The HuntingPA.com Outdoor Community banner

Fixed or expanbables ??

5K views 42 replies 23 participants last post by  bohunr 
#1 ·
I have always used fixed broadheads , since I`m looking to get new ones this I was thinking of switching to expendable's. I`m not sure what I want to do. Which one do you prefer and why ?
 
#5 ·
The only way they fly better is if your bow is out of tune. Mechanicals have little wind resistance which is why they fly like field points. Fixed heads will fly just like a field point if your tuning is true. More damage on the animal is subjective, if i hit bone I want a fixed head. If i hit guts a mechanical will be better. I have zero desire to shoot a mechanical, personal preference.
 
#4 ·
Well this thread should get interesting. It always does.
At one time I shot fixed but now for many years I only shoot expendable's . Never had any of the horror stories happen to me that is often brought up such as failure to open or lack of penetration. They always fly well and I have watched several deer drop dead within sight over the years.
To me there really is no difference between an expandable head and a fixed head as long as they are sharp and your bow is tuned.
One reason I prefer expendable's is I don't have to worry about the blade catching my index finger when I shoot. I know the odds of this are very low but the blade is close enough to my hand that it gives me one more thing to think about while shooting. I know others are unaffected by this but for whatever reason it bothers me so I have taken it out of the equation. The less you have to think about things the better your concentration will be when shooting.
 
#6 · (Edited)
I shoot both.

Crossbows cannot be tuned like vertical bows can so sometimes it is necessary to make the move to expandables if you are not getting good accuracy with fixed heads. You can often tighten the fixed head groups by going with spine indexed arrows or playing with front of center balance and arrow length. If you are getting good accuracy with fixed heads, there is no great reason to try mechanicals.

A fixed head and mechanical of the same cutting diameter cause the same damage.

You can generally get a bigger cutting diameter with mechanicals without potentially creating accuracy issues. The little extra cut diameter is a slight advantage if your shot is a touch off. The extra 1/2 inch may be the difference between a flesh wound and a kill shot. I use bigger mechanicals when I am turkey hunting cause the kill zone is so small.

I shot a black bear with a expandable a month ago but I am switching over to Slick Trick fixed heads for an upcoming wild hog hunt just for a little added insurance on hogs.

Bottom line is if your primary interest is deer, and you are currently getting good flight from fixed heads, there is no great advantage to switching to mechanicals in crossbows, IMO.
 
#9 ·
I am pretty interested in this thread. I just got the call that my Tenpoint Nitro will be in this week and I can go pick it up. It will be an impressive step up in speed from what I am currently shooting and I've been wondering what kind of issues that I will get into as far as broadhead selection goes...I look forward to comments regarding broad heads traveling at those velocities...
 
#26 ·
I have shot 2 bucks the last two years with shwackers both died quickly one went 30 yards the other 60. Problem was neither left much of a blood trail. Didn't matter on the first because I saw him drop but the second wasn't easy to find. Both exited the deer like it wasn't even there. Honestly I am thinking of switched to a three blade as it seems they leave a better blood trail
 
#13 ·
I know it happens to guys from time to time. I generally have the bow resting in the web of my hand between my thumb and index finger with my fingers extended. Not wrapped around the bow or gripping it the way some guys like to shoot. The thought of a razor sharp broad head passing a inch from my finger going over 300 FPS just doesn’t sit well with me.
 
#12 ·
This will be new to me because it will be my first year using a crossbow. I have cross bolts rigged with Rage Hypodermics for deer and Wack em fixed blades for hogs. I am shooting a Carbon Express 390. I depended on the advice of the guys in the pro shop where I bought my Crossbow.
 
#14 ·
A broadhead thru the boiler room will kill a deer with monotonous regularity regardless if it is an expandable or fixed blade. Now in certain situations a small fixed blade may work better than a large expandable or vice versa. If you find something that shoots well in your setup then stay with it. Make sure that the blades are sharp. Only other thing I do especially with expandables is to check it when I am loading in the bow to make sure the band is properly on the head and everything looks good. Again the key is to find something that shoots good in your setup.
 
#16 ·
As the other posters have said well. Tune the bow, the rest is easy. Whatever you choose make sure you got some great paper tuning in before hand.


I am still shooting Rock Mountain Premier 125's and will never give them up... I had one that shot 8 deer with, finally ruined it, twisted up another...
 
