DIY Bow Setup- Everything You Need to Know

All right guys in this video I'm learning how to set up and tune my own bow. Now how do we make the adjustments? Now we're going to make our adjustments. Most bows tune about an eighth knock high. About maxed out there boys and girls. Can I just tell you how satisfying that is? Okay what are we going to do first? Set it up get all the components put on. Yep first we got to get everything put on it. Start to finish I'm going to learn how to set up my own bow. So you're going to get your rest. Okay I got that. And we're going to put it on. Got the rest. Got the sight here. Let's go ahead and put these on. So Lance we call this thing the burger hole yeah? Yeah so these are built to go on your directly on the riser. All right so you're going to use your allen wrenches here because you're going to have to loosen this. All right and that clamps onto your. Oh so oh like that? Oh I see. It needs to go loose. Looser. More loose. I mean I think it's a really good idea to set up your own bow. At least have an idea of it that way something falls off or goes awry in the field. You kind of know how it's set up like. There's basics that everybody should know as far as like making sure that your rest is level. How to do a d-loop. How to tie in a peep. When I worked at Sportsman's Warehouse we'd get people come in that wanted they make portable bow presses which I like the idea of but again I would ask people do you carry extra strings with you? Do you know how to put them on? Do you know how to tune? And most 90 percent of people were like well no. Like then it's not worth buying a portable bow press if you don't know how to do that stuff or you don't carry the the equipment to do it with right? But basic stuff a d-loop tying in a peep if something happens that's stuff that is very easily easily done. When you get into tuning and restringing you can learn that stuff. It takes a lot more time and practice and understanding. The reason we want to leave that off is because we still may have to make some adjustments and then we'll put that on after. So now we're gonna do the d-loop. Okay I'm gonna show you this. Easiest way to do these is you're gonna want to melt one end so that it's got a mushroom on there and then we're gonna fold this in half like that. Where am I lining it up though? Right now we're just gonna get it on and then we'll then we'll worry about the center shot. So make a loop. Melt it first. Lay that on and then just wrap this around through that hole and then this one through that hole and then we're gonna snug it up tight. Okay make sure that this. Wait I didn't even know what you just did. We're gonna do the top piece first and I'll show and I'll explain why. Okay but when we do this we're gonna lay this short end on the top like that okay and then we're just gonna hold it against the string and then all you're gonna do is wrap this through the hole. Okay so literally I'm gonna take it like this. Does it matter how big it is? No because we'll tighten it. Okay wrap that through the hole. Yep and now take that bottom piece and do the same thing. Through that same hole? Yep same hole. Okay now pull tight. Okay and this. Yep so do it down here on the serving. Okay down here. Like down down down down down about where you're gonna put your deep. Okay now pull that tight. Gotcha. Keep tying up. So the reason you melt that end is so that it has something to grab against so it doesn't slip through. Yep. Okay that's actually pretty easy. Okay so make sure. Hang on. So what we're gonna do get this tight first. Nice and tight burn it. Nope not yet. So now this is where we're gonna start to get our center shot done. Okay so reason we leave things loose because we still want to make adjustments right. So we've got a couple tools here. You've got your string level so this just clamps onto the string right so that you can adjust and make sure that you're perfectly level and then this one goes on to the arrow. There's level right there. Okay. Okay so now so generally what I've known most bows tune about an eighth knock high. So that's generally where I start. That's where that's at right now. But you got to make sure that you're level with your burger hole. So right here we're a little bit low. Raise that up just a touch. So I'm raising this. So raise. Nope we're gonna raise the. So if you get level with your arrow and look through that burger hole. It's about middle of the burger hole. It is dude. We can start there. Okay so now what? Now if it wasn't. If it wasn't we would raise the rest, raise the D loop or lower either way to make sure that it's centered. So we would potentially need to raise that rest to bring it up to burger hole. Correct. Because you want that arrow running through the middle of the burger hole. Yes. Okay arrow running the burger hole. You said most of these bows tune about with that bubble of shade