High quality shafts from WAPITI ARCHERY PORT ORFORD CEDAR SHAFTS are not by accident.

We are out of the past where quality & service is all we have to offer. Our wood is cut into 1 ½” boards to facilitate drying with a minimum of checking. It is then stacked and sticker sealed, covered & protected. When we bring it to the shop, it is placed in our low temp. kiln and is dried for 3-4 weeks to 6% moisture. The boards are then cut to length and run through a planer to check the grain. The grain is marked and the boards are tapered to follow the grain. The maximum variation allowable is 1/8” to 3/16”, this results in a lot of reject wood. We run the wood through a band saw and cut into ½” squares. The square sticks are then checked for run out and straightened as necessary, as our shaft machine will not run crooked wood. The squares are hand fed through an old fashioned shaft machine with turns at 5000 rpm and it cuts, tapers, and burnishes the shaft. The shaft machine is a basic and simple machine, with a mind of it’s own. We change cutter blades every 100 shafts, or sooner if necessary. The little machine keeps us on our toes. We let the shafts sit for 48 hrs, or more to stabilize, as the heat and pressure of the burnishing process compresses the outer fibers several thousandths of an inch. The shafts are all hand spined on a dial indicator for accuracy, and then weighed on an electronic scale. We attempt to produce a shaft like some of you have never seen and those of you who have been around a while, may not have seen in 25 years or so. In spite of all our efforts, we do get blemished shafts that we sell ½ price. They are very serviceable shafts, they are not grain weighed and not restraightened, blemished and not always pretty. We call them stump shooters. Our equipment nor are we perfect, we do strive for the highest quality possible. If you become a customer of ours and have a problem, let us know first, we want you to be a happy customer.