Kaya Korean ?

[osmiu]

... the Wind Fighter bow made in China

this is a supposition , not a fact .

[cristian_iepure]

cristian_iepure wrote:
... the Wind Fighter bow made in China
this is a supposition , not a fact .

I have seen more than 10 Wind Fighter bows being shipped from the european supplier, and on the sticker applied to every cartboard box it was written the name of the bow, the poundage, and of course, "Made in China". I also own one of these bows and on the box, at the delivery was written the same thing. It would be easier to find out who's the bowyer by sending an email regarding the source of the bows to www.aixbow.de .[/url]

[cristian_iepure]

...and on the other side, on the Kaya cartboard box it's written "Made in Korea". So...

[osmiu]

... so this is a supposition , not a fact . a supposition based on a sticker from a cardboard box . this is not a fact . I buyed 3 such bows and never seen an indication like that bows are "made in China" . maybe the stickers just fly off not wanted to offend me . usually "made in China" stamp is on the product , from harmonica to space rocket . is not a sticker and is not on the wrappage . and the technology used to manufactured the Fighter is obviously korean , not chinese . and Fighter is on the market long before Kaya's birth . by long I meant years . so it can't be a cheap chinese imitation of an unexistent Kaya . remain ipotesis of a korean corporation that produce one type of traditional korean bow in China ? very strange if you ask me . one type of bow and one type alone . for that less you must locate your firm in China ? what for ? what if bows are produced in Korea and wrapped in China for smaller taxes or something ?

It would be easier to find out who's the bowyer by sending an email regarding the source of the bows to wwwaixbow.de

that is a different beast . do that . after that ... you may say that Fighter is a "made in china" bow . until than ... remain just a supposition .

ps : I knew that Fighter was made by an ex korean recurve archer , I didn't remember his name . It is not a question about what is a better bow form this 2 , just It's hard to believe that a single type of a korean traditional bow was made in China , long before Kaya company made her product . so the closest thing to a hwarang at that time and the first korean traditional bow in mass production was build by chinese ? pardon my expression , but it sound like *** . and all that from a sticker on a cardboardbox ? sorry Cristi , but this isn't enough for me .

[osmiu]

well ... I'am not a emailing fan , but Cristi made a good point . someone should email at the most well known hwarang producers for asking what is the designed draw length for each specific hwarang . because I really doubt that majority of this bows are designed to shoot for 34" drawlength . of course that almost every hwarang can draw to 34" , even my fighters did that , but I'am curios what maximum draw length (for shooting) recommend the producers of the hwarang . they should know better , no ?

[dragonman]

Orda, I completely agree. These are beautiful bows, practical at a practical price. I have a horn bow and other sinew/bamboo bows, and they arent especialy practical or even fast, because like you say, its very damp here. These bows would never have 'evolved' in this part of the world. And they are a bother to look after. The grozer bows are fast enough.... I'm a bowyer and seek perfection in bows, although I'll probably never find it...... This makes me overly critical at times. Not everyone has the time or inclination to make his own bow, obviously and these bows are very popular because they combine the best of both worlds, I would love to try out the 'bio-composites'

Warbow & Osmiu, what difference does it make what country the bow is made in???, you like a bow for how its made and how it performs, not where its made???

[Daniel]

"Fighter is on the market long before Kaya's birth"


This is not entirely correct. Certainly I'm not an expert here but I do remember seeing "Kaya" in 3 Rivers Archery '04 or '05 catalog. This was before Windfighter made it's mark on the market. Sometimes around end of 2006 and 2007 many polish traditional archers begun swapping their bows for Fighter and the bow become extremely popular.

[WarBow]

Dragonman,

I did not say the country of manufacture to the difference in the product.

Orda, I completely agree. These are beautiful bows, practical at a practical price. I have a horn bow and other sinew/bamboo bows, and they arent especialy practical or even fast, because like you say, its very damp here. These bows would never have 'evolved' in this part of the world. And they are a bother to look after. The grozer bows are fast enough.... I'm a bowyer and seek perfection in bows, although I'll probably never find it...... This makes me overly critical at times. Not everyone has the time or inclination to make his own bow, obviously and these bows are very popular because they combine the best of both worlds, I would love to try out the 'bio-composites'

Warbow & Osmiu, what difference does it make what country the bow is made in???, you like a bow for how its made and how it performs, not where its made???

[osmiu]

but I do remember seeing "Kaya" in 3 Rivers Archery '04 or '05 catalog

do you remember the price ? because "kaya" is a company , and before making the kaya bow as we all know today , the owner of the company sell hand crafted bows similar to hwarang under the name of his company . the bow you saw in '04 '05 is not the cheap , mass production kaya , who appeared on the market long after fighter became popular in Poland .

Warbow & Osmiu, what difference does it make what country the bow is made in???, you like a bow for how its made and how it performs, not where its made???

this is true in my case , but not for others . for many others "made in China" is like US "bad apple" and "made in Korea" is like french "OOOO-LAAAAA-LAAAAAA" . and when you put a "bad apple" label on a bow , at least you have to be sure that you are 100% right . because I throwed almost 400 tape measured meters with such a bad apple and I can tell you that the apple is not that bad .

[cristian_iepure]

because nobody apparently seems to know who is the producer of WindFighter, and that label surely indicates the origin of the product -China ( unless you suspect that some famous Korean bowyer makes this kind of bows, but he does not intend to promote them as the real Korean bows are promoted) I "suppose" 99.9999999(9)% that this bow is produced in China, and also the quality went down in the past couple of years, because most of WingFighters I've seen lately seem to have problems of construction (twisted limbs, the lack of the epoxy resin between the wood layers that lead to delaminations).