at one eighth. Yep. Okay now I'm going to. But again this is just a starting point. This is a starting point. All bows could be different. You've still got to mess with your cam timing etc etc. But this is just your starting point. Okay so now. So now that we're level let's tighten this rest. Okay. Okay now we're going to finish the D loop. Now this is going to be. This one's a little bit harder because as you do this the first one you can make the loop wrap both of them through. This one you kind of have to on the top start on the on this side of the string. On the bottom we're going to go on the on the other side of the string. Make your loop. Go through it and then from here what I say is you chase your your string back around. So you're going to come back around and see how it makes that loop there. Does that make sense? Yeah is that too big? Well what we'll do is when I get done is we'll tighten that down. I see I see. Okay and get it. I usually get it about even with the knock because you'll you'll pull that we'll tighten that back out. So but always give yourself a little bit extra room extra material because you can always cut that off. So our same loop. So down up through down back through the bottom. Yep. Okay I'm doing it again dude. You learn things through repetition. So I'm gonna go one more time. Down up through chase it down again back around and back through the bottom loop. There you go. Okay and then I could always give that more. I kind of go like that because you want that to be a little tighter because that's going to stretch some. I feel like that should I don't know I feel like you could give that a good stretch. So that's another reason why when you you want to do this top one first get your level set right and and tighten that so that there's less slack to come out. That's like you're kind of stretched right there. So once you once you've done this a couple times right is you can do it when I get it done I'll I'll cinch it right up like that. Oh you get it nice and tight? And then you then you just come right through there like that. Gotcha. And then you can grab enough stretch. So yeah so what we're gonna do is you want to give yourself a little bit of room. So and depending on the release that you're using some have bigger jaws than others. You've got to you've got to understand what your equipment is to know how much room to give yourself. But you don't want to be up next to you. Don't want to be up there. Yep about right there because again we're gonna we're gonna take some when we melt this end it'll take up some slack as well. Sure. Right so what I like to do is kind of turn that off to the side so you're not melting everything else. So the other thing I like to do is melt it let me see that and then press that against the end so that it flattens it out. Okay. We've got pliers right so you want to leave your D loop or your your string I'm just going to show you. But there's also these pliers are specific to where you can pull this out and put those in there and then just stretch it like that. That make sense? So you can do it either way. Get your fingers right up in there and pull. You got to get this tight. Don't be a sissy about it. Yes sir. So once you get that then you can pull this out and then these fit right inside there. Oh. And that'll stretch that tighten that right up. Okay. I mean I feel pretty good about that. So a limb driven rest is going to be down and your cable will attach to your limb but it'll be tight. As you draw the bow the limb compresses which allows slack which allows the rest to come up. Okay. So this works complete opposite. Where at do you want to put it? So these are nice because you can you can tie it right in right by where that serving goes. Okay. What kind of knot are we doing? We're not we're not. What kind of tie? There's two ways to do it. One you can split the cable and just put it in or these come with this cable clamp. Oh that's kind of cool. Right. So these are pretty easy. So the way these work is there's two slots. Right there. Okay. One right there. One right there. One for the cable. One for the string. Does that make sense? So the way these will go on your string goes in front and the cable in the back and it just clamps on like that. Oh really? Okay. Okay. But when you put it on again you've got to make sure you don't want to crank it down because we still have to make adjustments for the draw length. Okay. Make sense? So we could give you that. There's that. All right. So there's slots here. One for the cable. One for the string. Go ahead here at the serving level. Okay. So just get it to where it's snug. Okay. So when you do this you're going to want some slack in it. Right. Because depending on your draw length if the further back you go the more string it needs to come down. Make sense? So now what we're going to do prior to this you need to make sure that your draw length is set specific to you. Your poundage is set before we do any of this. Right. I tell people this all the time. Whenever you draw your bow always put an arrow on. Regardless. 