# Recurve Limbsaver Placement



## Bhunter32 (Jan 18, 2003)

I was wondering where is the best position on the limb to put a pair of recurve ultra limbsavers on my new gamemaster 2 to make them the most effective? I would appreciate some input. Thanks.


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## Viper1 (Aug 21, 2003)

B -

With all dues respect, the best place for them is in the package they came in. They might be considered a last resort, after all tuning methods to tame the bow (vibration or sound) have failed. 

If you don't NEED them, I wouldn't bother. If you do, while I've seen them on all parts of the limbs, the std recommendation is just beyond the fade-outs or a few inches distal to where the limb exits the riser on the FACE of the bow. Like anything else there might be some experimentation involved.

Viper1 out.


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## Perceval (Nov 25, 2008)

Bhunter32 said:


> I was wondering where is the best position on the limb to put a pair of recurve ultra limbsavers on my new gamemaster 2 to make them the most effective? I would appreciate some input. Thanks.


cut them down and use it as ear-plugs ...........sorry just kidding .

you may want to ,put it as far away from the riser possible on the belly side of the limbs , close to the tips but leave 1" 3/4 room for string . 
that is explained on the packaging and i ve tried a lot of placement and this is the most effective i found so far . i guess that the limbsavers folks have done some experiments . 

you must find the proper BH , then the proper arrow , then a pair of silencers like whoolie whoopers , catwhiskers , etc and if your bow is still loud then put a pair of limbsavers . 

the gamemaster is known to be loud ( same for a dorado i had ) , here is a tip : cut two piece of thin rubber ( i used bicycle tubes ) using the limb pocket of the riser for pattern , cut the holes for bolt and alignement pin and put it between limbs and riser it'll work


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## Viper1 (Aug 21, 2003)

Percy -

I have a little bit of a problem with putting them near the tip, sure they'll have the greatest deadening power, but they'll also rob the most performance from the bow. No bowyer in it right mind would make the limb tips any heavier than they* have* to be (Static recurves not withstanding).

Viper1 out.


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## Perceval (Nov 25, 2008)

Viper1 said:


> Percy -
> 
> I have a little bit of a problem with putting them near the tip, sure they'll have the greatest deadening power, but they'll also rob the most performance from the bow. No bowyer in it right mind would make the limb tips any heavier than they* have* to be (Static recurves not withstanding).
> 
> Viper1 out.


you are right and i feel the same , that's why my border wich is a speed burner with HexIV limbs don't wear limbsavers same for the ACS i had . any mass on the limbs will slow down the bow and more if it's close to the tips .
but my olympic recurve barebow wear them because i can't silence the thing and i hate noisy bows even on the shooting line and because it's plenty fast . 
it depends of the bow and the intended use . 
considering that the gamemaster is not a top performer ( but not bad at all ) and pretty loud , it's legitimate to use all the gadgets available to make it less noisy , if it's for hunting I'll sacrify a couple fps for a quiet bow anyday .


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## Viper1 (Aug 21, 2003)

Percy -

Fair enough. I've just found that most Oly/Oly type bows react the same way as any other bow. It's really amazing how noisy some of mine get if I screw up the brace height, even just a little. My DAS for example went from sounding like a car door slamming to a whisper by going from 7.75" to 8". 

Viper1 out.


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## marteen (Nov 29, 2008)

*Jun/Jul '09 Trad.Bowhunter mag*

...covers silencers in-depth with testing performed while having the following attached to the bow for sound readings(get ready): piezoelectric transducer(it generates voltage when shaken). That was hooked to a digital storage oscilloscope that "draws" a picture of how the transducers voltage output changes with time. Arrows were shot through a chrono measuring effects on velocity while testing numerous silencers, limbsavers being one of them. They were tested in 2 places, one being at the fade outs and the other being placed as close to the tips as possible without interfering withthe string. The arrow speed loss with the mushrooms at the tips was 1 foot per second compared to the placement at the fade outs. The deciel level was 2 points lower when located at the tips and 4 decibels lower than the test bow while bare. It was a thoroughly researched article as to be expected from TB and there seemed to be a lot of experimentation involved.


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## Viper1 (Aug 21, 2003)

marteen -

Amazing how traditional bowhunters continue to defy the laws of Physics. SIMS-RL an advertiser in TB? I suppose you also believe that compounds are pushing 360 fps in the real world? 

