ARROWS vs ARMOUR 2 - How powerful is a Warbow? 

Joe is an absolute unit! How many shots with that 160 lbs bow over a few days? And he's still accurate?!

Joe makes a 110lb bow look like a children's toy, when I would sprain something even *trying* to draw it - mad respect

Just want to say, I really appreciate the curated subtitles - it's a small thing, but it certainly shows an extra level of thought and demonstrates a level of professionality that too many large channels don't bother with.

Commentator: You should have a machine shoot the arrows! Tod: we have one *points to Joe* 😅 What a legend! 💪

Sad it's over for a.v.a.2... I'd like to see, for part 3 several people shooting 130 lb bows at longer range at the armour to see how many of those lucky shots find a gap in the armour... in the meantime, how about inviting Matt Easton in to do a pole axe versus armour?? Then we can see what happened to the French knights once they'd got past the archers!!

I shot a 45 and 65lb bow for range - six arrows from each - and while the 65lb bow did go slightly further on average, it was only slightly further and the furthest arrows from the 45 went further than the shortest shots from the 65. I suspect that with bow technology, there are laws of diminishing returns in effect. 120lb was not so long ago considered to be a very powerful - if not top-end - war bow.

One thing I really love here, it that every video in this series manages to answer a few questions, but also manages to raise a few more points to investigate later on. One thing I am wondering given how many arrows we've seen loose their heads but are otherwise still intact, could those still be drawn and shot and do damage in areas like the chain mail? And I think one thing we all want to see is Joe break out the 200lb bow and take at least one shot at the armour with that!

I feel so terrible not being a backer for this series, watching this for free is criminal! Amazing stuff Tod, and Joe’s shooting is *chefs kiss* impeccable.

If you do decide to make AVA3, could you please test the aspen/willow shafted arrows with LM16/JM4 arrow heads? The laws of Henry IV and Henry V make it fairly clear that these were the dominant type in warfare. The heavier armour piercing arrows were likely just 1/4 of their quiver, at least based on the Duke of Bedford's inventory and a 1475 list of supplies for a campaign. Testing that heavy arrows is 100% the way to go for shooting plate, but against high quality mail I'd like to see how the lighter arrows did, and I'm also keen to know how they do in terms of shootability between different draw weights.

Amazing series, every history professor teaching about this era should watch these videos, they could learn a lot. Thanks!

The modern English word “Warbows” is often used in the international community to describe military bows of typically heavy draw weight. It seems that in England it is typically used to describe Late Medieval English yew longbows but I personally don’t like this definition because it gives a rather narrow focus on a specific time period in English history. there’s a lot more variety even in England. For example Syrian archers were used in Roman Britan. Early Irish and welsh bows are closer to the Hedeby bows for example. in medieval history there are many other designs of “war bows” such as the Byzantine composite Warbows and the Scandinavian Warbows etc.

Man, Joe is such a beast with that bow. I hope this team continues making this stuff. Academic level content posted out in the open, truly invaluable

These videos are fantastic. They are providing so many interesting bits of information and it's opening up so many other questions. Truly hope we get more of these Arrow vs Armor. Now I'm so interested on what different builds of mail can do against arrows & when bow weights start to over power mail or gambison. You know you're doing good research when answering a question opens up a bunch of new questions.

Toby is a real asset in this experiments. His deductions from socket to warbow-weight highlight his scientific background!

Just when you think something has been decided, a thousand new questions arise! Great job.

I love seeing Joe draw these war bow. Really impressive! Keep on going :D

Thank you again for these wonderfully produced films to everyone involved! I agree with pursuing the question of range,arrow-weight and bow-poundage.Finding generally effective arrows for their archers would have been important for the historical people involved logistically in Henry V's campaign for France,variety introduces complexity and complexity often leads to confusion. Accuracy not being a major issue at longer-ranges is probably true,to my understanding anyway,but I have heard Toby Capwell describe elsewhere how the English archers were probably shooting flat and at shorter ranges at the French and in such a situation accuracy might be a great force-amplifier - obviously this a question worth pursuing. I am very much looking forward to your future projects,again thank you.

