Hey Skallagrim! Hope you're reading this. In case you haven't got an answer already, the reason why crossbows have a short draw lenght is their prod. Crossbows have short prods and drawing the string further back than normal would put the prod under excessive stress which medieval materials (mainly steel or horn composite) could not handle. They could have made the prods longer but that would have increased the price and weight of the crossbow considerably. Longer prods would also have made the crossbow wider (their width was already a problem in close troop formations in the field and also on rampart walls while defending).
+Tony Vajda yeah i was thinking the same, in order to be compact the prod was short and could already generate a nice ammount of power. a longer prod would require longer reload time, higher muscular stress to the user, less mobility and to be fair, what's the need of all that? most crossbows could already make short work of plate armor
+SanjiKunTheLoveCook crossbowmen have always been cursed with short prods and it's a bigger thing than you might think. Draw weight is not everything. Historical crossbows have huge energy losses due to their material construction (modern ones are MUCH more efficient). Crossbows with huge draw weights are overrated. As much I love them they can only pierce plate armor when they hit at roughly 90 degrees flat on and even then some upper breast plates were partially reinforced with a second sheet of metal so it would bounce off, not to mention that almost all breast plates and helmets have rounded surfaces that deflect crossbolts that would penetrate square on. So in short it was far from a sure thing that even a 1600 pound Genoese windlass crossbow would penetrate a knight's armor (not to mention the layer of chainmail and gambeson that were generally worn under the plates. A 120 pound English longbow could match, even surpass 1600 pound crossbows in range and armor penetration alike.
+Tony Vajda just to clarify for people who don't know excessive stress in this case means going beyond the elastic limits of the prod in other-words with a farther draw would cause the prongs to permanently bend out of the intended shape which obviously ruins the prods
+Tony Vajda Aren't crossbows much easier to use than longbows though (easier to aim with, can be kept spanned for a much longer time -> more time to aim etc.)? I think I read somewhere that in order to become decent at using longbows a lot of time had to be invested, compared to crossbows, which is why they were expensive. Wasn't that the reason why the English and Welsh mostly stuck with their already skilled archers? I might just be full of shit tho.
+witchkinglp You are pretty much spot on. English longbowmen usually practiced archery from childhood, shooting consecutively bigger and stronger bows. On the other hand you can give a crossbow to a peasant who never used one and train him an acceptable crossbowman in an afternoon. Crossbows are inferior to longbows in pretty much every other respect though.
The reason why crossbows didnt have longer draw lengths is because the prods couldnt handle the stress. Since prods are short, they have a considerable less amount of material to bend, thus a lower draw length and higher draw weight. Bows are the same way. Pretty much, if you tried pulling it back that far it would either be impossible, or it would shatter.
@@panzerofthelake1623 that's what the Han Chinese did, hence why their crossbows were more efficient despite the lower poundage and with a faster reload time without the need for spanning devices
We actually do not know why this was the case everything is a guess. I also do not see how a steel prod could shatter possibly bend out of shape but shatter?!?! No not likely.
"I don't know why they didn't put the nut further back" My guess is that 350 pounds of draw weight already is a lot of tension on the string. The further back you pull it the more the tension increases. So back there it would have more pounds of draw weight but you would need something like a steel cable at that point, because of all that tension on a string.
It just seems like they were wasting a lot of effort getting it cocked with that much draw weight of they also couldn't draw it back so far. So, instead of a more powerful bow, what about something easier to draw, but comparably powerful, a bit like a gastraphetes?
and I think thats might cause also danger to the user because if that string or something flies away from that crossbow while u r loading that wont be fun time.
Rhodoks for life! Also, making your own crossbow is probably one of the most fun project anyone can get into. Heck, I'm getting a small brass and bronze casting setup ready to cast my own parts (apart from the bow). I can't find anyone else who has ever used Aluminium Bronze to make crossbow parts. As for the woodworking, it's an easy and simple enough thing to get started with if you have little to no experience in that sort of thing. Even the string you can easily make at home. All you need are two vertical studs set at a set distance from another, a string shuttle and some string.
***** If you haven't already, come join us at thearbalistguild.forumotion.com/ It sounds like you have already been bitten by the medieval crossbow bug.
Hoops Laboratories I've browsed those forums before but I do not need to really join it yet in any case. If I ever need help with something I'll probably go there.