100%. Right. Always. Your D-loop can fail. Your release may not lock properly. If you don't have an arrow on you just dry fired your bow. Okay. Put an arrow on it. Stand in front of a target even if it's a little block. Point straight at it so that if something does happen you're not dry firing your bow and ruining your investment and ruining your hunt coming up. Never draw your bow without an arrow in there. And never let your friends pull your bow back either. Ever. Arrow's in perfect condition. Okay. So now we're going to come over here and stand in front of the target. Are we shooting actually through paper? No. We're just drawing the bow. We've got to get this adjusted to the right tension so that your release comes up and drops properly. Okay. Make sense? So draw slow. We're going to watch this string. Okay. So these rests have timing marks on them. That when that is all the way back those should line up. So it's a little. Okay. Shoot. Go ahead and shoot. Okay. So it released but we want to just a little tighter. We're going to tighten that down. I'm just going to say this is the first time ever shooting the RS. The back wall is rock solid on that thing. That guy's having a hard time bringing it off. Yeah. Okay. Grab your arrow. Try it again. So we're going to show you how your rest is going to pop up or function if your rest string is too loose. So we're going to go ahead and draw it again. All right. So as you can see he's at full draw and it's not completely all the way up. So that tells us we need to tighten that string for his draw length. Now we're just going to shoot it just so you guys can have an idea of how this rest will function if this rest string is too tight. So pull back slow because with it being tight it's going to come to full draw. It'll be locked up way before you're at full draw. Okay. Here we go. Okay. Nice and slow. Here's the draw. Okay. Hold up. Oh. I couldn't even draw. So did you see how. Yeah. So what happens is that comes to the the rest comes to full position way before you're at full draw. Now what happens is if you continue to draw that's going to pull on your cable which is going to make your cams out of time. Okay. Right. Because it's tight. Sure. Sure. It's locked onto that cable. You're still drawing but this cable is tight. So let's go back to the sweet spot. Let's go back to the sweet spot. What are you what are you looking for when you're eyeballing the sweet spot on this cable driven rest? Just a little bit of slack. When you're at full draw you want it to be tight and again this rest so if you look right here see how those it's locked up but those timing marks are not on. When you're at full draw timing marks should be lined up. Okay. Let that down. So again we're going to make sure when you get to full draw make sure our timing marks. Okay. So look at our timing marks. We're not quite there so we let down real slow. We need to tighten it just a touch more. I guess this is how you're tuning your rest right because you're getting timing on your so you're tuning your rest right now. Kind of. Yeah. Because even though even once we shoot through the paper we still may need to make some adjustments. Sure. So this again this is just initial setup. Yeah. Okay. So now we look our timing marks are lined up. Go ahead and shoot. And we're good to go. All right. So let's go ahead and shoot it through paper. All right. Paper tuning is a whole another video on its own but we're just going to cover some basics. You can build your own paper tuner just like I've done. Buy some PVC pipe and roll of paper from local hardware store. Generally you want to be eight to ten feet from your target. Again hold your bow steady as you can. Make sure you're not torquing the bow and once we shoot through then we'll see what the paper looks like and go from there. So that what that's telling us is this is where your point hit and that's where your fletchings hit. Okay. Which means you are that is knock low. Knock on the cams first because that could be a cam timing issue. Could be and you want to make sure your cams are timed perfectly first. Right. Meaning when when you're drawing the bow back they both hit at the same hit at the same time. Yeah. Yep. Yep. Yep. When you're drawing it can you feel any difference or do they feel like they're locking in the same. It wasn't really paying attention. It's kind of like more like listening at the draw cycle. So I don't know. We'll shoot another one. Yeah. Okay. So this time when you draw it try to pay attention to the cams. Feel it. If not that's what the press is for. Here we go. Real slow. Really paying attention here. That seemed like it hit at the same time. Knock low. We got the same. So that's good. That