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Mathews Outback ???

hcsafari

hcsafari

Member
As most of you know I purchased a Mathews Outback last year and was fairly pleased with the performance. This year, however is a completely different story.

I began shooting a good bit several weeks ago and after a couple weeks of shooting I began to notice the consistency of the arrow flight and my shot placement was decreasing. I carried my bow to the bow shop and they noticed the alignment holes on the cam were no longer parallel with the string. When I bought the bow I had the draw weight maxed out at 71 lbs. We checked it when I took it in and it was only pulling about 62, so they looked deeper and found that the cable had stretched, leaving everything out of whack. Replaced the cable with a brand new one, tuned the bow (now back up to 71 lb draw weight)and took it home.

After another week of shooting same thing happens. Consistency is gone. I take it in this morning and it's only pulling 65lbs and it's back out of alignment already.

Needless to say I am not happy. I had my old High Country for 13 years without a problem and I have this new, high dollar Mathews for less then a year and alot of problems. It's frustrating to say the least, especially this close to the opener. By now I usually have broadheads on and am ready to sit a stand. Far from it this year.

I e-mailed the tech folks at Mathews, but have not heard back from them.

Anyone else ever experience anything similar of have any ideas that may shed some light on this problem (other then saying I should have bought a Bowtech or Hoyt, cause I may be inclined to agree with you at this point).

Thanks in advance for any help.
 
As you can probably tell from my name, I shoot a Mathews as well, Q2. I had a similar problem, though not to the same degree as you've had. First of all, any string, except possibly the winners choice, will stretch. Most of the stretching will be done by the first two hundred shots or so. I put on a string last year, first one in three years of shooting, and that's shooting quite a bit. My dealer told me to shoot it at least two hundred times and bring it back in to adjust and tune. He said any tuning would be worthless before then. Many have been very happy with the already mentioned winners choice strings and cables, but I just haven't put the dough up to buy a set yet... Hope that helps.

BTW, by "adjust" I mean twisting the cable to bring the bow back into specs.
 
I shot an outback this spring and was somewhat pleased with it...however i didn't have any mechanical problems with it...however, in the past i had a relatively new bow from hoyt that i had a problem with the cam that reaccured once and that was all it took for me to say goodbye to that bow...my theory is that when i spend a good amount of money on a bow, and i work with experienced bow tuners to get it shooting dimes, any mechanical errors are unacceptable. If i were you i would get rid of that bow, and get yourself into a bow tech. I know that sounds bias, and it is cuz i am a bow tech guy, but im telling you their line up of bows right now are extremely easy to shoot, very durable, and they are now extremely fast and quiet...I think a lot of people would agree that they are the best out there right now as far as all aspects of performance and shootability. I think that if you made the change, and really worked hard to tune a new bow to absolute perfection, you would be confident shooting it within a week or two..I did this during the 3D season...got rid of the outback and got a deal with bow tech...took me about a week of shooting it to break it in..then i took it to a tuner and worked with him on getting it "super tuned" ...the following weekend i shot my personal best score, and picked up another tournament win....i would seriously consider getting rid of that bow despite how close to season it is
 
I also want to add that KSQ2 is right...you need to shoot 150-200 shots out of a new bow before tuning, because the strings do stretch...However,I work a lot with tuning and most strings will NOT stretch enough to make your bow drop 5-7lbs....usually the string may stretch 1/4 of an inch or so..but not much...with my new bow i had maybe 1/10in of stretch after 250 arrows.
 