I'm a physicist (3rd year collage), so this is my answer. hehe :) They didn't put if further because of few things. 1st. Energy of arrow / bolt is force times draw distance, but force is NOT constant throughout the draw. Force is, in your case 350p when fully drawn, but it's 0 when resting, so half way through its 350/2=175 and so on. So, energy of the bolt can be calculated as (draw weight)/2*(draw distance) because the average force is (draw weight) / 2. 2nd. Now you see , if they put the knot farther away they would increase the maximum draw weight because it depends on draw height, materials etc... This is called Hooke's law. And now you think GREAT, if the knot is higher up, i have more draw weight and more draw distance which means even MORE ENERGY. Correct, but more energy means your SHIT (wood, bow, etc..) would break, so they set it on the best place, where you get enough energy but you don't plastically deform your steel "bow" part. (even steel can only take so much tension) ps. Love your videos
the assumption that the force at rest is 0 is faulty, though. The bow is already pulled back a bit and exerting a noticable amount of force, by virtue of the string being shorter, that the distance between the ends of the prod if it were unstrung and at ease.
You wrote a lot more than necessary, it's better summed up as: the spring steel lacks the elasticity to bend much further without plastically deforming.
LutzDerLurch True, the bow is pulled back (when resting) , but that force can't be used to drive arrow forward or backward or in any way, so that force acts perpendicular to the back/forth motion, so it doesn't count, thats why i left it out.. ( Mathematicaly, it's multiplying vectors in scalar way so perpendicular doesn't count)
Mob Db well, but when assuming draw length 0 has 0 force and full draw length has full draw weight (force) there isn't going to be 1/2 that force at 1/2 draw length. there would actually (due to the bow/prod already having been under tension) more force early on already. :P
No, the draw weight is exactly the force needed to draw perpendicularly. The force with which strings act upon the bow is actually bigger (because of the angles), and thats NOT the draw force, so average force IS Draw force / 2. Full force (draw + resting) can't be used because its there is force even when resting, so one should exclude resting force from calculation. To sum up, draw force is the one u can use to fire arrow, because its perpendicular. The resting tension is allays there, but cant be used, AND draw weight is exactly that perpendicular part of the force, thats why, if you don't draw, the draw force or weight (shame thing) = 0
The reason crossbows were usually not drawn as far as bows is just that there was no material for a compact crossbow, that could survive the stress of being bent so far. They did not trust their steel that much. If a drawn steel crossbow would break, it could inflict some serious injuries.
Steel prods were a rather late developement though; they originally used wood and started using horn or composite limbs around the early Crusades (these being the ones that prompted the Papal ban on the weapon's use against fellow Christians, duly ignored wholesale by literally everybody). So eh...I do recall reading that the steel ones have shorter draws than the older patterns though.
they had good reason not to trust their "steel" there was also that the draw was probably shortened because an arrow would simply shatter under the strains and the force of driving a dtrong enough arrow would negate any ambitions of accuracy
[H]ouse MD Eh. You could always just have changed the material for the projectiles then. I've read they developed special heavy iron arrows in India for use against war elephants... Shot from composite bows AFAIK, but that's beside the point. Or simply used thicker, more massive bolts as in a vast range of siege engines. From what I've read you kinda need to size the bolts and arrows to fit the specific measurements of the bow for optimal results anyway so no biggie as such...
broadbandislife yeah, the thing is the main advantage of the crossbow was its accuracy (without/minimal training) and ease of use. bigger bolts or metal bolts cripple the accuracy advantage and to compensate for that takes training which takes away the ease of use advantage. the crossbows they had during the time were prettymuch the optimal
[H]ouse MD I don't see the connection. More of the nominal draw-weight being actually imparted to the bolt by a longer draw should mostly compensate for the heavier projectile, leaving the trajectory largely the same. And anyone intending to Hit Shit with a ranged weapon that's not a literal ray gun needs to know how to account for projectile drop with range *anyway*. Battlefield archery was mostly done against "area targets" like massed troop formations in any case, and at distances that required pretty high elevations. Crossbows less so than regular bows owing to flatter trajectories but not by all that much AFAIK. Moreover given the downright grotesque inaccuracy that was considered quite acceptable for smoothbore firearms in mass combat I severely doubt anything like that would have been seen as much of an issue in the first place. Summa summarum: doesn't seem to me like your theory of the technical reasons quite holds water.
*****, I might be wrong, but I think the reason crossbows didn't have greater draw lengths was because of the stress that would put on the material. Given that it was incredibly difficult to produce high quantities of high grade steel until -- I believe -- the late 14th century, most earlier battlefield crossbows were either made of composite wood/horn or lower grade steel, which were less forgiving than high grade steel reagrding stress.
