My bow
For those that are interested, this is my bow, and I’ll explain what all the bits are.
A basic recurve bow has three parts, the riser, which is like the backbone of the bow, everything else connects to it, and that’s the part you grip. The limbs, which give the bow it’s power. These are interchangeable - different sizes and draw weights, different speeds, and different materials, from wood to carbon. And, obviously, the string.
My bow also has a bunch of other stuff attached. The sight is pretty important, although you can shoot “barebow” with no sight, most recurve bows will have a sight. The stabiliser is a long, light carbon rod, with a weight at the end, to compensate for the inevitable aim wobble that comes from the fact it’s being held by a human. Humans aren’t perfect. Mine also has a vibration damper at the end, to counter higher frequency vibrations too (what can I say, I have shaky hands). I have another damper further up the riser which does almost nothing at all for aim wobble, but massively reduces the vibrations caused by actually firing the bow (which would otherwise travel through the riser, and up your arm). Most archers have two further stabilisers pointing backwards at an angle, called a v-bar. I don’t have one of these yet - they cost more money. The arrow rest and stand I would hope are quite self explanatory - the arrow rests on the former, the bow on the latter.
This leaves the sling and clicker plate. The sling stops the bow falling on the floor when you loose, as the proper technique involves not actually gripping the bow, you just rest your hand on it. Gripping introduces torque, which will twist the bow when you loose, sending the arrow somewhere you probably didn’t intend. Torque of this kind is partially compensated for by a v-bar, but it’s best to have a little as possible in the first place. The clicker plate, at the risk of sounding somewhat patronising, is a plate for the clicker to click against. The clicker lightly grips the arrow, and clicks back when the arrow is at the correct release point. I don’t have one of these either, I forgot to buy one.
Almost everything on the bow is on the left side, however, there is one thing on the right.
The pressure button compensates for something called Archer’s Paradox. Due to the way the string moves when released from your finger, the arrow shears off violently to the right. It still goes forward, but wobbles crazily from side to side in the process. The pressure button is a adjustable spring the pushes against the arrow just before flight to reduce this wobble.
So. Rest of my gear:
Again, I would hope the arrows are rather self explanatory. The quiver too, except for the fact it doesn’t go over your shoulder (unless you’re a longbowman), it actually goes on your hip, and leans forward at an angle. The bracer goes on your arm to reduce the epic bruising that may occur if the string clips your arm while firing. The tab goes on your hand to stop the string digging into your fingers and to stop you getting nerve damage from the vibration while firing.
That’s pretty much it, I’ll give you one POV shot to show you what it looks like from my point of view.
I’ve labeled most of the stuff from the other photos, so you can see what’s where. Normally the sight is just a black plastic circle with a red dot painted in the middle. Mine uses fibre optics to provide a glowing red target dot - it’s actually pretty awesome, but it unfortunately not really visible in this photo. the glowing dot is so bright, it’s actually just turned into a tiny white speck in the pic.
