staggered/offset arrow fletching

[rpm4463]

Has anybody experimented with arrows with staggered, or maybe the correct word is "off-set" vanes?  I'm not talking about fletching that is semi-helical, but the vanes are not the same distance from the nock...make sense?  For example, vane 1 is 1" from nock, vane 2 is 1.24" from the nock, and vane 3 is 1.5" from the nock, or they may be in .5" distances.

I've heard that this design helps arrows keep a consistent flight in windy conditions...or somebody just wanted to play around with fletching arrows.

any thoughts?

[tazz]

i asked a bow shop about it and they told me what it does is give you better stability. its like if you have 2" fletching it will give you the stability of a say 4". but of course this was before blazer came out with there vanes. hope this is what you were wondering. maybe i will play a little if i do i'll re post good luck

[THE DUDE]

I've tried it with a 2" Blazer , with a 2" Razer(2"Feather) ,  3"Vane,3"Feather.  and a few in larger sizes. stagered em from a .25 to .5 apart   I didn't see a stability increase some of the larger stuff was more eratic and if it helped with anything why won't they do it strait off the production line.  Just looked funny to me but what do I know.

[croix]

never heard of it. aerodynamically it kinda makes sense  that it would provide stability i wonder how weight distribution would be affected. i may have to give this a shot.

[rpm4463]

A few hunting buddies and I tried it out last night in our warehouse.  We got some big shop fans to provide wind at differnet distances.  We used staggered and regular fletching of differnet size vanes at 20,30, and 40 yards.  There were no obvious difference between those and arrows with regular fletching.

Just use what you have the most confidence in.

[bow4elk]

Scott Haugen does this with excellent results.  He uses 2" Blazer vanes (3) with the first one set at the normal distance from the nock, then each additional vane is placeed forward by about 1/2" so in effect, you get less cross-wind obstruction with a longer horizontal vane.  Looks goofy as hell but works just fine.  Remember, and arrow in flight is a dynamic object, not a static object so what it looks like sitting on a table doesn't really matter (in this case).