How to Paper Tune a Bow: Your Step-by-Step Guideline

Quick Summary

In this article, I want to share a very important step that can either be really easy or incredibly complicated for archery. This step is called Paper Tuning.

It’s something that archers study on their arrow flight with the rips which are created by the arrow on a piece of paper they use.

Paper tuning is not the only method to adjust perfect arrow flight, but it is a guideline and a good way to start achieving your accuracy goal.

In-depth: Paper Tuning

Some people think this is a process they should do only they purchase a new bow. However, this is completely wrong.

You should make this adjustment every time you change something on the bow, like a new bow sight, arrow rest, draw weight, and, of course, new arrows.

In short, every time you change a parameter that effects your shot.

We are using paper tuning to figure out if there’s anything that doesn’t work properly like rest placement, string twists or nocking point, the D loop, etc.

Paper tuning is just a simple frame with a piece of paper in the middle. The arrow is coming off the bow perfectly straight to the paper and creates a shape behind. This shape is like a snapshot of the arrow’s flight.

As a result, that imprint will help us to find an answer to the question of how to adjust our bow.

The Shape on the Paper

When you properly shoot through the paper, the arrow will fly and tune/mark the paper. Our main purpose is to see a hole in the center that shows your arrow shafts cuts on the paper perfectly with three framed tears around from the fletchings.

This also shows us; the arrow has a great flight.

You can get different types of tears before your setup such as nock high, nock low, tail left, tail right, and sometimes a combination of these problems.

Once you adjust it perfectly, arrows will come off straight, and that means you’re ready to shoot! (Shape A)

Shape B is an also tolerable left tail which is ok if you’re right-handed. But your ultimate goal should be to obtain the perfect shape which has a bullet hole in the center.

Bow Setup

The first thing you should do to achieving well-tuned equipment is to ensure the initial setup of your bow has been done correctly.

After that, paper tuning can be an easy adjustment phase.

Therefore, we suggest you follow our guideline to initial equipment setup and eliminate most of the possible confusions which cause paper tuning problems.

Install the Nocking Point

First, choose your shooting style. For the most popular shooting setups are mentioned below.

Clamp-on types are ideal for the moveable nocking point. Position the nocking point on the bowstring about ½’’(1,3 cm) above the horizontal axis for RF and CF and approximately ¼’’(0,6 cm) above the horizontal axis for CR. You can see the shape below.

Find the Limb Centers

To be able to adjust the arrow’s position on the bow, you should find and mark the center of the limbs (balanced limb center for the compound bow).

Recurve Bows

To find the center of limbs on a recurve bow, place a piece of masking tape across the inside of each limb a few inches from the riser. With a pen, make a vertical mark on tape in the center of each limb.

Compound Bows

With compound bows, you can use masking tape just like the recurve bows.

Consequently, this will compensate for the amount the cam is offset from the real center of the limb. The distance of 3/16’’(4,8 mm) is an average offset difference for most compound bows.

Adjust the Arrow’s Left/Right Position

Releasing the string with fingers creates a horizontal bending effect on the arrow. On the other hand, using a release aid causes a slight up/down bending effect.

Because of this, the arrows must be positioned differently for each type of release.

It is necessary to adjust the horizontal position of the cushion plunger or let the arrow rest so the center of the arrow will be perfectly aligned with your type of shooting release.

Finger Release

Align the center point of the arrow with the bowstring properly.

Mechanical Release

The center line of the arrow must be aligned with the bowstring when the bowstring is aligned with the balanced limb center beforehand.

Adjust the Arrow Rest

The arrow rest support must be invisible from the overhead view. But be sure enough of the flipper arm is extended to hold the arrow on the rest safely. (RF, CF)

On the other hand, compound bows commonly use the launcher type rests, and it should be narrow enough to allow the two fletchings without any contact. (CR)

Understanding the Shape Meanings

When you see a shape like this, you can understand where the point of your arrow first hit the paper and how it leaves it.

That shows us how the arrow flies through the target.

In this case, arrow direction turns right and creates a hole in the paper. But its shaft comes from the left relative to the arrowhead.

So, the tail of the arrow enters the paper nearly ¼’’ left from the arrowhead with the fletchings.

To fix this, you should first look at the yoke, not the rest. You see a left tear. So, just add a twist to the left yoke to change the slope of the cam a little. But, remember twisting to that direction, causing tightening.

Don’t Ruin Your Shot

Below are some different reasons can ruin your shot and your accuracy. Make sure that you check the list before shooting.

By going through this list and correcting potential problems, you get an immediate indication of potential problem areas and can troubleshoot them ahead of time.

Right or left tears can be easily adjusted by moving your arrow rest to the right or left.

Step-by-Step Guideline for How to Paper Tune a Bow

Let’s start the paper tuning to achieve the best shot. We’ve prepared a step-by-step guideline for you.

You can consider, there are lots of parameters like draw weight, draw length or depending on your choosing arrow types, slicers, bow release, or finger release, like that.

All of these can affect your shot in different ways. So, for stable shooting, you should paper tune every time you change something for your shot.

Another important bit of advice we can give you is to set your arrow rest to be at the center shot that the bow producer recommends.

