Introduction

Broadheads that bow hunters choose seems like an area where there’s plenty of fantasy and marketing, and very little substance. Realistic differences between broadheads out there is more academic and marketing than real performance. For a bow that won’t tune well with a fixed broadhead, expandable broadheads can be an answer. For traditional or low weight pull bows, cut on contact broadheads may give better penetration. For everyone else, almost any fixed, chizelled tip broadhead will kill your deer or moose if you do your part. At the very lowest price/quality, weight and concentricity can hurt your accuracy a bit. Some of the cheaper broadheads also have lame locking mechanisms that may mean losing a blade inside a deer. But anything above that is gravy, and as an inexpensive, yet moderate quality broadhead, Cabela’s FX3 broadhead do the trick.

Blades

I chose 100 grain broadheads, and these came with a 3 blade, 1 1/8″ cutting diameter. I really liked the feel of the blades as they felt strong enough to withstand hitting bone and not bend or dull instantly. The lock washer that fits over the blades at the back of the shank was also sturdy enough to keep the blades from kicking out.

Trocar Tip

The trocar tip on the FX3 is meant to provide a sharp point that glides past bone. Originally designed for medical applications, trocars were meant for surgery where minimal resistance was required. In a hunting application, the trocar tip provides a path for the rest of the arrow to follow while the blades do the real damage. They offer a bit more resistance than some of the cut on contact broadheads, but they are really durable and don’t expend as much energy on contact with bone. Modern bows in a 60-70lb pull will have more than enough power to still drive a trocar tipped arrow right through a deer or moose on any sane shot, so I don’t find the slight cutting advantage to be useful.

Accuracy

I test shot all 6 broadheads with a Diamond Outlaw from distances of 20 and 40 yards. While point of impact changed slightly compared to field points, I found that accuracy was still about 90% that of the field points. I did fire them through some paper to paper tune the bow to the broadheads, but found that further tuning of the bow was unnecessary.

Summary

Ultimately, I’d recommend that any beginning bow hunter buy 6 of their desired broadheads. The 3 that come in most packages is really cutting it close. Make any mistake firing the broadheads at a target and you’ll be down to 1 or 2 hunting ready arrows only. The 6 that come in this package for $25 will ensure you have the same heads that you practice with ready for the hunt.

My previous bow was a 2007 Bowtech Tomkat, a value priced bow from Bowtech. Bowtech typically prices the Bowtech branded binary (dual) cam bows higher than their single cam Diamond branded bows. As compound bow technology is still an area of high innovation, I wanted to upgrade to something newer. Arrow speeds are increasing with more aggressive cams, bow recoil (shock) is being reduced, and more features are being integrated into newer bows. String stops, for example, do a really nice job of further reducing sound, but cost about $50-$100 to add on to a bow. Upgrading to a newer bow gave some of these accessories, as well as an upgraded platform. This bow fits between low and midrange  pricing at around $400-$500. More than the cheapest bows, but still considerably less than the flagship models across the different manufacturers. I chose a 60lb draw weight in left hand. I find the 60lb draw weight to be effortless, and a bit easier to pull at awkward angles than a 70lb pull. That’s important, because I usually have a great field of view from my tree stands and need the capability to draw and fire from less than ideal angles. With the speed that a bow like this gets out of a 60lb pull, it doesn’t even matter. If you aim right, that deer will be toast.

Accessories

This bow comes outfitted with the R.A.K. accessories (Ready, Aim, Kill): inexpensive, yet capable accessories matching the price/quality point to that low-midrange pricing that the rest of the bow meets. The Apex fiber-optic sight is ok, the hostage arrow rest looks really cheap and junky but functions great and is as accurate as anything else out there, the S5 stabilizer looked cheap but balanced the bow well, the wrist sling is comfortable, and I found the medium size peep sight to be perfect for the type of shooting I do. The 5 arrow quiver felt a lot better than my other bargain basement quiver, and had a much more convenient rotating locking mechanism (see pictures below). The string stop was nicely integrated, and unlike add-on stops, looked appropriately lightweight. Those add-on string stops often try to accommodate both front and back riser mounting, and have a heavier and more complex mount.

