Buckmaster G2 Review
Written by Jon Nystrom

Whenever I do a review about a bow I always scratch my head as to how to start. The reason is because I am not technical minded when it comes to bows. I have seen many articles on kinetic energy, arrow flight and speed to name a few. When looking for a new bow its not because I need one. Something has to catch my eye for me to be interested. In this case it was an article written about the Buckmasters G2 (this article is reprinted at the bottom of this review). North American Archery Group has an assortment of bows to choose from including the Buckmasters G2. Now this article talked about all the things a technical bowhunter wants to hear.

The grip is solid, smooth and comfortable to hold. The red striped limb savors are built right into the bow. The riser is taller allowing for a bigger sight window. The camoed limbs are stiffer making the return rate faster. The cam technology is one of my favorites to talk about. If I ordered the wrong length or my arms someday shrink all I have to do is replace a little hardware and the bow is ready for a shorter or longer draw length. This bow is lightening fast and is quieter than most bows in its category.

Comfort, performance and quietness are what matter to me. I had to make a few adjustments to make it quieter. Not because the bow needed it I suspect. I have been told I am a little vein when it comes to making my bow quiet. I have shot my fair share of bows. The grip on this bow fits like a glove and the bow is light but powerful. 300 ft per second is not out of the question depending on draw weight and poundage. The ultimate test for me is performance and endurance. I hunted with this bow in all kinds of weather. Snow, sleet, mountains or rain can't stop it. When I transported it through an airline it came out shooting straight as can be. The true testament to me is how does it perform in the field. I carried this bow for up to eight miles a day everyday for 6 days. Sometimes I forgot I was even carrying it. After all the rain, bumps and bruises the bow performed magnificantly. Here is a picture of a moose I harvested with the Buckmaster G2. The picture speaks a million words as to how I feel about this bow. Give the Buckmasters G2 a look. You won't be sorry. It is one of the finest bows you will find on the market.

Thanks Buckmaster G2 for helping me harvest this Bull Moose.

Buckmasters G2!
By Staff Writer
Mike Mccombie - ArcheryWorld.com

We're not sure how many of you remember the first Buckmasters bow that was introduced but there was a lot of hype and a lean mean marketing machine behind it's introduction to the market. It didn't take long before the "buzz" caught on and reached a fevered roar. The Buckmasters bow became the hottest selling product in the industry. A reasonably priced bow with a ton of features typically seen on much more expensive equipment sent the message home to archers, good price, high quality, good value. There was one major problem for archery shop owners and the manufacturer, no one made any money selling the bow! True, the bow was priced to sell and sell they did but the margins just weren't there. As a business proposition the original Buckmasters was a big mistake but as a piece of ground breaking archery equipment it was outstanding!

Enter the new Buckmasters G-2! Recently Joe White, VP of Sales and Marketing of the North American Archery Group asked ArcheryWorld.com if we wanted to "Test and Tune" a new mid year product from Buckmasters, a member of the NAAG group of archery companies. Mid year product launches are rare as it is but even more rare is a nearly complete new product. Usually a mid year product launch is a knock off of another bow in the product line with some cosmetic changes. While you could argue the point with the new G-2, there's no denying there are enough differences that we all decided it was in fact a radically new bow.

When ArcheryWorld.com's, Senior Editor and Feature Writer, Bob Peck said Joe White at the North American Archery Group was sending me a Buckmasters G2 bow for Test & Tune I gotta honestly tell you, I wasn't really excited. Don't get me wrong, I have a dream job here at ArcheryWorld.com a lot of folks would die for. I test all manner of new equipment and tell my fellow archers what I think from a technical perspective. I'm looking to cut through some or all of the manufacturer's BS and tell y'all like it really, truly is. Not a bad gig. I hadn't seen or heard anything about the Buckmasters new G2. I figured, "ho hum" just another short axle hunting bow. I've seen some of the older Buckmasters and they were an alright hunting bow. To be kind, the old Buckmasters bows were not exactly what I'd call a high performance hunting bow. To top it all off I had just finished the review on the Parker Ultra 31 the week before I was sure that nothing could compete with it in the short axle bow class. That Ultra-Lite 31 absolutely rocked! I loved it! Well, I was wrong! I fell out of love fast.

The G2 (second generation) Buckmasters arrived tucked under the arm of the UPS guy. Plastered all over the box was a macho face painted mean looking dude. Hmmm, what's up with the attitude? Maybe it will be cool to review a mid price bow for the "average Joe hunter". I removed the G2 from its package. After a close inspection of the G2, I immediately reminisced about how much this G-2 looked like the Epic Extreme which we liked so much. I pulled the Epic off the rack and compared the two. I noticed some similarities but I also noticed many differences, many of which were for the better. This is where it gets interesting. I'm thinking mid-year knock off but no, not really.

Overall appearance of the bow is great and at 31" axle to axle this looks to be a killer treestand bow. For those interested in how we characterized the "look" wellƒ Like the mean dude plastered all over the box this bow looks like it has an "attitude" and sex appeal at the same time. The craftsmanship and engineering that went into the G2 is obvious at first glance. We know Mike Derris and some of the boys who are responsible for the design work and they've clearly done a fine job.

One of the first things you'll probably notice is the red striped Sims limb savers that is built right into the riser. While this particular limb saver is commercially available off the shelf from Sims, there is no doubt the red anodizing is a custom deal for the G-2 and there is absolutely no denying this second generation limb saver technology does an outstanding job of just eating up vibration and recoil. We'll talk more about that later.