A thought on the target, the plate does take a specific minimum energy to pierce and is then generally no longer affecting the arrow since the arrow head is a tad bigger than the shaft. Whereas the foam behind will get out of the way, but then grip the whole penetrated length in a way, that it will grip harder the further the arrow penetrates. So arrow penetration depth does not grow in a linear fashion with force delivered. Same with how arrows or other projectiles are harder to pull out the further in they penetrate.

I like how you guys break apart all of the different variables for these tests

Christmas has come early. These videos are the best thing I've watched all year. Thanks Santa Tod

Great series. Looking forward to the distance shoot.

Outstanding work I just love your investigations on the topic, it's fascinating.

So happy there are multiple videos out of this, great stuff

I love these videos, you answer a couple of questions and give yourselves a dozen more. Love it, true detectives.

Something to consider in future: You might want to put something like wood or padding over your steel frame, so that your arrows take less damage when they accidentally strike it.

Bow-Weight!! There's more!

I'd like to also see a chrono added to this for each shot Joe does so we can see how much energy he loses as he shoots throughout the day. As well as the speed of each arrow depending on the bow he uses.

I shoot a 130lb English long bow and it took me a while to get to that draw weight. I have such HUGE respect for Joe and the level he is at. I'd love to see more videos about this subject. Great content guys.

You guys are performing basic, repeatable, scientific measurements here that have NEVER been done before ! History owes you thanks .

I don't know if you'll read this Tod, but your first AvA video had a dramatic, life-changing effect on me, well it was more Joe's explanation on the biomechanics and because of your combined effect I've decided to start working out and improve my fitness and maybe one day be able to draw a bow such as the one Joe is using! Thank you for that. Truly amazing video! I was expecting it to be even better then the 1st one and it exceeded all my expectations! I'm very disciplined, committed and the results are coming in! And I just may be able to draw it (not shot it, I'm no archer 🤣)

BRAVO! finally a video and another good one from Tod's workshop that talks about and makes much sense of what may have been the draw weights of English warbows.

Oh no, sir, thank you for such great work. I love watching your videos.

Well done Joe. It appears to me that the penetration depends more on whether the arrow strikes the plate square on, or slightly canted. Shooting at the test plate this close ensures good strikes, but the arrow is still wobbling from being bent around the bow limb and hasn’t settled down. It’s easy to see, in the slo-mo, which arrows strike square on and they usually penetrate further, because all the kinetic energy is concentrated directly down the shaft. Great series Tod and team! 👏👏👏👏👏👏👏😁🥃🥃🥃🥃🥃

There's really no substitute for experience, and for me it's Joe's take that comes closest to answering the question. If the arrows are feeling sluggish out of the 110lb bow, better out of the 135lb bow, and sweet out of the 160lb bow, then I think that's a very good reference for what they were using--assuming they've got the arrow weight right. Joe said in a previous video that shooting much more than 160lbs was too taxing to be practical in battle, so I think we can assume that bows greater than 160lbs were quite rare. I'm sure there was a range of draw weights used, but based on this I think it's reasonable to conclude that they were targeting at least 135lbs. The arrows have to feel right to the archer, and Joe is the best reference for what a trained archer would have wanted.

Another great video Tod!! Enjoyed your video and I gave it a Thumbs Up for the support of your channel

Always great videos. Thanks Tod, Joe, Toby and crew. It occurred to me that each arrow will have deformed the steel plate to some extent. The ripples or ridges/furrows - the deformations - will have made slightly more and less resistant areas which might account for some of the variations in arrow penetration depth. In an ideal world you would use a new piece of steel for each arrow - but that's not very practical so I understand why it was done as it was . Fascinating stuff.

Credit to Joe for shooting that heavy bow ✨

I'd love to see a comparison of Turkish composite bows versus armor, and next to a longbow as well. We have pretty good ideas of draw weights on those thanks to research by Adam Karpowicz, and we also know that due to their design, with equal draw weights and equal arrow dimensions, they can throw an arrow faster than a self bow like the English longbow. And many Turkish arrows had metal tangs going deeper into the shaft, which would presumably have an effect on penetration of iron or steel. I'd be happy to chip in for a kickstarter to make that happen.

Good work with the series. I thoroughly enjoyed them. Perhaps for AvA3, I would love to see these tests with crossbows and more distances!