Actually in the musiums if you see the knot on most of the crossbows it was made of solid bone which ounce for ounce is stronger than steel. A cubeic inch of bone is strong enough to hold up 19,000 pounds making bone four times stronger than concrete. so the bone would still even nowadays be the better material the only downside is the bone is easyier to file down over time but the upside it wont rust and its easyier to make and replace you make it too big just get a chisel out and scrape more material off an amature could learn to fix the knot on his own crossbow instead of haveing to rely on a black smith every time it cracks rusts or wares down
josh gregorio, I don't know enough about the mechanical properties of bone to refute, but I was talking mostly about the stress of the prods. Given that the prods on a crossbow act like a spring, whici puts a sizeable amount of stress on them, requiring a material with great elasticity. Now my physics may be wrong , but I think that steel has a better elasticity than bone.
josh gregorio I think Francesco was referring to stress via bending of the prod, which has limitations on how far it can flex based on the qualities of the steel. That's interesting about the bone though!
***** I'm guessing it's got a lot to do with the size of the crossbow as well. In order to have a longer draw you'd need wider prods. And since the prods are horizontal, wide prods would be a major hinderance to you and others fighting beside you.
Swordsmanship requires more agility and archery requires strength. In games they even put some fragile woman in the archer role as if it was a easy job Video game industry has been doing it wrong again.
Sword and Archery are more like skills. Even archery is only using certain muscles - in real life, being a good archer doesn't make you a good wrestler. :P
Usammity True, That is also a major thing about which sword fighter would win against another swordfighter. It is mostly the skill of that person who wins.
Hi I shoot or did until I broke four ribs a 130lb English long bow and spent ten years working up through the draw weights. Cross bows in my oppinion were an answer to the problem of keeping a flow of well trained bowmen heading to the killing fields in France. Should you ever make it over to the UK I would be happy to shoot a target session, my 80lb bow against your crossbow. The very high draw weight bows are a real bugger to shoot with any degree of accuracy but as the draw weight drops to 80lb its more than possible to shoot very repsectable groups at 30 to 40 yards and certainly man sized groups out to 70 yards. Great videos by the way, thank you. All the best Kevin
It is nice to see, how people talking realistically about longbows and their abilities tend to be so much closer to realistic musket-output. Compared to overhyped longbow fanboy-babble vs "history channel" lore of how bad firearms were. :) "A common soldiers musket [..] may strike the figure of a man at 80 yards, even at 100 [...]" To give a period quote
[cont.] In the end, bows, crossbows and muskets were all meant to fling a lot of harmfull stuff in the general direction of the guys you happen to dislike.
I would actually like to learn a little about the potential impact damage between bolts and arrows. Traditionally bolts are thicker and heavier, so in theory they should hit a little harder. But of course, the force or impact depends heavily on the range at which the bolt or arrow is fired. But I'd like to see how a medieval crossbow would compare head to head with a commonly used bow from the same time period, at close, intermediate, and long ranges.
When talking about the transition from wooden prods to steel, you didn't mention composite crossbows which were more prevalent until the early 16th century and could easily reach draw weights over 600 lbs. The famous Genoese Crossbowmen also used composite crossbows for example. Few more inaccuracies: - The draw length of a bow you demonstrated is just the standard for documenting bows. 28 inches is not even close to historical for English Longbows or Steppe horse bows. It is not historical to anchor to the edge of the mouth, that is modern target shooting. To compare potential energy stored, power stroke and draw weight are directly proportional. For example: 350 lbs crossbow with 6 inch power stroke. The 6 inch power stroke is 72.7% shorter than the 22 inch power stroke of a bow. The equivalent bow would need to have a draw weight 72.7% less than the crossbow, or around 95.6 lbs - You mentioned the highest draw weight of bows you've heard mentioned, and I almost fell out of my chair. 120 lbs is not even the consensual *average* draw weight for English Warbows. Most recent experts put the number at 140 lbs. Most recent reconstructions of the largest bow found on the Mary Rose produced a bow of 202 lbs. A conservative estimate of the possible draw weight of the actual bow would be at least 180 lbs. The bow was reconstructed by Steve Stratton. He is pretty much the authority on building warbows. We have textual evidence of Chinese warbows exceeding 200 lbs. Of the historical cultures, the Chinese were remarkable because they actually measured, recorded and standardized draw weights. Soldiers were evaluated by how heavy a bow they could pull. - Armour penetration: No need to wonder about its effectiveness. It's been heavily studied and the best resource is Alan Williams' The Knight and the Blast Furnace although it's mostly on plate armour. That book is the best study of Armour effectiveness we have and a product of over 30 years of research. A 350 lbs crossbow will not be sufficient to defeat a soldier in mail and quilted jack (no one wears just rings on one's clothing). I have screenshotted the relevant page: imgur.com/6kJGx8T PS: You have been wondering why the nut is not further back thus increasing the draw length and power of the bow. The width of the crossbow, meaning the length of the prod limbs puts a limit on the draw length. The geometries of the set up come into play at this point. One could make the limbs longer or just increase the draw weight. Of course by having a crossbow that is longer (extends further forward) and wider, it also becomes less convenient to use. It will be more front heavy and accuracy will diminish because of it. Rifles luckily have a balance point near the trigger system because most of the material is near the shoulder. Even then, it is still a bitch to keep a rifle steady without the use of a tripod.
