Martin XR Recurve Bow Kit

This is not a toy. Its an excellent package to introduce your kids to archery. My son is 12 yrs. old and throughly enjoys using this set. The bow is excellent. Nicely made and sturdy. This will give you an idea of how interested your youngster is without breaking the bank.

i bought this and an Arctic Cat 90cc ATV for my sons 8th birthday. thank goodness the cheaper of the 2 is the only one that ended up being a lemon!!! where should i start... riser: injection molded & heat welded plastic, limbs appear to be made from the same material. has mounting pints for a sight- but not an arrow rest, it came with one that attaches with sticky tape. there is no way to fire from the shelf because there isnt one, just a rounded lip above the had-grip- which is horrid (admittedly this my be because of my large hands). me and my son are both beginners to archery, so i could be wrong on a couple of points like- wouldnt the arrow get the best energy transfer if it was fired from the center of the bow instead of offset by an inch and an eighth? and wouldnt it be a better idea if the limbs where the string attaches were less than sharp enough to cut? also, it thought when you release for your shot the bow was supposed to make a crisp 'thwang' sound, this one is more of a sickly rattle. the last thing that i will attribute to my lack of knowledge in archery (this one is totally my fault) i purchased a Martin because i thought it was a company that produced quality archery supplies; my mistake. the draw weight is what really upset me. description clearly states "10 to 20 lbs", which is only an honest statement in the vaguest since. using my fish scale (which i checked calibration just prior to checking the bow) i found that 12 lbs is the ACTUAL draw weight. yes, that is more than 10, but it is a %@&$-load less than 20. barely an inch & a half penetration on a foam target...really? had it been even 14lbs i would never have complained about any of it. luckily my son does not know any better, but i do and i think he would be better off had i gotten him one of those red fiberglass and garden twine bows like we had when i was a kid. i could continue but am becoming exasperated so will conclude with the hope that whoever is responsible for this ends up shooting themselves in the kneecap with one of these bows, i doubt it would even break the skin.

Yes, you've read it before the arrow rest is worst than a bad joke. I made a wooden rest but that really didn't work out as it moved the arrow to far from the center of the bow. I ended up using a round file and made a shelf by removing material from the grip itself then glued on a felt backer. Now it's decent and since I'm teaching my son primitive shooting it works very well. I went with this model mostly for the ability to shoot BOTH right and left handed. The bow can be reversed by moving the grip over to the other side. One more comment the poundage is kind of heavy for a little kids recurve. I backed it off as much as possible (via the allen bolts) and he still struggles with it reaching a full draw. I guess kids just aren't as active as we were with computers and all. (I sound like my grandfather) Another nice thing is that the quiver, arrows, arm guard and shooting tabs lets you shoot without additional trips to the store. BUT REMEMBER THE ARROW REST IS JUNK, YOU WILL NEED TO FIX or REPLACE IT. Overall this is a good way to introduce your kid to archery without heavily investing in hardware. I

We purchased this for my daughter's birthday. It came as advertised on the website. It's a great starter bow that provides practice without huge cost if they decide not to pursue archery as a major interest. The bow is a very nice beginner bow. Arm guard and finger tab OK. The arrows very cheap but adequate for target practice for a beginner. Arrow older is very cheap and doesn't work well. The bow comes with a small plastic peg that helps hold the arrow in place for beginners. It was helpful but the adhesive tape came off within a few uses. Overall a good purchase for the beginning archer who had nothing to start with.

The bow has a lot of potential, but the stick-on arrow rest will not stay on the bow. This is more than likely due to the ribbing of the plastic at the site where the arrow rest is supposed to be placed. I'm guessing the ribbing is supposed to save material during mass production, but it doesn't work well with double sided tape, and it's extremely disappointing to my daughter. I have tried everything from super glue, to gorilla glue, to other double sided tape. I'm thinking of placing Epoxy in the site and then maybe using a screw. Also, another very disappointing thing was the beginner bow and arrow "KIT" did not come with a sight. The holes are there, but no sight. I thought i was being smart buy buying two of these kits for my daughter to shoot with a friend or maybe my wife, but i just got two kind of cheap bows that needed fixing right from the box.Not Happy

I purchased this for my sons 10th Birthday. It was packaged well and arrived on time. The product itself came with all the starter gear but very little in the way of instructions on use. I have experience with bows so not a big deal to me, but should be noted. As stated by others the arrow rest is very poor and fell off after just a few shootings, but I expected this and considering how little it cost to buy one for him, I only took away 1 star. The bow itself seemed just right for his size and strength. It only took him a few shots to get his first bulls-eye.

I originally purchased this exact bow 4 years back and purchased because I needed a new string and it was actually cheaper to get a whole new kit than have a string custom made. The quality of this bow is a bit lower than that of the one I purchased a few years ago but still seems to hold up. This is a great target practice bow or a bow for smaller frames (not just kids).-Alyssa