Absolute brilliant content. It makes sense that a heavier bow will shoot an arrow much faster so the impact energy from the arrow is greater. Kinetic energy ( mass x velocity x velocity / 2) shows this. I do believe though that there is too much focus on just shooting the really heavy bows. Many bows have been said to be under 100lb so it would be great to test the theory on these too. One of my yew long bows is 90lb and very comfortably shoots an 80g arrow a considerable distance. Really love what you guys are doing. Keep up the great work

Some of the variation is probably due to the arrow flexing as it flies. So the head of the arrow is sweeping an arc as it goes, and it's pretty much random where in that arc it'll be when it connects. If it's at the left or right extreme, you're getting something close to a side-on shot. If you hit somewhere in the middle of the arc, then the point is more dead-on and will improve the piercing with less resistance.

Kevin Hicks @thehistorysquad has an interesting claim, that the Mary Rose bow were actually kind of unfinished bows, and each bowman would make his own adjustment to it once issued, and at the end the bow might have turned out a bit less powerful. As a former soldier (me as well), he says that upon being issued a personal weapon, he used to modify it and adjust it (weight distribution, balance, carrying system and sights) to his preference with the help of the unit's armorer. I have a very similar experience. which makes me believe that every soldier in every army might have done the same for his weapons. Kevin has been shooting professionally (i recommend looking him up) and says he doesn't even know what's the poundage of his bow, he doesn't care and it's just the way he likes it. Though I'm sure it's around the 90 mark if not higher)

Awesome test videos!!!

Bows are so powerful. The way the arrows shivered after hitting the target... so scary to imagine them piercing you

The shooting against an armoured figure showed clearly that frontal plate will likely never be penetrated by the heavy bow and the heavy arrow. Albeit that the energy transfer to the figure is noticeable. It was also perfectly clear that there were a number of weak spots that could be exploited by the archer, eye slots, shoulders, armpits, lower torso. Even at 15 yards Joe could not aim specifically at the weak spots with an expectation of success and relied on lucky hits. Yet a weaker bow, perhaps with a lighter arrow, perhaps with a different head would be ideal for those weak spots because it could be shot with accuracy at these ranges - see our friend in his The Historysquad RU-vid series. And see his filming from inside the helmet through the eye slits. And if the plate is known to be adequate protection against any arrow why would the archer persist with the heavy and less accurate bow? The only thing not yet considered is the need to address a knight's horse - would the heavy bow and arrow have a distinct advantage there sufficient for it to have justified the standard? There will always be more questions. I get the sense that we are at the beginning of a long journey. Your work is incredible. Thank you so much. I have waited months for this new series and the results have been as fantastic as I have come to expect from you and your team. Peter.

Has Joe ever lost an arm wrestling match? I'm betting no. And I hope he wouldn't take this the wrong way, but I'd be afraid to shake his hand. I kinda prefer it to stay attached to my arm, oddly enough. I've shot a lot of bows in my time, but him shooting those monsters recurves like that is absolutely impressive. Not only can he pull that thing back, but he can reliably hit what he's aiming at. Just amazing, anyway you look at it.

Nearly 2 hours of history nerd excellence on war bows vs armor? You spoil us, Tod

I absolutely love this channel. As an archer and historical battle fanatic, i continue to think about this regarding draw weight. I shoot mainly traditional and takedown recurve. Ive bows of 34, 40 and other limbs of 50 and 60lb. Years ago at my local club, ive tried others: horn/Hungarian, Asian bamboo, hickory self bow and a compound. Ive settled into more traditional barebow, wooden feather fletched arrows, i also prefer a selway leather bow quiver, it seems to reduce noise and vibration. Back to the pont! Have never shot a longbow before. Im only 5'5" tall and small to meium build, however, 60lb recurve is not a problem for me.

Hi Tod, I love the vids, these last few especially. I do have what is probably a stupid question. Given that there may have been bows with different draw weights, is it possible that the archers were arranged in a similar manner. The heaviest/strongest used at the longest distance, the medium bows at the middle distance etc? This would seem to be an advantage with an increasing number of arrows being released as the enemy advanced and the lack of range with the lighter bows would to a large extent be negated. Keep up the great work, stay safe and stay well.

