Archery Thread

[Toxn 1,392]

On 3/21/2018 at 11:11 AM, Toxn said:

Having tried recently to teach someone the basics of archery using one of my existing bows, I've very quickly come to the unstartling conclusion that a centre-shot riser design really is the easiest option for people who didn't spend their childhood dicking around with bows.

 

My next project is thus going to be a baby's first centreshot riser and sight.

After lots of work, this is what I ended up with:

 

The most useful thing so far had been the sight - although it's hilariously over-complicated for something which could just be a ring bolted to the side of the riser.

 

Fair warning to anyone wanting to make a slingbow in this style: it's very important that your grip be as close to the centre of the bow as possible. Too far off the centre and the arrow gets kicked upwards at an angle.

[Sturgeon 3,946]

@Toxn this is pretty cool:
 

 

[Toxn 1,392]

2 hours ago, Sturgeon said:

@Toxn this is pretty cool:
 

 

I remember this one. Sort of an alpha version horse archer. 

 

Funny thing: those vaguely triangular early middle eastern composite bows (egyptian, assyrian et al) are known to be very fast-shooting. I suspect that these things were no fun to be on the other side of, even if the whole setup looked a bit goofy.

[Toxn 1,392]

 

It turns out that the answer to 'how do you tiller reflex recurve bows?' is 'very carefully'.

[Toxn 1,392]

The Bitterroot recurve project is on track:

 

The design in bowsim.

 

The projected curvature and draw.

 

The stress along the limb at full draw. This curve isn't very optimal, but I was working around some constraints imposed by my tools (ie: hogging off material from the belly using a plane and power plane).

 

The steaming rig. The bow was steamed for an hour before being pressed into the jig and tied in place. Tying the limb tips proved to be a problem.

 

The bow after steaming. It's going to dry for 24 hours like this before I put a linen backing onto it and start final tillering. The final draw weight should be ~13kg (28lb) at 80cm. The backing always adds more than expected though.

 

Edit: she's almost done.

 

[Toxn 1,392]

 

[Mogensthegreat 41]

Terrible this guy doesn't show the shaping of the bow, but oh well, cool anyways:

 

 

 

 

One of the best videos on his channel:

 

 

[Mogensthegreat 41]

 

[Mogensthegreat 41]

 

[Toxn 1,392]

25 minutes ago, Mogensthegreat said:

 

[Mogensthegreat 41]

On 3/24/2019 at 11:09 PM, Toxn said:

 

Oh shit sorry, whereat? I don't remember that being posted beforehand.

[Sturgeon 3,946]

Shad is looking very fit as he explains some neat stuff about medieval longbow:
 

 

[Toxn 1,392]

8 hours ago, Sturgeon said:

Shad is looking very fit as he explains some neat stuff about medieval longbow:
 

 

He and Skallagrim must be on a weight exchange program.

[Toxn 1,392]

In other news: I used the lockdown to get proficient at thumb draw, broke all my old bows shooting in the winter, made a new red oak longbow and am now splitting time between it and a cheap compound (turns out that lefties can shoot a right-handed bow using thumb draw).

[Jeeps_Guns_Tanks 1,081]

17 hours ago, Toxn said:

In other news: I used the lockdown to get proficient at thumb draw, broke all my old bows shooting in the winter, made a new red oak longbow and am now splitting time between it and a cheap compound (turns out that lefties can shoot a right-handed bow using thumb draw).

 

 

Did you guys have a crazy toilet paper shortage too?

 

 

[Toxn 1,392]

4 hours ago, Jeeps_Guns_Tanks said:

 

 

Did you guys have a crazy toilet paper shortage too?

 

 

We had a short one, along with flour and yeast. Right now the craziest thing is a total ban on cigarettes (been in place since the start) and going in and out of banning sales of alcohol (thankfully I can brew my own just fine).

[Toxn 1,392]

I'd love to know what tree that is that they're extracting the sap from so that I can cross-check it against my copy of poisonous plants of South Africa.

 

Edit: my best guess (based on this and the not-very-good assumption that these particular Hazda folk are using the same tricks) is some species of Acokanthera. The poison would be a cardiac glycoside. Death would occur after a few minutes (perhaps up to 15) from heart failure, with a running animal speeding the process along.

[Jeeps_Guns_Tanks 1,081]

Does the sap have to get deep inside you to kill or can skin contact get you?

 

[Toxn 1,392]

3 hours ago, Jeeps_Guns_Tanks said:

Does the sap have to get deep inside you to kill or can skin contact get you?

 

I know that you can be poisoned by eating parts of these plants, so presumably mucus membrane contact can do it. But skin is usually a barrier to all but a few, rare, poisons. Other than that your quickest results are going to be from hitting a large, deep blood vessel.

[Toxn 1,392]

 

B...but big arrow better arrow!

[Toxn 1,392]

Oh I will laugh and laugh when someone finally gets around to testing a historically accurate mongol bow and longbow side by side, only to have the former just blow away the latter in terms of penetration...

[Jeeps_Guns_Tanks 1,081]

10 hours ago, Toxn said:

Oh I will laugh and laugh when someone finally gets around to testing a historically accurate mongol bow and longbow side by side, only to have the former just blow away the latter in terms of penetration...

 

Is that like the AK versus AR debate in the gun world? 

[Toxn 1,392]

2 hours ago, Jeeps_Guns_Tanks said:

 

Is that like the AK versus AR debate in the gun world? 

Sort of?

 

The longbow (which the brits, unusually, specialised in as an infantry arm which all their yoeman farmers were supposed to train with at least once a week) is still held to be this wonder weapon which singlehandedly gave them multiple victories over the French by dint of being monstrously powerful and throwing armour-smashing arrows from afar.

 

I've written at length about why I've come to think that both are overstated. For this video it was nice to see confirmation, yet again, that speed matters more than momentum when punching through armour. Even for arrows.

 

Edit: I should mention that there are also fanboys for the mongol bow out there who refuse to see it as just another horsebow and instead hold it up as some kind of perfection of the form, but they are thankfully too busy riding ponies and learning to throat-sing to write in forums or make obnoxious YouTube videos.

[Toxn 1,392]

In general I think we're seeing a slow turn to a less eurocentric view of history in the anglosphere. With it we'll hopefully we'll shed this attitude that tries to impose a technology-centred view on pre-industrial history, where anything quirky and particular to European societies gets seen as normal and/or superior, rather than a contingent result of local adaption and historical circumstance.

 

Here the period of European history that culminated in the colonial era and first industrial revolution represents, in my view, this great anomaly that still lacks a full explanation and where technology really is a big part of the story. It's also been at an end for a long while now, to the point where a lot of underlying assumptions by earlier historians; of world history as some sort of linear path leading to European greatness ad infinitum; look silly. IE: just because post-Roman Europe became important to history doesn't mean that European historical events were by themselves important in their time. For instance: Hastings as 'one of the great battles of all time' can fuck right off.