Equipment failures

[fm]

What have you had for failures while on your hunting trips. What did you do to repair the problem.
Last year the lower zipper broke on our tent in Co. Put a tarp over it but did not help much. Having new heavy duty zippers put in now. Had to mop up up a lot of water last year with all the rain. No good fix for that one in the field.
Another year the fiber optic on my thru glow sight broke. It was the part were you aim snapped off. The fiber was long enough that I was able to push it back through the hole and heated up a screwdriver and melted the end. Used that sight for four more years before replacing it.

Any good in the field repair tips.

[Swede]

My Bushnell rangefinder broke down and was useless. I reverted back to the old way before they invented laser rangefinders. I did without until I got the one I ordered from Elknut.

[Sneaky]

Superglue will fix a thumb when it gets tangled with a broadhead.

[WapitiTalk1]

Told this one before. A neighbor gave me a new Garmin GPS a handful of years ago when they put hard mounted GPS units in their HVAC service vans and he no longer needed the handheld unit (my first GPS). Thought I was cruising with Fonzie until the unit died in a WA rainstorm. What did I do? Pulled out my map and compass and got the heck out of that WA wilderness area before rain turned into snow and darkness

[Ridgernr]

I broke a carbon trekking pole while shed hunting , snapped it right off at the lower section when I took a spill down an ice covered draw.
I was able to slip the broken section back up in the pole a keep moving, sure glad in wasn't aluminum probably would have bent and kinked.

[ElkNut1]

The only thing that really comes to mind is a Nikon 550 Riflehunter rangefinder that failed me 3 years ago, never again! It was the last 20 minutes of light & my son had called a bull to me, I saw the bull skirting a patch of timber looking for the calling source, I wasn't sure of the distance as he came out at aprox 70yds & still coming my way so I attempted to range him, that lousy thing would not read a thing in the lower light, I tried a 1/2 dozen times at various things & a no go! The bull stopped at what I figured 40 & I skipped an arrow off his back, That rangefinder never left the house after that. (not grinning)

ElkNut1

[elkmtngear]

Superglue will fix a thumb when it gets tangled with a broadhead.

I always have the Gorilla Superglue with the blue top in my pack. I've made a lot of little repairs with it on various items...fortunately I haven't had to use it as "liquid stitches" yet!

[Indian Summer]

The only little snag that comes to mind as one the recurs is headlamp failures. Obviously you need to carry spare batteries but every once in a blue moon, or no darn moon, they need a smack on the side.

I plan to look at that ancient thread on here about headlamp choices the next time I need one. It seems my ways of thinking a Petzl was the only option are outdated.

[Lark Bunting]

Superglue will fix a thumb when it gets tangled with a broadhead.

I always have the Gorilla Superglue with the blue top in my pack. I've made a lot of little repairs with it on various items...fortunately I haven't had to use it as "liquid stitches" yet!

I have used it once when I was sharpening a knife and impaled it into the palm of my hand. The knife was actually moving in rhythm with my pulse. My son grabbed me some paper towels and as soon as I got the bleeding to slow down I fixed it with super glue. It's a perfect scar...much better than any stitches scars I have.

I always have duct tape, electrical tape, athletic tape and super glue when we go camping, fishing or hunting. If I can't fix it with any of those items we are FUBAR.

[Elkduds]

Throw various sizes of zip ties (cable ties) in your fix-it kit. And safety pins.

[Sneaky]

I love zip ties. They're like duct tape and bailing wire in one. I have various sizes strung all over my house, garage, truck, tool boxes, and my pack.

[jmez]

I had a Limbdriver fail on me. I fell one morning and my sight was the first thing that broke my fall on a large deadfall. I stayed in camp the next am to shoot my bow as I had fallen that hard I was worried about POI. First shot at 30 yards hit the ground 10 yards in front of me. Next two shots right on. Next shot, hits the ground at 10 yards. I continue shooting and can't figure this out. Buddy is watching me shoot and says, don't release look at your rest. I'm at full draw and rest has only come up about a 1/4 of an inch. Let down, redraw and rest comes up. Let down and redraw several times and about half the time the rest doesn't come up.

I took it apart and there is a set screw that holds tension on the spring in the rest that was stripped and wouldn't hold. There wasn't a fix other than looking down after drawing and hoping it was up. I didn't get a shot so it didn't matter but was a bad deal. The good thing was an Axcel HD took the full on force of me falling on it and didn't move at all.

I replaced that rest with a Limbdriver Pro and subsequently had a screw strip on that rest as well. No more LD products for me.

[Lefty]

I had one outing with extreme winds of 55-60 mph most of the night and a few times with rain. My dome tent turned into a flat tear drop. I moved to the down wind side and went back to sleep,.. man was I tired, the tent kept hitting me

Did you notice in my camp pictures I had three different tents. High winds 30-40 mph when I set up the tent for my last hunt of the year the only problem was the poles made a humming noise in the wind,.. My solution,.. go to sleep

[LckyTylr]

Traveled to Missouri 4 years ago to hunt whitetails with my Bow. Some friends leased a farm and invited me to tag along. I shot a buck on the 2nd morning, made a good shot on him, but he only went about 15 yards and turned to check behind him. I already had another arrow knocked and at full draw . . . couldn't find my peep. It was bouncing around, hanging from the rubber tube. Wtf . . . I know . . . if I had a good anchor point, I wouldn't need a peep. Well, the buck was already hit hard and I didn't want to "let one fly" in hopes that I'd connect on him again. I decided that it would be better to just let him wonder what happened and hopefully tip over right there. It worked out perfectly, he stood for another 15 seconds and tipped over dead.

Anyway . . . so what do you do when you are several hundred miles from home and don't know where to find an archery shop (some parts of Missouri are pretty "backwoods")? One of my friends, a very trusting fellow, told me to draw back and hold. "Don't let go" he urged me. At 80% lefoff, he was able to simply slip my peep back into the string. A little vertical adjustment and I was back in action, shot a coyote and a raccoon that trip with my bow.

Learned something new, didn't know that by drawing it would relieve enough tension to be able to do that.

[Indian Summer]

Even with the bow un-drawn you can split the string and do that. Just be sure to use a smooth object so you don't nick the string. But really if you're elk hunting you should take one of those cheap portable bow presses. I always have one in camp or in the truck. I think an elk hunter who waits all year to hunt should have as many little insurance policies as they can. A fix-it kit is a must. When I'm gun hunting I have everything I need to mount and level a scope. Bow sites and gun scopes take a beating.

Here is my peep site solution: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NJ41HKxJ0Wo