means I'm my grip is consistent. It's knock low. Now how do we make the adjustments? Now we're going to make our adjustments. Yep. Generally when you're paper tuning you chase your point. So we're going to the rest up just a little bit. Okay. Which means we got to take this off. Adjust that. But as we do this we're going to shoot it again and if it gets worse then we're going to go the other way. So bring the unit up. Yep. So then here's your micro adjust. So you see on the top where up is going to go counterclockwise. Yeah. A couple extra clicks for good measure. Now that we've removed the rest up that's going to shorten your cable. So we may need to adjust the timing on the rest. Okay. That make sense? So we might need to bring this up again. Give it a little more. Just give it a little extra. All right. So now I'm going to pay attention to timing. When the two cams hit the back wall make sure that rest flips up. Make sure your timing marks on the rest. Yeah. Timing marks on the rest. Okay. Here we go. It came up a little early didn't it? Still knock low. Not as bad as it was. Well for some reason the cord clamp is not clamping and so we are going to just put the rest cable through the bow cable. But to do that we've got to have the press. Shout out to MidwayUSA for the bow press. Thanks. Okay. So we're going to just split this cable here. Yeah. We can't really adjust it like this. Very good opinion. Yeah. This is actually a lot easier. Oh is it? Oh because it'll stay? Yeah. Oh dude that's way easier. I'm again I'm glad we're having to do all this. I think we should pull that tighter though. I think leave it for now because as you pull it'll loosen the first couple times. And then if it's too tight. Yeah. So this is like an automatic. You don't have to sit and fiddle with screw adjustment. Yeah. Okay. Hang on. You're not tight. Hold it. Shoot. Yeah. Still knock low dude. Okay. So we're not exactly sure why him and I are bullshitting knock low. So we're going to double check timing. Okay. Start cranking it. Okay. So we're looking for these points right here and on the bottom. See how the bottom is touching right there and the top there's a gap right here? Oh yeah. So your cams are out of time just a touch. Yeah. So what we got to do is a string twist. This string is because it needs to be lengthened. So we're going to take a twist out just a touch of that top. Because this one was hitting quicker right? The bottom one was. Yeah. So we can find which way to twist. Just do that. See just that little bit is something that you can't feel when you're doing it with just pulling it back yourself. Bro the top hits a little quicker. Okay. So we just need to do half a twist there. Okay. So you got to make sure you. So we did. We just want to go half a twist. Okay. And then make sure you bend that to go with half twist or sometimes hard because the cable depending on which way it goes. Timing on point. Yes. Yeah. Spot on. All right. Let's see if that makes a difference in the knock-low chair. Hmm. Still the same. That's. So now that we adjusted the cams perhaps now we need to move the micro just down. Trial and error. Here we go. Sometimes like this you make adjustments and nothing happens. So you got to figure out what the problem is. Better. Way better. Yeah. Let's move it down just a little more. Okay we'll go down. Now the cable needs to go down too right? Yeah just pull it through a little bit. We might just have it here. We're getting there. We're getting there. We'll see. It's a little better too isn't it? A little better. So now next one we're going to make two adjustments. We're going to go down still with the rest and then we're going to move it right. So we're knock right and low still. So let's go down. Now we're going to take this one. Move it right. Correct. So we just made that adjustment once again. Let's go ahead and shoot it. See if that did the trick. Fresh new paper. We're getting there. Still not perfect. You can see the points are just a touch high. So we need to go down just a hair. Yeah but we're good left to right now. Yeah left to right. Yes yes yes finally two hours later. I mean you can see how critical right that just that half a twist on the string of what that did because before all the adjustments we made nothing really changed. So we're still what? High? Good. So we're gonna go down. Down just like two or three clicks. That's all I'm gonna do. Here's the money one right here. There it is. Can I tell you can I just tell you how satisfying that is to be able to tune this myself and and shoot a bullet hole? Like obviously I wouldn't be able to do it without you so thank you. But like especially after the frustration of yeah that was making adjustments not knowing and then we only did a half a twist on the string to get the cables and once we got the cams timed which we should have done first but. Yeah we probably should have done