All holes are free of machining debris and camo dip thus ensuring there will be no problems when it comes time to bolt on your accessories. We have found that some manufacturers have problems with the dipping process and there are clearly visible seams that result. Not so with the G-2. They've done an outstanding job in this regard. The grip is a beautifully laminated and checkered with G2 laser engraved into its right side. The riser and limbs are dipped in Realtree hardwoods camo pattern, which does an excellent job of breaking up the bow. The fully machined perimeter weighted onecam and idler wheel were free of machining burrs and finished in flat black anodizing so there will be no chance of a glare spooking your game.

Riser
The G2 riser is similar to it's cousin the Epic Extreme but with several very important differences. The fully machined aluminum G2 riser is actually longer than the Epic but the overall bow length is shorter. We found it interesting to note that the G2 riser has a taller sight window giving the archer a better view of his quarry. The sight holes are standard AMO as well as the rest holes. By the way there are two holes. The riser houses an offset cable guard rod to ensure fletching clearance on even the largest vanes. The most noticeable feature on the G2 riser is the new built in Sims next generation limb savers. These built in limb savers do an amazing job of stopping almost all of the felt vibration when firing ultra light arrows and are tucked neatly out of the way inside the riser pocket.

At the each end of the riser you'll find machined aluminum limb pockets, also fully equipped with Sims limb saver material assuring that the limbs never come in contact with any aluminum. A minimum amount of limb vibration reaches the riser. The Buckmasters collaboration with Sims on this G-2 product has clearly paid off in a big way.

Limbs
The limbs on the G2 are Buckmasters compression molded carbon air quad limbs also dipped in Realtree hardwoods camo pattern. These limbs are about inch and a quarter shorter than the limbs on the Epic making them a little stiffer and thus making the return rate faster as well. If everything I know about bows holds true, this little bow should be a rocket!

Cam
The cam on the G2 is a Buckmasters Perimeter Weighted Onecam with 75% let-off (65% let-off is available). The Cam appears to be the same cam on the Epic Extreme, but the upper idler wheel is slightly larger. This cam does a great job at producing speed on the Epic so it's reuse on the the G2 is no exception. The only difference is the G2 is faster by about by 9-10 fps. Also a nice feature found on the G2's Perimeter Weighted Onecam that you don't see on many of today's compound bows, is a draw adjustment. This will allow the user to "fine tune" his/her draw length. This is a great feature since most of us don't draw exactly 28 or 29 inches.

Performance
This is always the best part of testing bows, at least for me it is. The G2 is not only a short bow but this thing is packed with more performance than bows price much higher. I must say when I first fired the G2 it seemed ok not much hand shock and the arrow seemed pretty fast. Then I put the bow on the scale and found out the bow was set at 70lbs and I thought, wait a minute, my arrow only weighs 300grs. This is bad, very bad, because I just shot the bow at under five grains per pound which is not only bad for the bow but can be very dangerous. Trust me. I did not plan this accident. Sometimes great discoveries just seem to happen. Take dry firing a bow by accident to find out that someone did an excellent job of figuring out how to absorb vibration and noise. Shooting the G2 at this extreme was that kind of discovery. I didn't notice much vibration and the bow was still quieter than most of today's modern compounds. Wow! I'm thinking the G-2 is amazing and I haven't even put it through it's paces! By the way for you techies out there that care, it shot 324 fps @ 29" 70lb draw which is 4.285grs per pound. Please remember! ArcheryWorld.com or Buckmasters DO NOT approve of or condone shooting any bow below 5grs per pound. It was a careless mistake that could have turned ugly but it didn't and we learned something very valuable.

After the big discovery I start to get excited about reviewing the G2. After changing the draw module to the 30" module reduced my draw weight and grabbed my 540gr arrow. At AMO specs of 30" draw, 60lb draw weight and a 540gr arrow the G2 repeatedly shot 241fps. After turning the draw weight up to 70lbs it was time for the IBO test. This time firing a 5gr per pound arrow through the chronograph the G2 shot 311fps and repeatedly 310fps. I was impressed since Buckmasters only advertised 309 fps. In this day of over inflating speeds to make sales and a truckload of buzzwords and techno hooey, it's refreshing to see a company advertise exact specs! When your product is this fast, I guess there's no reason to lie to make it seem like it's faster than it is. O.K I know what you're going to say: "There's fast and inaccurate and then there's fast and pinpoint. Which one is it?"

Like you, we wanted to know if all that speed is controllable. We used our Hooter Shooter shooting machine donated to ArcheryWorld.com by our good friend Tina Johnson at Spot Hogg. The G2 shot a respectable group of roughly 2 inches at thirty yards. Not being happy with the results I removed the G2 and did a little tuning work and reinstalled it in the Hooter Shooter. This time the results were much better. The G2 consistently slammed arrows together at thirty yards. It doesn't get much more accurate than that unless you're tubing arrows. Even off the hand, the G2 was extremely accurate and easy to control with almost no hand shock.

Summary
In most cases "you get what you pay for", But in the case of the G2 you get a whole lot more for your hard earned money. Like the old Buckmasters that burst onto the scene a few years back, the G2 packs the performance and accuracy of a bow priced much higher and in some cases packs even more than these bows.

The G2 has the all the right engineering and vibration dampening to make this an excellent target bow or an awesome hunting bow. We are completely confident the G-2 could do either task with ease. The fact that Buckmasters is dead on when it comes to their specs is another unexpected bonus. If you really stop and think about it, why would you want to do business with a company that lies to you to get you to buy their product?

I couldn't find any visual or functional flaws with the G2 and the manufacturer was so honest in their advertising specs I gave the G2 a 5 star rating. I would recommend this product to anyone at nearly any level of proficiency. I guess it comes down to is whether or not you want a bow that will do what it says it will do, or a bow that won't come close to doing what it's advertised to do, but everyone else is shooting it. Our sincere congratulations to all the people at Buckmasters on a job well done!