Look, if you want to use them or put them on your limb tips or anywhere else, be my guest, but not this puppy. 

BTW - 4 dB ??? Hopefully we all understand that the dB scale is logarithmic so we'd have to know what the actual numbers were, but still 4 dB??? 

Viper1 out.


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## rattus58 (Jul 9, 2007)

I'm not a limbsaver kinda guy myself, but I am a string silencer kinda guy and I've found that some materials do a grand job of making noise go away.

A limb on a longbow and probably recurves too, if you look at them in slow motion, actually whip back after the shot... startling actually to see. It can be so violent that you wonder how the limbs don't break more often, but what I'm saying is you can almost "see the noise".

It's hard to see how anything could solve the problem till you watch two arrows, both spined properly, but say 200 grains apart in weight, behave. The shots I saw had the lighter arrow whip the tips at very high frequency, where the heavy arrow after the shot looked like it was going to unstring itself with one deep cycle and stopped.

Viper might be able to explain this, but working with stuff and flying as long as I have, you realize a deep cycle is far more preferable to a high frequency cycle on your nerves... and I'd venture to say on your equipment too.

I use heavy arrows and I use heavy chord on the string about a handspan from the tips for dampening sound and it does a bang up job in so doing.

Yes yes... my arrows lope along like a basketball, but the eventually get there quietly... 

Much Aloha ...  :beer:


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## marteen (Nov 29, 2008)

Bhunter32 said:


> I was wondering where is the best position on the limb to put a pair of recurve ultra limbsavers on my new gamemaster 2 to make them the most effective? I would appreciate some input. Thanks.


Tony,
I regurgitated a portion of the article mentioned above to help answer the OP(he wanted to know the best position on the limb to put a pair of recurve limbsavers on his bow to make them most effective). It is written by Paul Fender who is a mechanic by trade and an archery enthusiast. It was his second contribution to the magazine. I have never seen Sims advertise in TB and don't know if they ever have or not.


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## Viper1 (Aug 21, 2003)

marteen -

Sorry about the snippy response, but I do find it a little hard to believe. I am a little skeptical about things written in magazines that seem to imply that "ya gotta have it" or defy some basic tenet of Physics to make something "sound" better than it is.

I've played with them myself and seen them in use on other bows, both recurve and compound, and have been less than impressed. However, if someone finds them effective, that's cool. I really don't like anything stuck to the working parts of my limbs, and the closer to the limbs tips the less I like it.

YMMV

Viper1 out.


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## marteen (Nov 29, 2008)

*follow-up*

The test bow was a 62", 45# @ 28" Pearson Colt wood recurve shooting aluminum arrows with a weight of 466 gr.(10.4 gpi). The decibel meter was placed 10 yds. from the bow and the bare bow reading was 65.8 db. Mushrooms at tips was recorded at 61.6 and at fade-outs was 63.6 dB. Many devices were tested and the largest "speed-robber" were rubber whiskers. Bare bow speed was 160 fps and whiskers dropped the speed to 154. They did produce the quietest bow from a single add-on however at 60.2 dB.


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## marteen (Nov 29, 2008)

10.4 gpi should be grains per pound of draw weight.


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## Viper1 (Aug 21, 2003)

marteen -

I've owned a BP Colt and currently have 3 of it's big brothers, the Javalina (pretty good bows for the price actually).

Lets put those dB reading into perspective (just copied this from the net): 

* Near total silence - 0 dB
* A whisper - 15 dB
* Normal conversation - 60 dB
* A lawnmower - 90 dB
* A car horn - 110 dB
* A rock concert or a jet engine - 120 dB
* A gunshot or firecracker - 140 dB

So the bow at it quietest was a little louder than normal conversation from 10 yds away? (Remember the log thing??) 

Look, I've never done dB testing on any of my bows, and I'm not an expert in that kind of Physics, but sounds a little loud there.

Anywho, if we are to take the article at face value and you're looking for the place to put them to yield the greatest sound reduction, I never argued that the tips would do the best job, I'm not sure about the speed differential and IMHO the best place to put them is in still their original package. 

BTW - why would he have chosen a 40 year old bow to test with???

Viper1 out.


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## slade (Feb 21, 2003)

I read about putting them near the tips so I tried them 1" from the string, the only thing i found was that 1) The bow slowed way down 2) They caused excessive limb movement.