I cannot remember where I read it but the baseline wasn't draw weight. You had to be able to shoot the standard arrow over a specific distance. 220 yard or something. Your bow was yours, you got the arrows.

I, as a modern archer, find it hilarious that these lad consider a 100lb bow ‘light’. Mad respect to Joe. The man must be a machine.

I've used slow motion footage to analyse my arrows kinetic energy and momentum, and comparing that with penetration of a straw boss. Something you could easily do to help quantify the differences between arrows and bows

And Joe is making a good point in the end: The archer was never the equivalent of the modern sniper (like the Robin Hood movies). In the battle field you had a bunch of archers and you would have used them more like a machine gun.

Which weight would Joe prefer to take to battle? Rate of fire and comfort? Surely a factor??? Great videos absolutely love these great job lads!!!! Seriously!!!

Dude gets shooting arrows.... Totally valid and apt comment at the end of the video about the weight more meaning the ricochet being a big factor .

I really appreciate your work! Would like to see these kind of tests with late mediaeval Crossbows or maybe Handgonnes. There's so many Myths to bust (or confirm).

First, an absolute fantastic series of videos. My praise for all involved. I have a suggestion for another armor test, though it would require a little research, calculation and adjustments to the bow weight for validity. I was looking up bow weight for Mongolian and Turkish bows. Apparently they are documented (by museum examples) to have bow weights of 100-180lbs, with a conclusion that 166lbs were feasible, but the average was lower. That seems remarkably close to your calculations on an English war bow. One of the comments spurred this post. The statement was that Mongolian bows and archers were accurate from 600 - 800 yds. That was a pretty broad statement and no one could reasonable believe you'd aim at an individual target. But if you were shooting at a mass of men, that certainly seems possible. The Lee-Enfield No1 Mk3 for example had volley sights so that a group of soldiers could shoot at an area target a thousand yards and more away. That required an extreme elevation to get to that range and that brings me to my point here. All of your testing has been at essentially point blank range where the arrow velocity is solely dependent on the bow weight and the short range. It is also directed against armor where the thickness and slope are the most advantageous. I believe that long range shooting was also done and as such, the arrows were shot at a high arc and then encountered the enemy in a downward plunge manner. I suspect, but it would have to be verified, that the bow weight got the arrow to that distance, but the velocity at impact was solely (or almost) the result of gravity and the height reached. That could be calculated/measured and then the requisite bow weight determined to get the same velocity at a close range target. Position your armored dummy at a corresponding angle to simulate plunging fire from a long range "arrow storm". I'll admit, this is a lot of work. I don't know how much difference it makes when armor of the time was also intended to protect against melee blows from above. So maybe the simple test would be to angle the dummy, use the standard bow and see if you had penetration. If you had effective penetration with an attack from "above", then you'd have justification to test for the assumedly lower velocity of a plunging area dependent on gravity. Anyway, I don't know if you had considered any of this but I thought I'd share. And again, a fabulous set of videos that I consider the standard that none other have met.

I'd be really interested to see an experiment to model the effect on the wearer of having arrows bouncing off your armour. There's a lot of force going somewhere, and a lot of it will get transferred to the person inside. I'd suspect that, even if the arrows didn't penetrate, the cumulative effect of the blunt force trauma from multiple hits would eventually take it's toll.

Absolutely fascinating. And yes, Ouh, man am I looking forward to the great bow weight comparison on the standardized war arrow over all the archery disciplines: Accuracy, range, volume of fire, area effect, target ballistics at range, resilience to environmental variables (wind, rain, leaves), etc.pp... It would be great to also try this not with a single archer but with a whole formation, but I do see the difficulty to muster 120 guys like Joe for a weekend shootout..... ;-)

Bows can vary widely within and between types. Some composites are just a little faster at the same draw weight with the same 972 grain arrow (yew 206 v Tartar 211fps), and some are a lot faster at much lighter draw weights with the same 1230 grain arrow (Qing/80lbs/190fps, yew/125lb/175fps). Yew bows made from that same tree at the same time to the same dimension can vary in weight and speed.

