English longbow arrows!

[mtngunr]

Yep. Even math and physics. Thanks to mtngunr for this one:

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Maybe a bit out of place in this thread, but I couldn't resist.

It gives me a thought: One of the big advances in firearms was the rifled barrel that makes the bullet spin. Is there any equivalent of that for archery? Perhaps the placement/orientation of the feathers?

Mr Weston beat me to the reply.....as for the physics board i shagged that off another thread, a hilarious one where a guy asked a question as to how to post photos and rather than someone steer him to a photo host, a guy took off for lala land with downloadable photo programs and powerpoint presentations slides and the works and commenced to losing everybody.....and one guy replied, "let me simplify" and then that physics blackboard....i about died laughing and can hardly wait to throw it out like a penalty flag....or die laughing when someone throws it out on me....

 

[kronckew]

me simplify

rocket stuff

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1. you throw stuff forwards, you move backwards. you throw stuff backwards, you move forwards. the faster you throw stuff the faster you move, the heavier the stuff is the faster you move. as you throw stuff you get lighter. you move faster when you are lighter and throw stuff. when you run out of stuff you keep moving until something stops you. usually friction. or a wall. or a planet. (pluto IS a planet, call me old fashioned). air is an effective wall if you go fast.

2. you do NOT need something to hit something when you throw stuff, you will move even if there is nothing to hit.

reminds me, my old chief petty officer owes me a case of beer on no. 2. we had an argument about jet boats. they throw a massive amount of water backwards to move forwards. he argued that if you angled the jet down to 'push' against the water, you would go faster. he lost. (picture two ship's boats each with the same model portable fire pump, hose & nozzle, one pointing straight back parallel to the water. the other with the nozzle angled down 45 degrees.) mine went about twice as fast.

recent myth buster type program here a couple weeks ago showed a man with a fire hose & nozzle arrangement that pointed straight down & when it was throwing enough water it would lift him up (they had safety ropes of course, OSHA). anyway he 'knew' instinctively that the water was 'pushing against the water or ground under him and if you took the water or ground away he'd fall as he'd not have anything to push against. they suspended him on his jet above a canal lock, then opened the gates and drained the water out from under him. he did not fall even tho the level dropped about 20 ft. & the jet of water had broken up to a mist that was not capable of 'lifting' anything.

 

[ndoghouse]

Theres plenty of evidence that they made stone points with a twist built into them for obvious reasons. Thats some skilled knapping if you can do that! I can do it sometimes but its not because I have any skill. Its because I screwed it up I made another point last night. Il get a pic of it tonight.

I vote Planet as well:thumbup: We need to remote Pluto!

 

[Bookie]

Pluto IS a planet.

 

[ndoghouse]

Pluto IS a planet.

So There! Its official now!

 

[christcl]

They are a bit on the heavy side for my bows but I've just got to adjust my shooting to account for the heavier weight.

They feel great, no handshock, fly and hit pretty straight and are just cool to look at.

 

[ndoghouse]

So pardon my ignorance but what are the "bumpers" for on the outer limbs? Noise? Another thing im noticing is that these bows tend to have most of the flex or spring closer to the hand and the end of the limbs are built up thicker and stiffer?

 

[kronckew]

they are called sayah(s) , you find them on composite horse bows, they extend the draw length & hence the power for a given bow size. the bumps are one way of keeping the string from slipping past the limb when undrawn. there are other methods

here's a scythian bow, bent tips, but no sayah


and a more typical hungarian bow with sayahs.

 

[christcl]

So pardon my ignorance but what are the "bumpers" for on the outer limbs? Noise? Another thing im noticing is that these bows tend to have most of the flex or spring closer to the hand and the end of the limbs are built up thicker and stiffer?

Excellent observation and great question!

The bumpers are called "string bridges" that serve to change the angle of the bow string slightly, which ultimately helps increase the arrow velocity at release. I don't quite remember the explanation of how that works right now. Actually, I looked it up again. Per my friend's article from "Evolution towards the Manchu bow"

"The main difference between the Manchu bow and its predecessors is the more forward angle of the rigid ear and the presence of a prominent string bridge. This makes for a flatter force-draw curve, and more stored energy for a given poundage. Disadvantages of the design are that any bow with more forward pointing ears is also more susceptible to twist, requiring more attention and skill in maintenance. Heavy bows of this type store a lot more energy than static non-contact eared bows or contact bows with less recurve, which are the same draw weight. But they are also harder to string and require more care to maintain. Contact ears by the way weren't a new invention, they have existed since ancient antiquity. But all these ears were rather short, and the Manchu bow appears to be the first bow with very long static contact ears. The shorter ears of all previous designs somewhat reduced their maximum stored energy in comparison with the Manchu bow, but made very efficient and fast bows designed for shooting lighter arrows with high velocities much like the Korean traditional target bow."

So I maybe incorrect in saying it adds arrow speed. That is the more commonly held belief stated by "horse bow" retailers.

Though off the top of my head, the Manchu/Qing bow has the large limbs/ears by design because they wanted to shoot the largest and heaviest arrows as effectively and with as much velocity as possible.