You don't have to be "offended" because you got such a bow, it is a good bow even if it's a chinese one (*supposing). For it's price, it could prove to be a good deal for some buyers - almost 155eur. But as reliability and quality you can't compare them to the real Korean bows.

[Daniel]

Osmiu,
I don't remember an exact price, but it was less than $200 at that time. I'm almost sure that it was thesame bow as they sell today, only the price has gone up considerably.
I took this picture during my visit in 3 Rivers Archery in Sept 2006.
One of the bows hanging on the rack is "Kaya"

[osmiu]

I "suppose" 99.9999999(9)% that this bow is produced in China

the site http://www.aixbow.de say after the title "Wind Traditional Fighter (Reiterbogen)" ... and I quote "Traditioneller Koreanischer Bogen - 50" kurz (Reiterbogen). In Korea schie?en weitaus mehr Menschen mit traditionellen B?gen dieser Bauart als mit den bei uns bekannten Recurve-B?gen." I didn't understand german but some words used here give me the impresion that they consider fighter to be a korean traditional bow , not a chinese one . but if you wanna be a chinese one at all cost , ok ... it is a chinese one .

also the quality went down in the past couple of years, because most of WingFighters I've seen lately seem to have problems of construction (twisted limbs, the lack of the epoxy resin between the wood layers that lead to delaminations).

most of ? how many most of ? but this is true . quality went down . the lack of epoxy lead to delamination ? are you sure ? the process of shooting that particular bow without arrow and without serving the siyahs from an inexperienced user in your presence have nothing to do with it ? ok ... if you say that was a bad bow , be it . it was a bad bow . "made in China" .
but what about quality that went down in hwarang ? can you tell me more about that ? about gini's semihorn bow that delaminate from nock to nock after a few arrows shooted (and ginni is an archer with vast experince in the field , who care about his bows , is not a beginner ) . what about that hwarang who destroy itself at first full draw , even before releasing the arrow ? if fighter was made in China , that particular hwarang was made in Congo . by baboons . I hope you didn't refer to that when you are using sintagm "real korean bow" . there is no forrest without rotten trees . I supposed that you know that by now .
I'am not "offended" . But your advices are one-sided . Tell the full story.

[cristian_iepure]

I saw only two broken hwarang bows from a total of maybe 20 used by my friends. I also have seen A LOT OF serious dry shots being performed by beginners or not, using SMG bows, the bows were ok. I have personally drawn a Windfighter at my full draw, the string come out from the tips of the syahs and then the bow was totally destroyed, the upper arm was severely broken. I had the same problem with my old 55lbs SMG, and that was the bow that I used to shoot for learning, during an entire year I fired some dry shots, but the bow still stands on strong. The conclusion? Korean bows are reliable, the chinese replicas are not.

I have sent today an e-mail to aixbows.de, I hope we shall find out news about the bowyer, chinese or not. And, by the way, the local bow supplier, does not sell anymore Windfighter because of the proven issues of this bow. The buyer's choice is by far the Kaya's KTB.

[osmiu]

Daniel ...
that is the old version of kaya . the one that was selling with "hand crafted" specification ("price : $245.99The KAYA bow is a hand crafted masterpiece of Korean style bowmaking. The limbs are made of layered carbon fiber and hard wood minimizing weight while providing optimum performance. Each bow is stamped with the official seal of it`s designer, Mr Kwak Yoon Sik. The bow is made with a maple core and has carbon and fiberglass laminations")
I meant , like that :

a fighter model 2008 was like that :

a fighter model 2007 ... I don't have pictures , but is was like 2008 model but without that spotted leather pattern on the handle .
curios thing is that , when kaya model 2009 apeared , the back and the handle was covered all in spotted leather , like was the handle of the 2008 fighter model .
I meant like that :

this is the model that came in our country .
at the time that kaya was available here , I allready owned one hun toth , 2 fighters (2008 model and 2009 model , which was better). and then a hwarang . unfortunattely I didn't find the german site with all fighter models . I'am not sure , but I think that I saw there a 2006 fighter model .

[osmiu]

so ... I understand that for you ... a good bow is one that resist at the largest possible amount of dry shots , right ? interesting ... why you didn't say so in the first place ? we could avoid that discussion . this is the asian technique suited for Romania ... the massive dry shot ! the winner is the one with the bow still intact after a archery course .

I have personally drawn a Windfighter at my full draw, the string come out from the tips of the syahs and then the bow was totally destroyed, the upper arm was severely broken. I had the same problem with my old 55lbs SMG, and that was the bow that I used to shoot for learning, during an entire year I fired some dry shots, but the bow still stands on strong.

Did ever recall to you that bow maybe was never designed to draw at your full draw ? and any thumbringer with some experience verify from time to time string aliniament on the siyah . and you have some experience . torsion in the handle is not the same at fighter and hwarang . and you know that . like you know that first rule that must tell to a beginner is that he must never shoot or draw with thumb without an arrow on the bow . you fail to do all that , but you are qualified to draw conclusions about chinese replicas . that broke on dry shots from a poor technique .

And, by the way, the local bow supplier, does not sell anymore Windfighter because of the proven issues of this bow. The buyer's choice is by far the Kaya's KTB.

how come the fighter bow provided to me by the local bow supplier is OK even as we speak ? and the bow was sent by me to a beginner . could be the fact that I , even without any qualification in the field , do not teach the romanian dry shooting technique ?
don't forget about 34" drawing of the hwarang . maybe producers clear this subject for us .

ps : all your talking is about fighter bows damaged as a result of dry shots . OK . but what about ginni's semihorn delaminated head to toe ? without dryshots ! or that hwarang that swallow like a pumpkin at it first draw ? first draw ever !!!! that bow didn't see a dry shot not even on youtube ! what about that ??? what is the korean reliable and what is the chinese replica ?