Mary Rose bows are reported to be of 80-130 lbs. The traditional arrow for an English longbow was a 'Cloth yard arrow'. A cloth yard I was a standard measurement used in the cloth trade--and was 28 inches. Few English archers of the time reached six feet. 5' 7" to 5' 9" was average.
Not exactly, it distracts the opponent, which gives you the chance to run to him and stab him with a spear or sword. Just be sure to not fire at maximum range. Unless you're Usain Bolt, in which case: OH MY GOD A GHOST !!!
The reason steel prod crossbows have such a short powerstroke is due to the steel's elasticity. It can't flex to much without snapping. Two things that could be done to help this are: 1: Make a longer bow, this will give the crossbow a longer draw lenght and the prod will have to flex the same as of it was shorter with a shorter draw, however, this will increase the cost, the weight, and will screw the balance of the crossbow, the bigger bow is more combersome to carry and is located on the tip of the crossbow, making it front heavy. It also won't be that big of a increase in energy transfered, the longer bow will have lower starting weight, and the heavier limbs will take more energy to move foward than short limbs, reducing the crossbows eficiency and penetration, making it just slightly more powerfull than the shorter bow for a big penality in cost and practicity. 2: Thinner and wider limbs. Thinner limbs can flex more, but are weaker, to compensate for the weaker limbs, you can make them wider, but this isn't as eficient as making them thicker in a matter of draw weight. A common rule of thumb amongts bowyers is that doubling the thickness quadruples the draw wight, while doubling the wideness only doubles the draw weight, so now you again, have a heavier crossbow, for not much increase in actual force. Modern crossbows fixed this problem by, not only using more flexible modern composite materials, but also using a compund sistem of pulleys and cams to help. This sistem has the advantage of, for every inch the limbs flex, the string goes back 2 inches, allowing for very short bows with very long draws: imgur.com/nStBAVw Other crossbows even go as far as having a reverse bow, to make the whole thing shorter and thinner, ideal for hunting in the woods were you have branches and rough terraing to deal with: imgur.com/yLUG59Q
The reason the draw length of a crossbow is not very much is due to the short limbs and the material used. For a crossbow using steel limbs that are short and thick, it cannot bend very far. Bending it too far would damage the limbs, just like overdrawing a bow. If the limbs were longer, there could be more flexibility and therefore more draw length.
red toasti upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/6e/Roman_crossbow.jpg looks like it has something that looks like a pommel. Maybe you can break it off and throw it.
Hi Skall, what a beautiful weapon. I browsed through Todsstuff and came across the Windlass Crossbow he offers with 800-900 pounds drawweight. I am aware that this one is rather expensive, but if you could get one some day and review an test the brutal force on numerous targets I am sure lots of people would be extremely interested.
great video Skall ;) I always wondered the same thing about the draw-length but I came out with a few possible explanations: 1) a greater draw-length could bend the steel of the arms with repeated use 2) a greater draw-length would require a more time to reload, and given it's already a pretty slow weapon I'm not sure I'd like to make it even slower 3) a greater draw-length would require bigger loading tools, which means that the levers would need to be bigger, thus more cumbersome for the soldier 4) also you might end up to the point that the goat-levers or similar are so big and cumbersome that they can't really be used comfortably, so you might end up equipping every crossbow with windlasses, which I think it's a little slower and prone to malfunctioning 5) also a greater draw-length would probably require the crossbowman to unstring the weapon every time it's not using it to prevent the steel from bending, and stringing a crossbow is a pain in the ass these are some of the things that came up to my mind over the years haha (roughly in order of likelihood?) I'd love to hear your opinions on this. Have a nice day on the other side of the planet ;)
Thanks for the interesting video. I'd like to point out another advantage to the crossbow over the bow that may be especially relevant in a roleplaying setting: They can be fired while crouching or while prone without much of a problem, making them better for sniping from concealment. Though I've never tried to fire a bow, bar childhood homemade bows, I am pretty certain firing a bow effectively whilst prone would be pretty much impossible. Firing a crossbow seems pretty much the same as firing a rifle or carbine.
