Today I sat down and hand tapered a dozen shafts. After I was done my hands were a little achy (I have a touch of arthritis) so I said to heck with this and went to some supplier sites looking for the Woodchuck Power Taper tool. To my dismay not a single site had one for sale. My question is this, do they make them anymore?
Don't know if they're still made. Can often find them used on the auction site. If you have a table saw or disk sander, can make your own. Quite easy to make a taper board. Some have even figured out a way to do it with hand held and bench belt sanders. A quick look in the archives or U-Tube would likely turn up a bunch of how-tos.
I use a table top belt/disc sander. The tapers are 11 degrees for the nock and 5 degrees for the point. I use a board with "V" grooves cut to those degrees for the shaft to rest in.
I'm with Pat B - disk sander and home-made jig. I tried several different taper tools that used a blade and none of them worked well enough for my liking. Minor point though - the nock taper is 11 and a half degrees.
I had a woodchuck taper tool and sold it.
It worked ok, but they are expensive.
Unless you plan on doing many many dozens of arrows, I would setup a jig like mentioned above.
A homemade jig will work just as well as the woodchuck tool.
Someone makes what is called the perfect taper tool. It works on a drill and does a great job.
Traditional Archery Products/Gary Renfro. Google it.
Thank you guys for the information.
Quote from: Pat B on April 03, 2019, 05:42:17 PM
I use a table top belt/disc sander. The tapers are 11 degrees for the nock and 5 degrees for the point. I use a board with "V" grooves cut to those degrees for the shaft to rest in.
Yep if I shot woods that's the way I'd do it. For that matter that's what I did but went to carbon
Harbor Freight makes a cheap benchtop combo disc/belt sander that works pretty well for this. I use the disc sander portion.
Can't beat the one Gary Renfro makes. WORKS GREAT
Yes the perfect taper tool comes with 3 tools for 5/16, 11/32 and 23/64.
Andy of Addictive Archery is making belt sander disk jig.https://www.addictivearchery.com/collections/arrow-building-supplies-and-tools/products/tims-taper-tool-for-barrel-tapers