  • Like
Reactions: Danesdad
#23 ·
About a year ago I did some research for an article I wrote. With mechanical broadheads, in most cases, the crossbow versions of broadheads have stronger blade retention systems than the regular versions. If you use crossbow versions, you should be good. I believe I looked at regular and crossbow broadheads from 8 different manufacturers.
 
#21 ·
I've had poor luck with expandables, but it's been LUCK...nothing that could EVER be blamed on the head. I've had slam dunk shots be misses, lost a few deer...I won't say the name of the head because it's NOT the head's fault. I just had a lot of bad luck whenever I had one of those heads on my arrow.

I switched back to standard, plain jane, boring 3-blade Muzzy heads mid season because of this terrible run of bad luck. I literally hunted about 45 seconds and killed a buck that cruised by just at the opening minute of that day. Of the last 4 bucks I've killed with a bow, all were with the same 3-blade Muzzy. One went about 80-100 yards down and open access road and died in the middle of it. One died in sight after a 40 yard sprint downhill. Another died in sight after a 30-35 yard uphill run. And the last one died in a bed after 90 yards and a liver hit.

I've been thinking lately that I want to switch to a compact head at least, as those big old Muzzy heads look ridiculous on my skinny little FMJ shafts, but man...it works.

Even paper tuning for compounds, I've found, is NOT the end of bow tuning. Then I've found bows need broadhead tuning to bring broadheads to the same POI as field points. THEN I consider the bow tuned, when broadheads and FP's hit in the same group to at least 50 yards.
 
#22 ·
I’ve been using 100 grain 3 blade Spitfires for over 20 years. Probably killed 30 deer with them.I’ve never broke a blade in a deer..,,bent a few. I know there’s been a lot of new ones out now, just never saw a need to switch.

I have however gone to the Crossbow rated Spitfires since I started using a crossbow.
 
#24 ·
NAP 100 grain spitfires out of my Parker crossbow, killed 3 deer with the same broadhead, just cleaned it off real good and put it back in the quiver. blades were sharp enough to cut a rubber band every time and put a crease in my finger nail.


very accurate
 
#27 ·
I have really wanted the expandable I was carrying to work out for me. I think they're a great head, but my gosh... I just had a black cloud following me around whenever I hunted with them. It's no fault of the head, and I'm usually not superstitious like that, but it was pretty stark how bad my luck got when I had those heads on my arrows, lol.

I may toss one back in my quiver this fall and if I get a nice shot on a nice mature doe and want to take it, maybe I'll run one again and see if I can make some better luck with them.

I really want to change to either a Slick Trick or compact Muzzy, as they're a better fit on my FMJ's, but dang if those old, big Muzzy heads don't just work, and it's hard to stop using something that works so well.
 
#29 ·
I'll spare you the long winded reason why I see no advantage in any scenario with a mechanical and just say this.I'm no expert with crossbows but bought my son a stryker 380 several years ago when he turned 8.We played around with it a ton and never had any issue getting fixed blades to work well at 380 fps.He ended up using 100gr slick trick mags because I had a ton of them in stock.They shot perfect and every deer dropped within sight,except for one that was hit in the liver and it made it about 80 yards.
 
#30 ·
You're right, of course. I don't deny that. I just get stubborn, lol.

I have seen more than one drop in sight with my old style Muzzy's. Going to an expandable was driven by a desire for a heavier blood trail, but.... I can't say I haven't found a well-hit deer. I've lost deer, yes...because I made a poor shot.

This past fall, my buck started moving as I released. The result was that the arrow went through his liver only. I didn't even brush against a lung....pure liver hit.

I found him without a blood trail, HOWEVER...I went back the next day (this was right behind my house) and found the blood trail in the daylight. There was GREAT blood from about 10' from where I hit him all the way (~95 yards) to where he laid down. Very good blood...had I been on the right trail, it'd have been super easy to follow even in the dark. I just heard him drop and thrash and didn't need it.

The Muzzy has never given me a "red carpet" blood trial. But if lungs/heart/liver are involved, I haven't had any issues recovering them, either.


On the topic of Spitfires----

My father uses them. I've also taken a few with them. They are a very effective head, however, there is one "gotcha" I've observed with that opening mechanism that the Spitfire employs.

They do NOT open on contact, despite what is said about them. Rage used to have (maybe they still do) high-speed slo-mo footage of a Spitfire going into hide, and what it shows is that the blades open AFTER punching into the hide. I thought "ok, it's Rage, that's marketing."