Sven Meling smaller bows could be fired while crouching or lying prone (not something like a british longbow) and they also have the advantage of being able to be used on horseback, whereas most crossbows you wouldnt be able to.
Stupid question: why isn't the goat's hook lever device (or something that serves the same function) permanently attached to the crossbow? Looks like quite a hassle in the videos to handle that thing.
I believe there are some crossbows that have devices like that built onto them. Probably smaller versions, though; the style that Skall has would be really awkward to have fixed to your crossbow, I'd think. I'll have to check that out. :)
There is some models found with the mecanism permanently in place, and not only the "goat's hook" thingy, but with a crank too ! (he showed a photo of that in the video).
you'd have to move it toward the back so that it doesn't interfere with the string when you shoot. But in this configuration it would prevent you from aiming properly since it would obstruct your sight.
But yes, crossbows close from what you describe existed. The chinese chu-ko-nu for example that was a repeating crossbow (although nowhere near as powerful-per-shot and accurate as an european crossbow, obviously)
Two theories about why the crossbow draw is so short - (Theories, not answers): 1: Early development would have had the lever system available but not the windlass system - the geometry of the lever might be too awkward for larger draw distances, and when windlasses came out, the draw length was just by tradition. 2: The advent of very controlled steel stengths is actually fairly recent - I've heard it said that Napolean's steel cutlery was more valuable than his golden cutlery, for instance. Given strength variations of iron/steel in the middle ages, it's quite possible that a larger draw might have flexed lesser steel too far and caused it to snap. Consider the effect of such a mishap on a battlefield...obviously a shorter draw length that doesn't overtax the steel is the wiser choice when you have 1000 mass-produced crossbows.
Unstringing a crossbow was considered murder back in the 14th century. When it rained before the Battle of Crecy, the Genoese Crossbowmen couldn't unstring their crossbows, while the English Longbowmen simply removed their bowstrings and placed them underneath their helmets. When the battle commenced, the Genoese were out of their element: 200 yards away from the English lines (max crossbow range was 150 yards), no pavises (shields that protected crossbowmen while reloading), and most importantly; wet bow strings. When the crossbowmen shot, their bolts were 80 yards short from the English lines. When the longbowmen shot, all their arrows went in the Genoese lines; slaughtering many of them and forcing the remainder to flee.
one like this would need to be unstrung with some mechanical aid. You couldn't just push the ends of the prod together and take off the string. Perhaps you could improvise some kind of mechancial aid in the field but it would be very difficult and could result in injury.
Crossbows required very little training to use but were more harder and expensive to make. Longbows weren't some toy you could just pick, draw back and release the pretty arrow into the air, they required lots of practice to develop a strong draw arm. The English are just bloody lucky it rained otherwise it would have been a pretty close battle. What were the bowstrings made of anyway, I don't see how rain could effect the draw strings. I can't imagine crossbows being used the same way as a longbow though being used by multiple archers to release a shower of bolts since they are expensive and hard to make, crossbows seem to work better for horseback, lone archer type thing so the equivalent to a sniper although a large 1000 Ib crossbow seems to fit that description better.
Work [energy] = Force * Distance I think modern bows use a reverse draw and pulley system to get the best of both worlds. High draw weight AND long draw distance. FYI: agility (as dexterity) is the main stat for being able to hit your target with bows but strength is key to DAMAGE. If you have low strength then damage will both be low AND you'll have penalties in trying to even hit. This has been true in D&D/Pathfinder for a while. Crossbows are very popular in such games for weak characters who are otherwise dexterous (sneaky rogues or magic casters). They count as a grade easier to learn to use (the lowest grade) and even if very low strength as long as the character is strong enough to carry the weapon they get no penalty on damage done. Though they are of course much slower to load.
Holy shit, Skal. The difference in video quality with your new camera is staggering. Gonna have to do another collection vid soon so we can see all your blades with awesome clarity.