The Bow

The first thing you’ll notice once you have this bow in your hands is the “Invelvet armor coating”, essentially a soft touch coating on the riser. These soft coatings are gaining traction in rifles such as the TC Encore and Browning Xbolt, and make for a nicer feeling bow. Hitting it against the zipper on your coat won’t make a loud metal-on-metal sound, and it’s a bit more ding and scratch resistant than a plain film camo dip or paint job. The rotating module enables a bit of adjustment, and I was thankful for the slightly longer 30.5″ draw length, because I felt more comfortable at that draw length. The other thing you might notice about the bow is that the cams rotate beyond the end of the limb tips. Supposedly, this is supposed to help with the cam’s tracking and help with nock travel. The bow is really accurate, but I don’t know if it’s because of this technology. For all I know, bolting the can and setting the bearing assembly past the bow limb tips could make it cheaper to make/assemble.

Shooting the Bow

Shooting this bow is an absolute dream. As with other newer bows, the valley is quite sharp and doesn’t offer much room. Let off a half inch, and you get full draw weight. While that’s a lot less forgiving than older bows, you’ll forget all about it once you pull the trigger. A smooth, quiet “plink” and the arrow is in the target. Your bow hasn’t moved an inch. It makes firing the bow a lot of fun. Where on my previous bow, the large “hunting” peep sight made it a bit difficult to squeeze out accuracy at 40+ yards, the medium sized peep on this bow makes 60 yard shots a lot easier. The speed also helps make up for problems in your range estimation. Making a mistake between a deer at 30 yards vs 40 yards isn’t going to take your shot out of the kill zone like it would with a slower bow. That quietness is real; according to Hunter’s Friend, the Outlaw came in 7th quietest out of 261 bows and #5 all time on their shock accelerometer test. Given the price point of this bow, that’s nuts. With a brace height of 7″, this bow is also a bit more forgiving than some of the other speed demons out there, and it’s good to see they didn’t cheat brace height to squeeze out some unforgiving fps. In fact, if you look at the Diamond Fugitive, it seems to be almost identical to the Outlaw, save for a shorter 6.5″ brace height, and a few more fps of IBO-rated speed. As for accuracy, I was able to put arrows into a much tighter grouping, more consistently. 60 yard shots at my home made target are all within a 6″ circle and, if conditions were good, I would be comfortable taking a deer at that range.

Knocks

To get a fast IBO speed, you need fast, lightweight cams. One of the areas where you can skim weight is in the string channel on the cam. A thicker string channel will stand up to more abuse, where a thinner one will be lighter weight. The Diamond Outlaw uses the latter style cams, going very light on the string channel materials. This means that if you drop or hit the bottom of the bow, you may bend the channel over a bit, and it’ll wear on the string. Wear on the string = broken strings and broken strings are the most common complaint I’ve seen online about Diamond bows (since they all use fairly fast, lightweight cams). It may be because the strings aren’t durable enough, or it might be cams that are wearing on them. The second most common complaint from users is the string jumping out of the cam. Again, that light string channel is good for speed at the cost of durability/reliability. For what it’s worth, some posts online claimed that the string will almost always jump out of the channel if the bow is dry fired. I’m not going to risk damaging my bow to check that claim, but it’s probably true.

Conclusion

Among other bows at this price point, the Diamond Outlaw comes to the table with sensible features and fantastic shootability. While it’s missing some of the fancier gimmicks, you’d be hard pressed to find a bow as quiet and fast as this one in this price range. Most other bows I test shot at this price range had more hand shock and lower speeds. Shooting a well setup bow like this gives a lot of confidence that your arrow will hit exactly where you aim, and that confidence inspires better shooting.