Crossbow (pics)

[sagitarius boemoru]

Oh no Dane, its not me...Its the owner. I made couple of these since, they are pretty accurate for crossbow.

Jaro

[carpespasm]

I wanna see a Sleestack skin backed bow. And Wolfshire, you should use the unicorn horn to make a hornbow, you don't even have to worry about a curve since they're usually pretty straight!

[Kviljo]

The idea is to have  the prod wide, then it can be made shorter.2´´ wide is about what I used. They arent nearly as much stressed as they look like. This was made two years ago.
I made one with a roller nut recently.

Jaro

Very nice crossbow, Jaro!

Of course you're right, it could be made wider too. But with the dimensions of the Lilløhus bow, I wouldn't pull it any longer than what it was originally. Don't think there is much to gain, as these probably were strung longer at a time than the hand-bow, and therefore more prone to stringfollow. By the way, have you seen any evidence of what string height was on these all-wood crossbows?

Great fun shooting these. Sadly crossbows are prohibited here, so mine is probably going to be a wall-hanger, if I don't get a permit.


Dane, I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one wanting to see some pictures of a gladius or two. Why not make a roman reenactment thread? As I understand, you have a couple of very interesting projects going on

[sagitarius boemoru]

I dont think that any  owner of wooden prod crossbow would have it spanned for long time. There is definite gain from longer draw as it shoots reasonably better even with low drawweight. I m still oggling the english crossbow with wooden prod photographed in "The great warbow". That is roller nut action metal lever crossbow, with yew prod seemingly thicker than mine wrist. Its rounded from back and flat on belly. It does have lots of follow, though it probably fell into castle ditch mud spanned. I think the prod is in 200#, altough the drawlenght is not very long.
This is always an argument of people advocatising metal prods: "Buuuut it draws 500#" - yes but with effective drawlenght 5-8´´ or some. That is not awfully much of the push. There are two german cranequins auctioned on Herman Histrorica now who are apparently for drawlenght of 50 cm (allowing effective powerstroke of 18´´) - these are for horn prod crossbows. Talk about the effectivity!

You can see current owner of crossbow and crossbow in action in this album:

http://foto.curiavitkov.cz/main.php/v/zima2006/

The owner parted with it only because I m making him horn belly prod crossbow now.

Jaro

[Dane]

The idea is to have  the prod wide, then it can be made shorter.2´´ wide is about what I used. They arent nearly as much stressed as they look like. This was made two years ago.
I made one with a roller nut recently.

Jaro

Very nice crossbow, Jaro!

Of course you're right, it could be made wider too. But with the dimensions of the Lilløhus bow, I wouldn't pull it any longer than what it was originally. Don't think there is much to gain, as these probably were strung longer at a time than the hand-bow, and therefore more prone to stringfollow. By the way, have you seen any evidence of what string height was on these all-wood crossbows?

Great fun shooting these. Sadly crossbows are prohibited here, so mine is probably going to be a wall-hanger, if I don't get a permit.


Dane, I'm pretty sure I'm not the only one wanting to see some pictures of a gladius or two. Why not make a roman reenactment thread? As I understand, you have a couple of very interesting projects going on

Ivar, I will when I have something to post - the large scorpio is coming along nicely, and I am working on the stand now. I have the wooden part of the springframe for the scorpio-minor / manuballista nearly done, and then the stock, maybe a month more and I will post those. I have to finish my bronze furnace and cast the plates before I can finish the project, and am seriously considering making sinew ropes for it, but not sure yet.

I will post pics of the tiny gladius over the weekend, I hope.

Thanks for the link to the pics, Jaro. Those guys look great!

[sagitarius boemoru]

Dane are you working on that scorpio minor from spanish find with thesprings in diameter of nearly 2´´ ?

Jaro

[Far East Archer]

There are two german cranequins auctioned on Herman Histrorica now who are apparently for drawlenght of 50 cm (allowing effective powerstroke of 18´´) - these are for horn prod crossbows. Talk about the effectivity!

Do you have more info on these crossbows or pics if possible? They sound very interesting and I would like to replicate one if possible.

Alex

[sagitarius boemoru]

Those are cranequins, not crossbows as I WROTE. Besides I have yet to see decent replica of german crossbows around as they are difficult to make. Most of what you can find on internet is crap and does not resemble its historicall model  in any manner whatsoever.
Though back to original remark - if there are cranequins which allow span of 50 cm, its reasonable to assume that they were made for crossbows with that drawlenght. I have also seen couple of other cranequins in 40 cm + range. Steel prods are incapable of this kind of drawlenght and given the area and the place (mid europe in 15. and 16. century) the only other thing it can be is horn prod.
Then german/mid european crossbow in 15 and 16 century is pretty generic thing, in military variant without extravagancies etc. In fact the one with roller nut I posted is pretty generic german crossbow, and altough decent job its on the verge of authenticity - if you study these a little you find a lot of details (like the bolts binding the stock together to avoid the wood split) which do make authentic/ not authentic item.