They would hide behind large shields called pavises to reload, then pop out, shoot, and get back behind the shield. This was where they had an advantage over other archers. At Crecy, they were not allowed to retrieve their pavises from the baggage, and were badly beaten by the archers, (due to rain weakening the crossbow strings, they were outranged by the longbows).
I know about the Pavise Crossbowmen I just thought they were a particular type of crossbow would they all have pavises? and if not would they have to stand in front of the troops give a volley off and pull back behind the infantry, archers can stand behind the main line and pour fire arrows down in a arc with a crossbow I assume they would've of had to have a line of sight etc.
In an open field battle crossbowmen would've preferly used Pavises (en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pavise) to cover themselves. The poor Genuese crossbowmen at Crecy had to encounter English longbowmen without them and it ended terribly. The crossbow generelly shows it's pros more in siege-like situations.
Drayran Part of the reason for their abject failure at Crécy was also the fact that poor string maintenance meant that their crossbows had an even lower effective range, and crossbows already lose out compared to longbows when it comes to long-term accuracy and power because of the aerodynamics of the projectile. Heavy, windlass-drawn crossbows were probably used very extensively in sieges, though, since you didn't have to worry about someone shooting back while you reload, and you can be concerned more with accuracy and killing power when you're not trying to loose bolts into the air.
um, skallagrim, my 18nth birthday approaches, and for it im not sure if i should get a replica recurve bow, or a modern, carbon fiber crossbow. whats your honest opinion?
+John Pugh My honest opinion is that it's 100% personal preference. What do you like more, the aesthetics and extra challenge of a traditional bow or the precision and convenience of a modern model with sights?
+Skallagrim oh the old bolts were often called quarrles and aerodynamicly they fly pretty much the same drop rate no matter the distance, while an arrow will fly flatter longer, modern crossbows shoot what is an arrow a special arrow, but then again I got into crossbow and hunting for a few years scouring the web for information about them and the trends, as well as advances in arrow tech and thoughts on arrow flight. also many of the older style midevel crossbows would have a spike on the front to help hold it in the ground, and as a last resort to stab with if it came worst to worst.
+Couch ! Everything hostility related seems to be illegal in Australia, I often wonder how you defend yourselves from the hellbeast spiders everywhere without serious arms
another big advantage of a crossbow is, that you can increase the "firing" frequency drastically by assigning a loader and a second crossbow to the crossbowman. Thats useful in siege situations (for the defender ofcourse) so that untrained personel can assist trained crossbowmen (if you have more weapons than trained men). Another adv. of the crossbow is, that it can be used in conjunction with horizontal loopholes, where Bows require vertical loopholes (wich expose significant more of the bowmen to return fire from below).
You said you couldn't dry-fire (you're right, dry-shooting sounds weird) crossbows and bows, why is that? I could understand a regular bow, but on a crossbow wouldn't it just shoot like normal except without a projectile? Kinda confused XD Also: Loving the 60fps goodness
the bowstring could snap since it has to take the all the energy of the bow/crossbow. If a bolt/arrow was inserted the energy would be mostly transferred to the bolt/arrow so there is less stress on the bowstring.
9 лет назад
Shooting with a projectile puts most of the energy of the draw into the projectile. If you don't have one, all the energy goes into the bow itself, possibly breaking it.
Can someone with experience with crossbows help me with questions i've often considered but never took the effort to find out about before? So, the question is; How stable are the bolts on a loaded crossbows? Will they fall out of place if the crossbow is moved around, like if the bow-person is running, climbing or performing any other such physical activity? Is there a difference between classic and modern crossbows when it comes to this and if so what? Thanks in advance, if someone could enlighten me about this...
ilzen ver'khaan Yeah, it seems like it's pretty much a weapon for stationary use. But i can't help but think of all those times in game mastering a role playing game that it would have been fun surprise the players by having their crossbows be empty if they did something physical after loading them. In our games crossbows were like single shot rifles that were ready to fire all the time after loading them, no matter what the player had done. I think i remember one friends character rolling down a hill, crossing a chest deep river and firing the crossbow at the orcs following him with him having loaded the crossbow 5 minutes earlier when they suspected an ambush. But hey, if people can shoot fireballs from their hands in these magical worlds, maybe there's magic to hold the bolts in place... ; P
As PsykoOps showed, some crossbows do have devices to hold a bolt in place. A small piece of horn or steel could be used as a tension device to "clip" a bolt in place, as a paper clip is to paper. (TodsStuff actually has this available as a feature for his crossbows). I'm no expert, but I'm fairly certain that this was done back in the period, though it may have been a 'less than standard' feature, as I haven't seen many historical depictions of crossbows with such a device.
