1. Field of the Invention
The invention relates to an archery bow stabilizer and vibration dampener particularly adapted to inhibit bow torque during arrow release, thus accomodating a more accurate arrow flight path, and to also dampen and attenuate vibrational energy released in the bow per se by the violent return of the bow limbs to the at rest postion after arrow launch.
Recent years have seen an increased public interest in field and target archery. Concurrently with this growth, investigation into the physical aspects of arrow launch has been undertaken to effect techniques to improve the archer's accuracy. These investigations have shown that some archers torque the bow off target line by involuntary muscular reaction during arrow cast. Torque and resulting bow movement is also produced by a physical reactive effect known as the "archer's paradox". Briefly, just prior to arrow release, the forward portion of the arrow is physically resting against the bow at the arrow plate and the arrow nock at the rear is engaging the bow string with the archer's fingers embracing the arrow and holding the drawn string. At release, the bow string rolls slightly to the left off of the archer's fingers and the arrow nock moves to the left with the string. The thrust of the bow draw-weight is transferred to the arrow which causes the arrow to bend and induce a torque applied against the arrow plate on the bow. This action moves the bow slightly and the arrow reverses its bend and passes from the bow at the arrow plate without touching said plate. On true center shot bows, of recent design, the torque action is somewhat reduced.
In addition to bow torquing archer's are familiar with the fact that vibration and "bow kick" upon arrow release are frequently the cause of many inaccurate shots. Vibration and bow kick are also physically discomforting to the archer engaged in frequent contests requiring many shots over a short period of time. 2. Discription of the Prior Art
To aid in controlling bow torque, devices called stabilizers have been developed by archery technicians. Initially, the stabilizers consisted of adding weight internally to the grip section of the bow. The added weight increased bow stability by increasing the inertial capacity of the bow. Thereafter, the idea developed to provide an arm and extend the added weight forwardly of the bow to provide a "lever arm" and further increase the inertial movement resistive capactiy of the bow. Prior stabilizers have been provided that are adjustable in length and weight. There have been both stiff and soft couplers where the stabilizer rod is attached to the bow. Soft couplers consists of the interposition of resilient rubber-like material in the connection line. The purpose of the resilient material is to prevent rigid contact path between the rod and weighted head of the stabilizer and the bow per se. Examples of these prior art structures are U.S. Pat. No. 3,524,441, dated Aug. 18, 1970 and U.S. Pat. No. 4,135,486, dated Jan. 23, 1979. In addition, U.S. Pat. No. 3,412,725, dated Nov. 26, 1968 discloses a bow having hollow cylinders embeded in the body of the bow above and below the grip section and extending transversly of the bow body. Spring loaded pistons are disposed in the cylinders to provide inertial resistance to torque and a viscous liquid is placed in the cylinders to dampen sustained oscillations and prevent the noise of metal to metal contact of the weighted piston with the cylinder.