I'll quote my friend who has done all the research into from his webpage. http://www.manchuarchery.org/bows

"The Manchu bow is the largest of composite bows, with rigid ears not infrequently of around 30 cm in length measured from knee to tip. All composite bow ears work as levers to help bend the limbs, and due to their size this effect is most extreme among Manchu bows. This gives the design the flattest force/draw curve of traditional bows. This not only enables the bow to store more energy for a given maximum draw weight, but the flatter draw curve also reduces the need for consistent draw lengths. After all, slight fluctuations in draw length to not result in large fluctuations in arrow velocity and so if effectively solves one of the archer's main challenges: The need for very consistent draw lengths.

A well-made 60 pound Manchu bow of all traditional materials will not outperform a well-made 60 pound English longbow. The Yongzheng emperor stated that from 80 pounds and up is enough for the military, so when Wen Chieh offered to make a bow for me I ordered that poundage. It was only when we tested this bow that the facts and figures started to impress again. At 82 pounds its draw weight started to outperform the disadvantage of the weight of its ears, results were impressive. The 82# Manchu bow, made by Wen Chieh, outperformed a well-made 128# yew longbow, shooting the same 1230 grains (80g) military weight arrow a stunning 190fps against 170fps for the longbow. This is exactly the reason why the Manchu bow used to have a bad reputation: People were testing low draw-weights that were too low and found no significant advantage in poundage pulled versus arrow velocity to justify its complex construction. The design really is made for war and hunting, to do damage with heavy arrows. They may not be the fastest bow, but no other bow design can launch an arrow that heavy, that fast. There is another catch though, the high initial draw weight of Manchu bows makes them considerably harder to pull than a longbow of the same draw-weight, but at full draw they feel similar again."

To sum it up, its a purpose designed bow. Instead of showering enemies with smaller, faster arrows, they preferred to shoot bigger, relatively slower spears. And they did it well. They were still using this up to the 19th century by which pretty much everybody else had guns (they used guns too). Which makes the history of this bow so interesting, but I actually just like shooting them.

I prefer not to get into pissing matches with the other ethnic ultranationalists about who has the best bow. The best weapons are purpose designed to be the best a given task. Its pretty much like saying the AR15 is better than an M1A or vice versa without talking about which platform would best serve you in a given task.

 

[ndoghouse]

Holy moly!!! Those look like beast when unstrung! Ive never seen anything like that.

So the rigid ears kinda act as an atlatl would for throwing a spear or dart. You arms are the spring for storing energy and the atlatl the lever. Wow! pardon my analogy but seems the same. It does make perfect sense that if the ears were too far recurved it would twist and be pretty unstable while pulled fully back so I guess you would have to adjust the recurve to not be forward till after the release sometime. Dont know if that makes any sense at all but I think I kinda got it

So the force/draw curve of a Manchu bow would be more like a compound bow where you have greater pull force initially then life gets easier near full draw? Khul! Gotta like physics. I gotta lot to absorb here and thanks much for the link and all the good info. Amazing what time will do to refine such a machine!

I was talking about the bow building last night and completely out of the blue my wife said "Now thats something I always wanted to learn". WTH??? Didnt see that coming?

 

[christcl]

Holy moly!!! Those look like beast when unstrung! Ive never seen anything like that.

So the rigid ears kinda act as an atlatl would for throwing a spear or dart. You arms are the spring for storing energy and the atlatl the lever. Wow! pardon my analogy but seems the same. It does make perfect sense that if the ears were too far recurved it would twist and be pretty unstable while pulled fully back so I guess you would have to adjust the recurve to not be forward till after the release sometime. Dont know if that makes any sense at all but I think I kinda got it

So the force/draw curve of a Manchu bow would be more like a compound bow where you have greater pull force initially then life gets easier near full draw? Khul! Gotta like physics. I gotta lot to absorb here and thanks much for the link and all the good info. Amazing what time will do to refine such a machine!

I was talking about the bow building last night and completely out of the blue my wife said "Now thats something I always wanted to learn". WTH??? Didnt see that coming?

Sounds great to me!

 

[christcl]

Closer look at the string bridges for those interested.

And to answer another person, yes they are laminated. American Gordon glass over layers of bamboo and mulberry, and epoxy glue is then applied over everything. They are lighter than they look!

 

[mtngunr]

I was gonna throw out the rocket science penalty flag again but the bow photos softened my heart....even answered the unasked "laminated with what?" question....was almost expecting the answer to be horn.
..

 

[ndoghouse]

One more dumb question (for now)? Are the limbs the same length or is the lower one shorter to make up for the handle width. In other words is the arrow resting exactly center of the limb tips?

 

[christcl]

I was gonna throw out the rocket science penalty flag again but the bow photos softened my heart....even answered the unasked "laminated with what?" question....was almost expecting the answer to be horn.
..

Horn-sinew-tendon would indeed be the ultimate traditional bow material. However, the number of bowyers who I would look to to build such a bow are few and their work in high demand. Guys such as Lukas Novotny, Jaap Koppedrayer, Magen Klomp build such bows. I would have to ask nicely and be willing to wait.

To be worth it, I'd get a Manchu bow at least 80lbs draw weight. I'd have to build up my muscles and technique to be able to pull it and also have the skills to tend to a horn bow. Unlike the modern glass, the horn and other natural materials will need regular maintenance and care and training.

One more dumb question (for now)? Are the limbs the same length or is the lower one shorter to make up for the handle width. In other words is the arrow resting exactly center of the limb tips?

The limbs are the same length, top and bottom.