You can make a comparison to Qing archery standards. They had similar weights of bows, and records about how many people could draw them. Good to test out the difference practically, all the same.

There's lots of information on Chinese Manchu war bows, and the draw weights. An explorer wrote about a military garrison in China, and an archery contest they had every year. Would have to look up the exact #'s. But out of say, 80% could pull an 80lb bow, 40% could do 130lb, and maybe maybe 10% could pull 160lb, they also had the champions bow at over 200lb that a few guys could actually use and they would get a money bonus for hitting a target with the champion's bow. He also mentioned that the official royal deer hunters had to be able to use 120lb bow minimum. Medieval Chinese Manchu war bows would probably be similar draw weight to the English, and same can be said from the strength of the archers themselves I have a Korean bow at 130lb at 32 inches, and have tested heavy arrows, and points. It will easily stabilize arrows over 4000 grain, and broadheads at over 1200 grain. There's a great picture of Manchu war bow used by the Chinese military, they tied a grenade to the front of an arrow and let it fly lolz 😂.

Enjoyed the series keep it up gj

I know it’s much easier said than done, but please please try to find a group of archers close to Joe’s ability to do a volley in A vs A 3. Imagine 4 or 6 heavy arrows hitting the armour at once! Or firing into a group of armoured targets! It will answer and add so many more questions. Loved this round of vids but I’m still hooked for round 3.

I'm so impressed with the amount of thought and effort everyone has put into this. Well done everyone involved.

The Manchu thought 80# was reasonable and adequate, although they had people capable of far more. HOWEVER: their design of bow had a high ratio of stored energy to peak draw weight, so they are equivalent to much heavier longbows.

Got to point out the 9cm deep arrow. In the slowmo we can see how the archer's paradox make it collide an other arrow, get diverted and lose a bunch of energy in the other arrow's shaft. Another thing to consider to avoid flukes, even though the archer has little control on that, is the angle at which the arrow enters the target. I don't know if it's the camera angle, but I have the counterintuitive impression here that the ones on the top and bottom have impacted real strong, and with quite an angle. I would have expected the opposite. Angled shots imply a little more metal to pierce, but if my impressions are correct, something else has to be at play. Maybe the bendiness of the arrow shaft, depending on where it is in it's oscillation at impact time. Dunno really, need more data, slomo wide shot maybe.

As I recall, they made a video previously in which actual Medieval armor was fired at, and try as they might, were unable to do more than mildly dent it. Having said so, the arrows did deflect dangerously, which was then countered by metalwork on the armor plate away from the face and other vulnerable body parts...

Todd, there was a very interesting episode of the Australian guy, forgot his name, he was shooting arrows from different longbows with his brother, and a 90lb or 100lb longbow was outshooting a 120lb bow, the same arrow was flying further or at the same distance. So, what i'm saying is it is quite silly to talk in just draw weights without chronographing.

Excellent series =) Not sure about the best way to test this (humanly) but I'd be very interested to see how different bow and arrow weights dealt with warhorses.

Hey guys, loving this series. Please do some longer/long range testing. Shooting so close I feel is a little unfair to the armor.

Consistently good presentations!

Would be very useful to know the difference in ranges.

I’m really interested in how a 200 pound bow works and if it was even at all possible for archers to continually shoot them. I’ve seen joes 200 pound bow and holy cow is that thing crazy. I wonder if they could penetrate armour or just shatter the arrows instead?

Great video guys thank u

I love these series :D

I'd have liked to hear from Joe about how tiring each of them are to shoot, and how quickly can he shoot them off? ie if the enemy is charging at you, could the 110/135 lb bows get off an extra arrow in that time?

Keep up the testing. Can each bow hit a target effectively at 100, 150, 200 meters?

Always an amazing video when Joe is shooting. When and were these filmed ? I assumed you lived in the uk but obviously the weathers not like that here at the moment haha

There's one thing most people don't really talk about when it comes to bows and it's not mentioned here either. Just because a bow has a high draw weight doesn't automatically mean it's super powerful. It has a lot to do with its construction and materials, since that effects how fast it releases the energy once you let the arrow loose. I really want to see testing done with heavy and lighter bows made out of different materials and using different manufacturing methods to see how much of a difference that makes, or if the draw weight really is the king when it comes to power. That pretty much sums it up. Have bows of different make (still using medieval methods) as well and compare them. Draw weight, as I understand it, is just one factor that determines how powerful a bow really is. If a lighter bow can have similar results there are many benefits of using it over bows with heavier draw weight. It drains less stamina, and is also easier to draw and aim (I imagine, as I have never drawn very heavy bows).