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## sj_lutz (Feb 25, 2005)

Just dug out that issue and re-read the article, couple points.

First, there's no testing results that indicate that he tuned the bow to get it as quiet as possible prior to adding any of the silencers. I've got nothing to base this on, but I'd guess that for damn near any bow, getting the brace height set properly would easily result in a noise reduction equal to or greater than the magic 3db point. Seems reasonable to me that a given silencer would have a greater impact on a bow that's not as quiet as it could be prior to the silencer being added. 

Far as the article being biased towards advertising dollars.....I've never seen a Simms add in Traditional Bowhunter, and the author of the article makes no mention whatsoever of the brand name of any of the silencers tested. My impression of the article is that it's decidedly impartial. 

Bhunter32, there's nothing at all anywhere that indicates that the Limbsavers won't provide some degree of noise / vibration reduction to a given bow. Same as any other silencer, you're likely going to see some sort of a performance trade off, IE quieter bow = slower arrow. Far as the placement of them, that's your call. Try them in different spots on your bow, they're fairly easy to move.


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## Snuffer (Oct 15, 2002)

I have a GameMaster II and also have Tony's book and have read it, very good info. But I have tried six different arrow types and different weights and everything else that others have brought up, well tuned bow and the thing that helped the most was the Limbsavers at the limb tips. Lost 4 fps.


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## Viper1 (Aug 21, 2003)

Steve -

Good point about tuning and just to add a little fuel to the fire (I'm kinda a fan of those bows). 

The Colt and it's big brother the Jave are a little above entry level - but still super shooters, IMHO. They are effectively SEMI-recurves and *require* a brace height in the 7.5" range for any kind of efficiency (to give enough curve to the recurve). Don't even think the Colts had tip over lays. An arrow that heavy is not one I'd recommend, so it really does raise the question of why that bow when it doesn't have a lot in common with most current stuff. 

Also, the near the tip thing raises another question. Just as the string travels beyond the resting brace height as the arrow is launched, it travels farther down the limb / string groove. By placing the mushroom "just away from the string", it may actually be getting hit on shock. The only real way of telling would be by string ware or coating the string with lipstick and checking for marks on the mushroom. Oddly enough "stopping the string" is a common practice in the compound world not only to help silence the bow, but IIRC (don't quote me) to increase speed. 

btw - the advertising crack was tounge in cheek :zip:

Viper1 out.


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## Icentropy (Jul 26, 2013)

Viper1 said:


> Steve -
> 
> Good point about tuning and just to add a little fuel to the fire (I'm kinda a fan of those bows).
> 
> ...


well found this article looking for a way to quiet down my short 70# nomad stalker. I think i've exhausted my attempts at quieting this bow down. 
Tried the BH from 7.25 thru 8.25, nothing seems to help but 8.25 gives me a bit more speed (around 5fps) 
arrows from 670 up to 800gr (no noticeable difference in sound but the 800gr arrow is getting more KE so I assume it's sucking more energy from the limbs)
the string is a dacron flemish (i think this bow is FF safe but figured a dacron flemish would be softer on it and quieter)
Added beaver balls to it as well as velcro strips on the string grooves.

I'm thinking it may just be a side effect of a 48" bow, never had a recurve this short so maybe this is just how they are. Since I had planned for this to be my hunting bow this year I need to get this thing quieted down (it's about twice as loud as a 50lb long recurve i have). Limbsavers may be my last chance.... oh and someone mentioned it's easy to relocate them? how so? I thought once they were on there was no moving them?


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## Icentropy (Jul 26, 2013)

Just FYI, I decided to remove some old limbsavers I had on another recurve i don't shoot and stuck them on this short bow. Went out did some chrono testing and was extremely surprised with the near zero loss of arrow speed. Being a hunting bow i was more concerned with sound than speed so i placed them towards the tips. around 1-1.5" from string (when strung). Chrono testing showed only a 2 fps loss with 670gr arrows (from 175 avg to 173 avg) and a zero loss on the 800gr arrows (stayed right at 159-160fps). I'm guessing it's a combination of heavy arrows and heavy bow that basically means they don't slow down the limbs much if at all. 

Far as quieting it down, they helped but it still isn't what I'd call a quiet bow......


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