***** Ralph Payne Gallwey describes these extensively, both made from steel and horn. They were often put on hunting and recreational bows. Most bolts however could simply be wedged into the groove on the nut.
it was looked down on during the time I believe but it was used because then its not a battle of how good you are with a sword its a battle of can I kill you faster then you can get to me plus on a wall I've heard swords arnt very effective at killing people at that height diffrence
A 70lb long bow would be sufficient to knock down a very large deer at quite a distance. When you consider how poor the ballistics were with early smooth bore guns it really makes you wonder how they ever caught on? I'd love to hear your thoughts on that transition. As in at what point did guns overtake long bows and why?
I would suggest it's penetration power. While you have a relatively bulky weapon ( see the arquebus) the ability it had to penetrate armour of the time effectively is important and valued. Especially if you're talking about properly made plate armour. If an arrow can't do it, a bolt can't do it, but this thing called a bullet can, you'd go for the bullet over both the bolt and the arrow. Keep in mind, I have anecdotal stories relating to bowmen, archers, pissing into the powder to have a go at the hand gunners. I also have stories relating to plate armour of the time being effective against pistol, but not full rifle shot. Of course, that's not quite everything, as I have other stories, anecdotes, but I'm hoping to confirm the details before posting.
There Be Game ***** A arquebus would also deadly against modern body armour. A ball with 2,5cm or normally more is really heavy. The end of plate amour was more about the cost, the lack of god horses and that the noble were not longer in the first row.
***** My degree is in Historical Studies and weaponry/warfare has always been a hobby of mine. One of the major reason behind the transition in England from the Longbow to gunpowder based weaponry was actually due to a cultural shift rather than due to any technological advances. Prior to 14th century (roughly) England was still rather hazardous, you had Norse raiders, regional warfare, bandits, wild animals, various ethnic groups immigrating in, and so forth. Men in England developed great skill with the Longbow as a necessity for survival both for protection and to put food on the table. However after England's monarchy began to consolidate their power (due in large part to the skill of their bowman) the English countryside was considerably safer. With towns expanding, many of the wilder more dangerous places being settled for farming, and the worst of the bandits/raiders now driven off most people began to lose their skill with Longbows due to the fact that they no longer grew up needing to learn to use one to survive. This contributed more to the fall of the English Longbow than anything else from what I researched. To the best of my knowledge the English Longbow was superior to most mass manufactured guns up until the 19th century over all. The Longbow simply took years to master where as a soldier could be trained in the basic use of a gun in a few weeks.
Caleb Lucas That makes a lot of sense thankyou! It always confused me when you see depictions of say US soldiers fighting during the civil war and they would be 30 yards away from each other shooting in a line when they could of shot at each other from a hundred yards away or further with bows.
Well I guess the bow kind of died with the upcomming of standing armies in the 16. Century. Until then the bulk of most armies consisted of merchanaries which armed themselfes. When you planned for a war you could pretty much choose, if you wan't crossbowmen from italy or longbowmen from britain or hallbardiers from switzerland or all of them. But the standing armies got armed by the state... and those states where mostly young nations which wanted to show the world how supperior their armies where. Of corse they wouldn't arm them with anything, but the most modern weapon, even if the older ones could do better. Similar story: Today the US Navy has to use cruise missiles to attack targets a few miles from the sea. Fifty years ago it could have used naval artilery (mainly the Iowa) to deliver way more firepower to the same target for way less money. But battleships are second world war technology and there was no place for them in the arms race of the cold war.