Hey Todd... did that one arrow... The 18.5 from 160 lbs bow... it looks like it might have come out the bottom of the backing material.. which would help it go in further...

Something to note is that even with a 60# bow you can definitely take down a human. Some warbows were possibly as light as that. Lighter bows also allow for faster shooting, which is specially handy for horse archers--the Qing specifically lowered their military standard for bows for that reason (and because they were having trouble recruiting strong archers).

Thank you guys

Well done! One thing I am curious about though is the change in energy delivery to the target at the longer ranges. Our archery instructor implied that after traveling such a distance, the spine cycle would have dampened out and more of the energy would drive into the point instead of flexing the arrow. It would be wild to compare high speed of the impact at that range with these. Tricky though, hitting such a specific target at 200m!

There is a movement in traditional archery hunting to use as heavy an arrow as possible because the arrow will penetrate further even using very light weight bows. I think the same principle applies here as heavy arrows have great momentum. I hope you can do further testing with lighter bows to check this out.

Amazing you're doing the work acamedic archaeologists and historians won't. Amazing set of films. I look forward to seeing the tests done at range, it would be interesting to see the damage drop off over distance. Again thanks for the films.

I found the archer's shooting stance awkward , then I researched further that the common stance wont let you draw such a heavy bow , one has to bend to use the back muscles fully , and this very stance has been depicted in medieval tapestries

One thing I would really want to see in AVA3 would be some test of accuracy at range; these videos really seem to hammer home that it's the weak points that matter, so seeing how reliably someone can hit those weak points with a heavy bow and traditional arrows would be a really important piece of the puzzle.

I think that an important question that needs an answer is: how long can an archer keep up a rate of fire with the various bow draw weights? Maybe a lighter draw weight ultimately puts a lot more arrows in the air. Then too is the question of recruits. How many guys could they get who are in peak shape to pull war bows of high draw weights? A hundred Joes could not put as many arrows in the air as a thousand Tods.

I really would have loved to see the greathorn crossbow with over 400 joules of energy hitting the chestplate. I'm positive it would have gone through.

Everyone watching this should go look up matching your arrow spine to your bow. There is way more to it than I ever realized before I got into archery, and it depends on so many factors -- bow design, bow weight, draw length, arrow material, arrow thickness, head weight -- and all of them factor in to making the arrow shoot accurately in your bow.

If you do a part 3: Things I'd like to see: Range of the different bows Test crossbows vs armour Give the knight a shield and see how much that changes things

Joe pulling that 110 lb bow back like it's absolutely nothing and I'm outside struggling with my 80 lb lol. I started at 55 though so I'm making progress. Joe and I are about the same size as well. I'm a bit taller though I'd say (6'1½). It really shows how much technique and practice matters. It's not just brute strength. These films are truly incredible for an aspiring Bowman like me.

If the English / Welsh longbow was such a devastating weapon why didn't other European nations adopt it? I suspect it was due to the length of time that needed to be invested to train an archer to use it effectively (probably starting from childhood). A longer training period would develop the muscles and technique needed to shoot a heavier bow, which would suggest to me that a heavier draw weight was more likely the standard on the battlefield.

another nice documentary :)

Todd wailing away and waving his arms: “We just don’t KNOW!” Don’t forget to have fun throughout all this brother lol

What does self yew mean?

I forgot how great this video was. So important that we got this made, and that it gets people talking and trying to shoot all different weights of bows and arrows, and see how much velocity loss there is over distance, how accurate or not the arrows are, how interchangeable are different weights of bows are with different weights of arrows, etc... Well done us!

Very interesting! Thanks

When he was mentioning how on a battlefield distance is more important than the accuracy that was needed in this test a question came into me on how effective arrow volleys even are- if a large group of people shot their bows at the same time at roughly the same area how many arrows would collide and break before even reaching the target?