I shoot an Outback too. Bought mine in February. My string has stretched some, but there is no way I'm down to 62lbs. I would guess mine to be 68 to 70 still. It's shooting dimes and I've put at least 1000 arrows through it. I should probably take it in and have the string twisted some, but I've very happy with the performance of my bow. Not sure why yours failed so badly.
 
gotta agree with all the bowtech comments, never shot better scores.

but, to the point of the question. mathews strings have MANY dissatisfied customers. put on top notch strings (winners choice, vapor trail etc.) and run a few undred arrows through it. if that don't work, i can give you the number of a top notch bowtech dealer...LOVES selling iowawhitetail members
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Ah yes...tuning problems of the one cam bows that don't need tuned. Folks, all bows need tuned and almost always, the change in tuning is caused by a change in the string or cables. Don't matter what cams you have on your bow, it can happen. Get the bow that you like and invest in some good strings and cables such as Winners Choice but even with them, expect to maybe do some minor tuning from time to time but much less often that with most factory installed strings and cables.
 
Hey guys thanks for all the insight. Rudd your info was an eye opener.

I wish I could jsut get rid of the problem, i.e. get a different bow - but money is a major issue especially since I dropped a large sum on this bow to start with.

Well here's the latest scoop.

I e-mailed the tech at Mathews before I left Friday. I got a response from him this morning.

"String and cable stretch is normal, you will have it on any bow any model regardless of manufacture. You did not need to replace string and cable do to stretch, you just need to add twists to each to get bow back to spec.Once you have 400 to 500 shots through the bow, the stretch will cease. Those 400 to 500 shots are a break in period for string and cable, nothing wrong with the bow, it is reacting and performing correctly sir "

Only thing is this. My bow is the only one that has shown that kind of problem. The guy at my bow shop had to call Mathews because he had not seen a problem like this before and was baffled. So if what the tech from Mathews said is correct, then my bow is the only one out of hundreds sold from this shop that is "reacting and performing correctly" . Everyone else's Mathews are'nt working right.

When I mentioned that, I was told to check with the string and cable dept. at Mathews and maybe they could give me some insight. Guess I'll try them now.

P. S. I talked back with the guy at the bow shop Friday evening and he said my bow was completely out of spec, due I guess to the cable stretch. Brace height was off, axle to axle was off and draw weight was off.
 
Rob, no need for a new bow....just place an order for a new string/cable from Winners Choice and you will have them in a couple of days. It will take no time to get it dialed in and you will be happy with your bow once again. The strings on both Hoyt's and Mathews suck (IMO). Why a $700 bow does not come equipped with a good quality low stretch string is beyond me. You may have to tweak it a little at the beginning but that peep will stay put for a long time.
 
I agree with rudd....but that mathews dealer obviously didn't understand the significance to your case...bow's do not fluxuate that much just because of string stretch...PERIOD. I think trying new winners choice or vapor trail strings is the only logical solution besides buying a new bow, but personally i think that the factory may have messed up on that specific bow, you should look into getting it replaced if you have the warranty. One way or the other, the problem that has taken place with your bow..i believe, is more than just strings and cables.
 
Your situation sounds all to familiar to me as my Q2....when I owned it did the same thing. Needless to say, it was a bad situation that was not handled well my the mfg and I rid myself of the bow cheaper than dirt on ebay a month later. My situation was a limb gone bad and the string seemingly stretched based on the dealers observation. You are running out of time for season opener, I hope you have better luck getting it resolved than I did.
 
If the problem reoccurred after replacing the cable and re-tuning, which means twisting the swing back into tune, I doubt a different string will solve the problem. No string stretches that much to cause a significant loss in # pulled. There is a major problem with the bow itself. Send it back to Matthews or simply buy a HOYT.
 
after re-reading your problem I would have to agree with the others. It is more than excessive string stretch to be that far out of whack. Your pro shop should stand behind it and lend you a loner til a replacement has been returned to you.
 
How often to you guys change stings/cables? I bought my Outback in February. The sting looks pretty good. There is a little frey to it, but I've put wax on it. Every 1-2 years? Just curious. I'm most likely gonig to go with a WC string when it's time, but I wanted to get as much life out of my zebra as possible. I'm at least going to hunt with it this season, as my bow is shooting very well even with some stretch (amount unknown).
 
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