Draw length is measured from back of the bow. I recommend shooting arrows which are made to your draw length to the base of the point (plus a maximum of enough to allow for one broken off point then be replaced (for field shooting where points breaking off is quite common).
Arrow weight 5grains per pound is more like a minimum for flight shooting. 8-10gpp is more usual. My standard arrows which I use for bows from 30# up to about 55# are round about 400 grain. Heavier bows like a bit more weight.
I think Bickerers bows have max draw length etc written on them.
Del
I have no idea what AMO stands for, and I'm far to grumpy to look it up... good practice is to write out an acronym in full where first used. Sadly very few people do this and we have much technical writing degenerating into mass of TLAs (Three letter Acromyms).
Thanks Del, The bow has a max draw length of 29", which measuring to the back of the bow is ok. Apologies with the acronym, I didn't think to write it out as it's used so much on here (I normally would as a lot of chemical names etc are shortened) - it's Archery Manufacturer and Merchant's Organisation (not sure why it's not AMMO), I think they swapped to the Archery Traders Association (or it was the other way round). Which is pretty much irrelevant for
longbow but the standard for
recurve and
compound - where the draw-length is length to the pivot point + 1.75" which would have been a pit of a push.
Now I just need to assemble a couple of arrows and I can try it out
hopefully my wrist can cope with the draw weight, I think it'll be ok seeing as I wont be holding like with the
recurve/
compound. My other
longbow is a dedicated flight bow so the arrows are going to be too light, I couldn't remember how heavy they were though as it's been a while since I made them.
That would put me up to six bows...