Guideline

Some Common Mistakes

Sometimes even if you adjust your arrow rest, you can see the problem is not solved. In this case, you can understand that there is another issue.

A lot of times, it happens because of improper flight due to face contact or because of release.

Except these, there many common mistakes made by rookies. However, you can learn how to avoid them.

Face Contact

If you release the string coming out away from your face, you will send the arrow away all the time, and this will cause your arrow rest to be unable to correct the shot.

In case you have too much face contact with the arrow shaft, it will cause that arrow to get away from your face every time, and arrow rest won’t be able to correct that either.

Moreover, if you draw back and have contact between your chin and the string, your chin can twist the string a little bit, which makes it a tear right. So, if you consistently have a right tear, even if you do everything correctly, the first thing to do is draw your bow back, hold it away from your face and shoot as a test shot and see if it changes anything.

That will help you to find out if you’re using a twist effect with your chin to the string involuntary.

If you’re torquing the grip, then you’re going to find these left and right tears. Even if you adjust the rest, you’ll see the tears on the tuning paper. There are lots of comments on the internet whereby people did everything right and still did not see the result they wanted. In most of these cases, the problem was the grip. Tune is affected by the grip.

High and Low Tears

For the high and low tears, you should move your arrow rest in the same direction as a tear. Even if you move your arrow rest up and down according to high tear or low tear, and if you still have the same tear, it means that your arrow shaft could be too stiff.

If you think this is the case, increase the poundage of your bow just a few pounds and check to see if the hole (the tearing) gets better or not.

Also, you can do the same thing by adding point weight to the arrow shaft.

For High tears; If you still get an error, even after you move your rest up, that indicates the veins contact too much with the rest and are skipping up every time you shoot. Don’t worry. It’s a very common problem that most people encounter.

These are the tips and basic steps you should follow to get the best results when paper tuning.

Analysing your Results / How to Adjust the Shot?

After shooting, it’s time to examine the hole the arrow made in the paper. Our ultimate goal is to achieve the perfect shape, which is of the arrowhead and fletchings entering the paper in the same hole.

But, mostly, we’ll see different types of shapes before achieving this perfect flight. You can see the types of tears and how they can be fixed by looking at the chart below.

Tips for Analyzing

Most Common Tear: Combination of the Ribs

Sometimes you can see a different shape that’s shown below. It can be a combination of the rips.

In this case, the recommendation is correcting the vertical tear first then work on the horizontal correction. If you still experiencing a tuning problem, we advise you to go to your local archery shop and check the ‘’timing’’ of your cams.

When you achieve a perfect shape on the paper, you’ll be ready for a great shot.

Our Advise for How to Paper Tune a Bow

We advise you to make a horizontal row of about 5-6 aiming point and shoot a set of 6 arrows.

After that, you should analyze what kind of pattern you get. It shouldn’t be any different type of shape.

If there are, most probably the problem is in your form. If they all the same just continue the row below.

At close distances, shoot 2-3 inches below your aiming point, You will end up with a series of rows of holes. Get little notes on each shot and what you did to adjust the tuning.

After that, you will end up with something you will keep as a solid adjustment for future use

This question is asked, especially by new archers more than anything else. The bow must be tuned to achieve maximum accuracy. But it is impossible to proceed accurately with the tuning process unless you have a consistent shooting form.

You can test your consistency by shooting groups. After that, you’re ready to move on to paper tuning.

Bonus: DIY advice! How to make a Bow Paper Tuning System

A good, old cardboard box makes one of the best paper tuning system. Plus, you can do it by yourself—homemade. Just cut a hole slightly smaller than a piece of paper in the front of the box and fix your paper over it with standard tape.

Make sure that you’re shooting into the paper parallel with the ground.

References

Tuning a Recurve Bow by Ed Eliason – Retrieved from. https://d36m266ykvepgv.cloudfront.net/uploads/media/sRi0CJ495I/o/recurvebowtuningguide-edeliason.pdf

Easton – Arrow Tuning and Maintenance Guide – The Complete Archer’s Resource. Retrieved from. http://www.wvac.asn.au/docs/TuningGuideEaston.pdf

https://www.wikihow.com/Tune-a-Compound-Bow

https://www.magnumarchery.co.za/news/paper-tuning

https://www.hunting-bow.com/blogs/news/how-to-paper-tune-a-bow

https://www.huntingnet.com/forum/technical/248435-paper-tuning-question-left-handed-bow.html

https://www.archerytalk.com/vb/showthread.php?t=3888329

https://www.archerytalk.com/vb/showthread.php?t=1121245

https://www.archerytalk.com/vb/showthread.php?t=1960770

Lancaster Archery Supply / NRTR 12 – Paper Tuning (Youtube)

SoleAdventure.com / Bow Setup & Tuning (6) — How to Paper Tune (Youtube)

Bow Life TV / Levi Morgan’s Game Break “Paper Tuning” (Youtube)

LCArchery / Thing A Week #6 | “Paper Tuning 101” (Youtube)

PSE Archery / Bow Setup DVD – Introduction to Paper Tuning (Youtube)