don’t hesitate, you can't be disappointed. Thank you Gary!!!!!!
Thanks for the comment Jullien. Your correct that the tool does a fantastic job. You are also correct when you wonder who can afford the tooling. The problem with specialty tools like this is the small market. If I could sell 10,000 of them obviously the price would be less. If your making footed arrows you already realize that you are a minority and not that many people are making them. Believe it or not there are folks that can afford them for personal use but many that buy this tool and the custom blade, do so to make footed arrows to sell. When a dozen quality footed arrows costing $100-$150 it's easy to see that the investment is paid off very quickly. The tool will not wear out and replacement parts are available if something happens, so it really is a life long tool. This tool helps solve several tough problems when making the footed arrow. The pricing is based on the cost of having a machinist build them the cost of anodizing and all of the other labor and parts it takes to make the tool. I have made footed arrows from wooden jigs for years, in fact (if you haven't already) you can visit www.traditionalarcheryproducts.com and purchase a 3 1/2 hour "How to" DVD showing how to build and make wooden jigs and fixtures for footing arrows. It has helped many guys and gals all over the country build them. For the dedicated saw. I picked up a small Dewalt table saw at a pawn shop for next to nothing and it is my dedicated saw. Either way, I love the fact that you make the best flying arrows in the world--keep after um Julien!!!