If you want to see these things go to pages of herman historica and search for "armbrust". That said alot of 16. and anything past 16. century stuff is sporting and it requires alot of research and work to make believable medieval crossbow replica.


Jaro

[Dane]

Dane are you working on that scorpio minor from spanish find with thesprings in diameter of nearly 2´´ ?

Jaro

Jaro, no, mine is based upon the Xantan find from about 2,000, in Germany. It is an all wooden Vitruvius machine, faced with iron and bronze. Some reconstructions have that bogus shoulder stock, which makes no sense, and looks like it was lifted from an anti-aircraft gun, perhaps. That is an Alan Wilkins idea, I think, which I am avoiding.

My springs will be about 1.3” – 1.4” in diameter. I’m trying to do as much as I can, including casting the bronze parts, but I do have to find someone to hand forge some iron nails, and the bolt heads.

[sagitarius boemoru]

Ah, yes xanteen "catapulta". Isnt the bent stock often misinterpreted as for shoulder not vertical, but horizontal in fact and it serves for spaning the manubalista against the ground? (Basically the U- piece of stock is put against one belly and the weight is used to push the slide inside of the stock, thus spanning?

Jaro

[Dane]

Correct. The gastraphetes, or belly shooter. The verticle rest makes no sense. No recoil with one of these kinds of machines, after all. Someone misinterpreted that, and hence we have that bogus shoulder rest.

Only the Xantan machine, no one knows what the stock looked like, but I am going that route, spanning by leaning into the machine and pushing the slider, dovetailed into the stock, up until I lock it with a small bronze trigger. With sinew ropes, it should have very decent performance, with bolts a bit over 12 inches (based, like the rest of the machine, on the diameter of the springs. That is the formula the Greeks and then Romans developed over many years). I'm looking forward to doing some penetration testing with authentic riveted maile with subarmalis, shields, etc. when it is done next year.

One day, it would be fun to make a real Greek machine with composite bow instead of the steel one Schramm built. Siege engines are addictive, just like bows.

Take a look at the photos of our legio's ballista - just the spring engines alone weigh over 300 lbs. It is all ash, Fred, the builder, did a fantastic job with this. Assembling it was a bit harrowing, as you can see in the second shot. And the third shot is of Davenport the pug, in her tunic and gladius I made for her.

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[sagitarius boemoru]

Oh that is what I call awesome machine. That is not megalomania, but gigalomania!
Centurio canipulos with his little sword is looking bit suspicious though.

What I would like to see in top performance is one of those inswing metal frame manubalistae with horsehair or sinew springs. They should be capable of shooting around 500 meters should we believe what they write about them and also able to pick up individual targets at ranges 200-300 meters, feat which no other form of mechanicall artilery was capable to repeat ever after.
Medieval machines are often primitive and crude and almost all the knowledge about torsion powered engines has been lost, but these are awesome.

Jaro

[Dane]

Suspicous eh? She is a bit of a devil sometimes.

Keep in mind that ballista is about the smallest example of that kind of stone throwing machine. And it is so well balanced, you only have to hold the winch end up with one three fingers to rotate and elevate it on it's stand. No metal fastenings at all - all motised and interlocking components to hold it all together.

This machine is still new, and still undegoing trials - this was her 3rd or 4th firing session. We had only one turn on the two springs, and on the second shot, it split the top left timber in three places, and bent the iron plate the washer is on! Fred made those by laminating ash vertically, and we learned you need solid timber there, so he found some 5" stock and is replacing them. Truly a learning experience.

The inswingers are the apex of these kinds of machines. Even the wooden Hatra machine would perform maginifcently, I suspect, as it is an inswinger. Funny how the torsion machines dissapeared quite quickly as the Roman empire dissolved. After getting to know such kinds of torsion machines, tribochets aren't nearly as cool to me.

You are right about the accuracy of those things, wooden and metal framed. A legion woud field perhaps 60 arrow firing machines, and if you can fire 3 to 4 bolts per minute, that is murderious fire. I can hardly wait to get my full sized Scropio finished, and do some indepth testing with her. Anoteh rmember of our legion is building a metal framed inswinger, so we will find out a bit about those as well. In fact, it will be cart mounted, and we will arrange to get a team of mules to field with it.

Dane

[Far East Archer]

Sorry about the misunderstanding Jaro, I assumed you were talking about 2 crossbows with cranequins on them. Anyways, so a composite prod would be made same as horn bow? I was watching a clip Asier posted while back on PP and they had a cross section of a composite crossbow, only unusual thing was the horn was not a single layer but many square strips glued together. (or rectangular)

Dane,
That is just amazing!

Alex

[Dane]

Alex, thanks, but I just get to play with it, I didnt build it.

Fred, the builder, is in the top photo, stocky guy with the shaved head. He is a cop in real life, and a highly cool, fun guy. He has two pugs, btw.