# how often do you tune your bow?



## Robspartacus (Feb 20, 2017)

mudboatmafia said:


> How often do you tune your bow, do you bring it to a pro shop and have them do it or do it yourself?


I ONLY tune myself. Nobody can or will tune a bow like you yourself will. "Good enough" isn't good enough for me. Besides, I do some unorthodox stuff with my bow. 

Generally, I tune up before tournament season and periodically check to make sure my specs are good. Usually what I do is periodically shoot a bareshaft at 20-40 yards (depends on what bow) to check. If its off, I go back to the tables and modify back. String and cable stretch is usually the culprit but nowhere near as big of a deal that some make it out to be. 

Right now, I have a Hoyt Invicta 37 SVX. I just retuned it and did some weird stuff. I long strung the bow, have the bottom cam way re tar d ed (more than normal), and lowered the poundage. My bareshaft is off by 2.5-3 inches to the right (left tear but doesn't show in paper or in bareshaft to 10 yards). Bow shoots lights out. I promise, noone would ever tune a bow like this. Bow shoots better than ever and its not anywhere near a textbook tune. 

I tune my bows. Me, and me only. 

Sent from my SM-N960U1 using Tapatalk


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## Vanguard777 (Jun 6, 2021)

mudboatmafia said:


> How often do you tune your bow, do you bring it to a pro shop and have them do it or do it yourself?


The only thing I take my bow to a shop for is when strings need to be replaced only cause I don't have a press but everything else I work on myself.


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## TMan51 (Jan 25, 2004)

mudboatmafia said:


> How often do you tune your bow, do you bring it to a pro shop and have them do it or do it yourself?



As Robspartacus suggests, a bow tuned for me, may or may not be tuned for you. 
Tuning has a learning curve, be prepared to take it to the shop when it turns into poo. You need a press, a draw rig, vise, etc. Doing your own tuning is a must for any serious shooter. Like practice, nobody can do it for you.

Lots of people are not clear on "setup" and "tuning". Whether you do the setup or someone else does it for you, you need to bring the bow to spec, before you dive into making changes that optimize your complete setup, including you.
Careful setup by a competent tech is often 95% of the job, and can often be enough for good performance with field points, or mechanicals for hunting.

To the question, how often:
Once you complete the setup > tune process, there's no reason to retune unless something starts to be a problem.

Replace string and cables, retune.
I shoot off the string/no loop, a re-serve usually needs some work.

I usually move things around year to year. Sometimes I need to swap out the rigging. This year I moved all of my Hoyt's to a QAD rest. They all needed to be checked and retuned.

On average, if nothing changes, a quick check with a bare shaft, and a pass through the chronograph let's me know if I need to find out why something changed. That might be years for some, every year for those not OCD, myself, every couple of months I do a health check.

So, if a shooter goes to the expense of equipping a decent workspace, you might as well get a couple more bows so you can practice tuning. Six is a nice even number.


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## LovelessInSeattle (Apr 19, 2021)

No one is going to invest the amount of time and energy that you can on your own setup so I’m a firm believer in doing everything myself. I understand not everyone has a press, but it was the best decision I made to get one. I had two good friends come over last weekend that had just bought brand new V3’s. We spent about 5 hours tinkering with them, I enjoy the tuning process it’s sometimes a complex problem that is fun to solve! Both bows needed top hat and timing modifications that their bow shop didn’t even bother with. A bow shop is a place to buy a bow or equipment if I can’t get it online.


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## ukxbow (Aug 17, 2018)

I tune it. Shoot it. If it still shoots better than me, I leave it alone. I pay periodic attention to timing marks/specs to see if anything has moved, but if it hits behind the pin, there is nothing to do....


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## Hoodie42 (Jun 13, 2021)

Once generally unless I change arrow set ups. I keep a few bareshafts around to check the tune periodically though.


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## yifuqiao (May 31, 2021)

Agree with above comments. I tune it almost every time I shoot at 30 meters or whenever I think something is weird. It doesn't take much time, honestly, 😄


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## Lipka101 (Jun 13, 2021)

I’m constantly tuning mine, I may go weeks without actually adjusting anything. Always places to improve


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## Connell83 (Dec 22, 2020)

As long as the broadheads/field points are shooting true, I’d leave it alone. I bought a bow press and draw board attachment last year after bow hunting for about 10 years and it’s a game changer - my bows have never been dialed in like they are now


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## huntnfish5 (May 5, 2018)

Once a year.


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