I received 2 sets of ILF adapter plates to review and evaluate. The plates I received are made from a solid piece of machined Aluminum stock. These plates are not carved out in a basement, they are precision machined to fit ILF limbs and made in different sizes for the various old metal risers we like to convert into a recurve.

The Idea of the plates is to have a simple and accurate way to mount modern ILF limbs on those old metal risers like the ones listed here. There are many possibilities, so it is up to you to decide if that old compound can become a modern recurve. Talk to Del and tell him about your project. He will advise you what plates you will need, and if any fitting will be required to make them work.

 These plates are just to easy to install, and use. I have converted bows by other means, but by far the adapter plate is the easy way to have a bow shooting in no time. The first bow I used them on is an old PSE Heritage metal riser recurves, that had failing limbs. The machined riser looks like it was also used as a compound riser, and has all the screw holes for every accessory known to man. I had already made a conversion for this bow but was not completely happy with it. It functioned well, but looked amateur. The Black Bear plates Del sent me just happened to be a perfect fit in the old PSE limb pockets. All I needed to do was remove the old paint from the bottom of the pocket, scuff up the bottom of the adapter plate and the limb pocket to let the epoxy have an anchor to bond to, and clamp the plates in place to cure.

 That’s it! Done. After the epoxy cured I slipped in a set of ILF limbs and started shooting. The limb alignment was perfect, and in less than half an hour's work I had resurrected the old PSE bow to become a very good shooting ILF set-up. It just seems too easy, but that is just what these plates are about, easy and precise.

 The next bow I used the plates on was a bit more work. It is an old Hoyt TD3 riser. I have converted several of these risers before and they make an excellent shooting bow. My way of doing it was a bit more involved than using the adapter plates.

 The plates I used this time were Martin plates. They are a rectangular plate, and the TD3 is a tapered pocket riser so this meant I had to do a bit of shaping on the plate sides to make them fit.

All that was needed was to remove about .165 "from the back, half this amount on each side tapering to nothing on the front edge. I scribed a line on each side of the plates and reduced the shape as needed on my belt grinder with a 36-grit belt. It took about 10 minutes to have the plates fitting like a glove. Next I took a die grinder and removed the paint from the limb pockets, scuffed up the plate bottom of the plates with the belt grinder for good adhesion and applied JB weld to both surfaces. I clamped them in place and today I have another TD3 converted to ILF. Total time of work was about an hour at most. The limbs sit perfectly straight, and the bow shoots very nice.

In summary I have converted several bows to ILF by various means. These ILF adapter plates are by far the easiest and fastest way to do this.