Please help me identify my Yamaha bow

weemanrd

New member
It's a Yamaha bow, but I have no idea what model.
This is my first bow. I bought it second hand from a member of my club, with a good reputation.
There is nothing wrong with the bow, in fact it shoots really well, i'm just want to be able to tell people what it is and not just say "it's a Yamaha".
ImageShack Album - 9 images an album with some images of the riser and limbs.
I've tried searching google, but with no results, please help.
 

DarkMuppet

Member
It's a lovely looking bow you've got there. I had a Yamaha for many years, only stopped shooting it last year actually.
What you have there is a Super Feel. It was made in the mid to late 90's and was one of the last bows Yamaha made. They made a Super Feel 2 just after and then stopped. Their archery wing was actually part of their motorcycle dept.
Those Super Ceramic limbs you have are arguably some of the best that have ever been made, some would say that many today are still playing catch up.

All of Yamaha's dies and bow making equipment was later bought and used as a basis for his own bows by Sebastian Flute (SF Archery) which is now a part of Win and Win.

Hope you enjoy shooting it, it's a rare beastie now! :D
 

dropbear

Member
As the photo of logos on the riser shows..it is a Yamaha SuperFeel Forged with Yamaha Super Ceramic Carbon limbs.

I believe this was the second last bow made by Yamaha, the last one being the Superfeel Forged 2. After this they went out of business due to not making enough money in their archery division. Win&Win bought all Yamaha's archery technology and used it to make the Sebastian Flute range of recurves.
 

JohnK

Well-known member
If I remember correctly, the SuperFeel Forged riser only came in 23in, which would make that a 66in bow.

Lovely bows, and very quick. However, you will have trouble buying accessories for it as all the threads are metric, including the button.
 

weemanrd

New member
Thank you everyone for your help.
If Win&Win used the Yamaha technology for the SF range, does that mean i would be able to use SF limbs with the riser?
I like the bow as it is, but it's a 38 pound draw, which I find hard to draw at times.
 

DarkMuppet

Member
Sorry but all the SF equipment uses ILF (international limb fitting) which is pretty much the standard across all archery manufacturers now, apart from recent Hoyts which use another type again.
The only way for you to get lower poundage limbs is to keep an eye on Ebay and the private ads here.
There is a dealer in Holland that has quite a few old limbs and risers, will take a look for it and let you know. :)
 

gtek

Member
Their archery wing was actually part of their motorcycle dept.
Incorrect. Yamaha Motor Corp makes motorcycles (along with a slew of other "heavy industry" items, even the engine in my Toyota). The archery division was part of Yamaha Corporation, a separate company, originally Nippon Gakki, best known for musical instruments, and was specifically part of their automotive interior division. Yes, they stuffed archery into a corner of an operation making dashboards for vehicles. This was to allow using some of the same production equipment for both product lines such as CNC routers. This is also why they dumbed - down their last series of limbs to molded parts of highly variable performance. The CNC routers from dashboards were used to produce the limbs. The loss they took on the SFF2's near 100% return rate killed off the business.

W&W bought some simple squeeze casting equipment, their "technology acquisition" was never what they implied it to be.
 

Rik

Supporter
Supporter
The original Superfeel with the ceramic limbs was a pretty good bow, at the time. And damn expensive. ?1000+ for the riser and limbs. A very nice looking bow as well. Pity about the name :).
But Yamaha seemed to lose interest after that, then canned the archery division and sold some equipment to W& W.
Win & Win tried to imply they'd bought some sort of IP with the machinery, by talking about buying "technology" and the first SF bow looked a lot like the Superfeel...
But that may just have been Flute's preference, as he shot Yamaha.
 

weemanrd

New member
?1000? Seriously? I only payed ?400 for the bow, arrows, case and pretty much everything I needed to start. like I said, the guy had a great reputation.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2
 

JohnK

Well-known member
That does seem a fair price. Just bear in mind the difficulty of upgrading the kit. If you change bows, you'll likely need to change most of the rest of the kit, and therefore sell it as a package.

Enjoy!
 

DarkMuppet

Member
Here's a video of the Superforged being made ..
[video=youtube;eF5X-pHnOOM]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eF5X-pHnOOM[/video]

:)
 

Rik

Supporter
Supporter
Thank you everyone for your help.
If Win&Win used the Yamaha technology for the SF range, does that mean i would be able to use SF limbs with the riser?
I like the bow as it is, but it's a 38 pound draw, which I find hard to draw at times.
IIRC weight adjustment was using shims in the limb pockets. So if you can lay your hands on some shims, you should be able to reduce the weight a bit...
 

i32547

New member
Your photo link doesn't seem to be working for me on the iphone...
I have a Yamaha alpha ex and a Yamaha eollo. With super ceramic limbs.
What weight are your limbs, as I mentioned am unable to view your pictures. If you want to sell the limbs ill have them...?

Isa
 

weemanrd

New member
They are 38 pounds at 28 inches, but sadly I don't see myself selling them for quite some time, sorry.

Sent from my GT-I9300 using Tapatalk 2
 

Stretch

Well-known member
Keep an eye on the "thermoplastic" plates on the riser. The limb pushes against the plate and the plates are prone to cracking. I believe that all initial plates cracked and allegedly the replacement plates did not. Might be worth contacting a shop like Quicks to see if they have any old stock plates. The cracking was pretty obvious and the bow gets noisy when the plate cracks. If it cracks, don't shoot it.

Super Feel limbs were either awesome or rubbish - depends how lucky you got (IMO) - if the bow is quiet and the limb recover is good then you have a good set. SFF1 was 23" only SFF2 was 24" AFAIR

Stabilisers can be re- bushed to 5/16 but some folks still make 8mm pressure buttons.
 

Stretch

Well-known member
(Off topic, but...)

Stretch! How's things?
Great thanks - very busy with work and family (2 Five year old daughters) so not much time to talk archery... Or shoot much...

But returning to topic - Simon Needham and Links Archery Club folks in Montrose know everything anyone needs to know about Yammys.

Stretch
 
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