Then I started looking at every deer my father took with them. Son of a gun if the entry wounds aren't exactly like the footage on the Rage site. Every time. So, you get about a 40-caliber hole on entry.

So, here's where this can become a factor.

Entries are often higher than exits with an arrow, since many bowhunters are in treestands aiming down at their quarry.

If you have a dead perpendicular shot angle, this is pretty well inconsequential, as the lower opening, the exit, is big (blades are fully expanded), and that's the primary source of "leakage". All is good here.

But what happens if you hit the far shoulder or for some other reason have NO exit? Here's where life gets interesting. Or, if the shot is such that the exit is behind the diaphragm (quartering angle), it's effectively the same thing, because once the exit is aft of the diaphragm, blood really doesn't come out that opening much, as the diaphragm acts as a dam of sorts, keeping blood forward of the diaphragm, until it fills enough to spill through the hole the head made in the diaphragm, but at that point, the animal is likely down. And, it'd have to work through the viscera to the exit, which is often clogged with viscera. For whatever reason, my father winds up with that kind of shot angle a lot...hitting lungs, back to liver, exits aft of the diaphragm.

The end result is this-

You don't get a blood trail for a good 20-50 yards, because it doesn't really come out till it works its way out the deer's nose/mouth.

So you have a heck of a time of it finding blood for a long time, and then it comes out in buckets right before you find the animal. But those first 50 yards will be the kind of situation that'll keep you awake at night.

Does the same shot angle yield different results with a different head? I haven't compared apples to apples. But I know I've seen this scenario play out a bunch with his spitfires.

I've also noticed with his crossbow that the Spitfires are not great at shoulder blade penetration. Not that we should be counting on such, but if he hits bone, his bolt isn't penetrating far.

Doesn't mean folks shouldn't get Spitfires. Just go into it "eyes open". Stay off bone and get broadside shots...which is what we should be doing regardless of heads anyway, I guess.
 
#31 ·
I bought a pack of 2 bladed spitfires back in the early 90's when the first came out.I shot a smaller doe that was quartering away.I hit just behind the ribs and at the shot,it's guts literally poured out of the entrance hole instantly,The broad head went through the lungs,liver and was sticking out in front of the opposite shoulder.I shot a couple more deer with them without a failure but nothing spectacular happened.They did fly good,which is why I used them at the time.The old TM styled rests and offset fletching weren't always conducive with great BH flight.Today there's really no excuse.
 
#32 ·
I've had no issues tuning multiple bows to send Muzzy's into the same POI/group with my field points out to 50 yards. I read a lot on the web in general about how Muzzy's are super strong but won't hit with field points.

All you have to do is google up the Easton Tuning Guide and follow it and they come together with FP's nicely.

I also notice a trend for folks to do a paper tune and then say "see? I paper tuned and the broadheads and fp's aren't together." Ok...so broadhead tune and then they will be. At the end of it all, if we're tuning a hunting bow, don't you want your broadhead tune to be the "final" tune? That's how I look at it, at least.

Since going to illuminated nocks, I've been amazed to see how little deer seem to slow the arrow shafts with those Muzzy's. It's something to watch that lit up nock streak to the deer, vanish for an instant, and then reappear out the other side. The closest comparison I can make is it looks just like when you paper tune and the way the shafts go through the paper.
 
#33 ·
At the end of the day, it really all boils down to shot placement and taking only good shots. I switched to traditional gear years ago and have had arrows pass clean through deer using two blade Zwickey broadheads out of a 50# longbow that left incredible blood trails. A good buddy of mine who also hunts with traditional bows uses mechanical broadheads(not sure which brand), and that used to be taboo because of low velocity. Helped him drag his buck out last year, great blood trail and complete pass through, broadhead worked flawlessly. I’d say it’s all a matter of preference, if you put the arrow where it needs to be then you will have nothing to worry about. I get it that bad shots happen, I’ve made my share. A lot of it I think is psychological, so shoot what your confident with.
 
#36 ·
A lot of it I think is psychological, so shoot what your confident with.
Spot on. Hit em where you are supposed to and modern broadheads will do their job. Placement trumps what you hit them with every time. Animals are crazy creatures. They can surprise you with what seems like a perfect shot. Many are quick to blame the broadhead.
 
You have insufficient privileges to reply here.
Top