that first. So do you are you why did we add half a twist to the top? Because it was slower than the bottom. That's why we added the half a twist at the top and not the bottom right? So if the if the string is longer right but well it was actually. It was longer here so it was slower here. Yes. It was hitting slower. So that's why we added half a twist to speed it up so that it would hit. So it was actually shorter which made this one touch faster. This one was shorter. You have to think of these because this cable wraps around so if it's shorter it doesn't come around as far. Gotcha. Right? So we added half a twist so that it came around the same time. We gave it length. We gave it length. Okay. Yep. Dude all right let's uh let's tie a peep in. Well put the put the side on. Put a peep in. Put a peep in. So we're gonna try this peep that doesn't require serving and see how it holds up. Traditionally that's not what I've used in the past. I've used the Hamski Raptor like that's in the Lift-X right there. But we're gonna try this and see if we can figure this guy out. So back in the press we go. Because again we gotta we gotta put this in. Gotta have you draw it back. Make sure it's comfortable. It may twist on us depending on how the string. So you're just trying to take the threads right there and split them in the middle? Split them in the middle. Get get as even as you can. Are you counting threads at this point or no? I am not. You're just kind of guessing. Just guess yeah. So the way this works is those wrap around like that. This one comes around the top like that. But should this slide up and down on you? How do you move this up and down? It's not it's not supposed to under tension right? So when you let the bow out of the press the idea is that because it's wrapped around it's not going to move. So you don't need to tie it in. But to adjust it we're gonna have to put it in the press so that it releases the tension of the string. So it will move. I just moved it there. Watch this. But once you once you take it out of the press it won't move. All right here's the thing. We can't see where the peep needs to be until we figure out what the heck we're looking at. So we need to install the sight first. So this peep because it's got a half an inch. I don't know what these are these vertical things here but it's legs legs whatever. We're limited on what we can do here. So we got the three pin vert. Get it in the old bridge lock huh? Let's try that boys. That way I know what I'm looking through when I draw my bow. Yeah it's too freaking low. That's good. So I'll just slide that up. About out of adjustment there. What would you do? Well depends on how the string lays. See how it wants to twist on you already? Uh-huh. Is just take it out and leave. Let's take it out and put it in like this because the string naturally wants to lay that way anyways. It's kind of a pain to get in there isn't it? Yeah a little bit. Did you get it? So now we got to go all the way up. Yeah push it up all the way. Yeah I don't mind this peep. It's not what the pros do but. Not everybody's a pro. Not everyone's a pro. So when you're doing your when you're doing your press always keep pressure on that to make sure everything stays in the track. Okay. I mean that'll work. I think we can get a little bit more out of it. About maxed out there boys and girls. See if we can make this work. Gosh this is kind of fun. Well guys leave in the comments all the things that I did wrong. Actually leave in the comments all the things he did wrong. Yeah. And he was trying to teach me so we did a few things out of order but whatever. We still got a tie on this cable though too. Again goes back to trial and error. This is how you learn. You make a lot of mistakes. You do things on your own and eventually you learn. See I've set up a lot of bows and still make mistakes so I'm okay with it. Dude that works for me man. It honestly does. That works dude. There we go we just set up our own bow. So we are going to put this bow in the bow press for the last time and tighten this arrow. Just the string itself? Yeah. Close enough? Yep. Okay cut it. Now this is just me again I would I like to leave a little bit so don't cut it right against there cut it out here and then burn it gives you if you ever make an adjustment you know gives you some room to play with fire is away from your that's good yep there you go there you have it guys subscribe to the video leave a comment tell us all the things we did wrong or we could do better because we're always learning and improving so hopefully this will help help you guys help somebody with the back to business stop talking to the kid like I'm acting different ain't nobody seen nothing you can ask the witness racks to riches young star asteristic hey back to business stop talking to the kid like I'm acting different ain't nobody seen nothing you can ask the witness