Bow set up
As you begin your archery journey at Liverpool City Archers, Archery Australia accredited club coaches during the safety course will inspect all of your equipment to ensure that it is in good condition and suitable to the archer.
If the bow weight is set too high for the individual, the coach may request that you lower the poundage (compound bow) or change the limbs (recurve bow).
Failure to follow the coaches recommendation may exclude you from any activities.
It is highly recommended that all beginner archers start at a comfortable draw weight that is not beyond the individuals ability. Once the archers gains the skills and techniques required, they can then increase the poundage of the bow and shoot longer distances.
Setting up your sight
Setting your sight is an important step to archery success. Your bow will generally not have sight markings, so it is highly recommended that you shoot your first arrows into the target at short distances: 5m-10m. Once your have established that you are not going to miss the target, you can then move your target back to 20m and commence adjusting your sight.
As you gain confidence and have consistently hit the center of the target, you can then set your sight for further distances: 25m, 30m, 40m etc.
There are several types of sights in target archery.
Most beginner compound bows will have a scope housing with 4 fibre optic pins. The highest pin on the sight will be the shortest distance. Each pin can be set to different distances: 10m, 20m, 30m, 40m.
Recurve and compound bow target style sights will have a scope with a single pin or dot. The scope will slide up and down the sight bar, with the shorter distances higher up the sight. Most of these types of sights will have an indicator guide markings to assist in the setup of the sight.
There are several techniques to sight set up:
1. The tried and true method of shooting your sights in at every distance. This is a long drawn out process and can take a lot of arrows and many days to get right.
2. Using a Sight Scale Template, this involves getting two sight marks usually 20m and 60m and transferring these marks to the edge of a piece of paper. Then using a sight scale run the paper along the sight scale until the marks match the Sight Scale, than copy the marks for all the other distances onto the piece of paper and then transfer these marks onto the sight tape.
3. The third method is considered the best and entails using computer software to determine and print out your sight marks, it involves obtaining two sight marks again usually 20m and 60m and then entering other measurements from your equipment, the software than calculates your sight marks, you than print out and attach to your sight.