the reason cross bows don't have more of a draw length is the string. given that, like the one you have in the video, the string is mounted on a small area that allows the string to slip off if drawn to far. I have made a few crossbows and my first one had just this problem I put the nut too far back and the bowstring would slip off the bow. excellent video, keep em coming
I know this is an old video and you won't see this comment, but... About the short draw length... I'm the furthest thing from an expert on this stuff, but I want to hazard a guess...I have just a very general knowledge of materials, but since steel will break or bend permanently if bent too far, I'd say the draw has to be directly proportional to the overall width of the limbs (please forgive me if I'm using incorrect terminology). I would assume these were made narrow deliberately. Since a crossbow extends on two different axes, a wide-limbed crossbow seems like it would be terribly unwieldy to transport on your person. Anyone care to comment on this and tell me how bad I did? lol
^Pretty much this You can test this with a metal ruler. If you bend it just slightly it will return to straight, but if you over do it it will stay bent. Besides being cumbersome it might get also heavy to carry long steel limbs(Prods). For the gun reference with bolt speeds, it may not open to non shooters. This explanation of mine is simplified, but I think it gets the message delivered. First take a look at this graph from Internet: www.intechopen.com/source/html/32021/media/image1.jpg In the picture "Stress" represents is the force that is applied between two particles/atoms in the prods. The "Strain" is linked to the bending of the bow. Note that it is linked, not the actual bending. And the curve is nominal to material, this case it is Human Achilles Tendon. I choose this just because it has nice shadings, other materials follow the curve more or less the same. So, the more the bow is bent the more the strain increases. As the strain increases the internal stress within the material increases also. Now if you pull the bow to the 3% strain mark, you have "potential" energy that of the smallest shaded area. Now if the bow is bent to the 5% strain mark, you have much larger shaded area representing the energy that will be (mostly)transfered to the bolt. If you go and bend even more the effect of stretching takes hold and tendon (prod) deforms and the energy is lost to this process of permanent deformation. Think it as pushing a sandpile, if you push it from one place to another it wont return. Bending even more causes the stress to exceed the limits of the material breaking the bow. Note that the angle of the curve dictates how stiff the material is (or: material dictates the curve). But balancing with different attributes: mass, form, size, Young's modulus etc. is another story. 2cents. Correct if I'm wrong, or if my English doesn't make any sense.
Steel is a very wonderful material which behaves differently if you heat-treat it differently. Steel, with the correct amount of carbon, hardening, and quenching, you can make it spring-tempered: aka, it would act like a spring. Iron is soft. Very high carbon, aka, cast iron, is hard but brittle.
You are pretty much correct. If the prod was as big as a longbow it could be made of wood and function pretty much the same but it would be a massive weapon. Made of steel it probably wouldn't bend as far but would be very powerful. Heavy as shit though.
Hey, friend. So, about why they didn't put the nut further back is probably because the metal arc that makes the crossbow works loses its elastic properties when it is deformed too much from the resting position. So, in order to be able to put the nut all the way back, they'd have to make a larger metal arc, which would add more weight, obviously , and less mobility for the wielder. This loss of elastic property in solids is explained in physics: the solid gets back to its resting position if its crystalline structure is not modified, but when u put too much tension on it, it brakes its inside structure into a new atomic/crystalline organization. Hope I helped :) Nice video, as always!
The reason why the drawlenght is so short on medieval crossbows is simple, its all about the materials, the steel wasnt as good as it is today and they knew the restrictions of their steel. :)
+PalmFrond Front Or the guys who didn't know the restrictions of their steel had angry customers complaining about their crossbows breaking in the middle of a battle.
+PalmFrond Front The way that is built is you have to flex the string, and if they placed it back further you'd have to flex the steel. Modern cross bows have the wheels that allows them to increase the draw length.
PalmFrond Front I went and looked it up and they are placed there to increase speed, and accuracy. There are several different types of cams that differentiate slightly, but they all have the same purpose. Like he said in the video the further you can draw the string back the more power you can build up. Most regular bows are made so they flex when you draw them back but you can't really do that with a crossbow.
But in both the bow is often hugely overhyped and overrated. And early guns are usually much much better than most people give them credit. that goes for speed, power, range etc.
LutzDerLurch The problem with muskets and other early firearms is the reload time and accuracy. But if you hit someone eventualy, you put a basketball sized hole in their torso, so no need for multiple shots.
Jakub Žídek reloading time and accuracy are exactly two of the main parts, that have an undeservedly bad reputation. if you have the skills in aiming to do it, any long smoothbore gun/musket will be well able to hit mansize at 80 to 100 yards. There really is no magic to it, that through the power of the gods sends off the lead balls at odd directions. There are plenty of ways for beginners to totally fail at aiming early guns, though. And as per reload, you keep hearing they needed several minutes per shot etc. Which is somewhat exaggerated. even with the most crude guns, you shouldn't break a sweat to stay under a minute, and once you're in the territory of the first real guns (arquebus, musket etc) loading is relatively quick if you know how.
Jakub Žídek LutzDerLurch There are many false perceptions surrounding weapons. I think Lutz has already stated most there is to say, except for one misconception that many people also have : bullets always penetrate armour In fact, depending on multiple factors (bullet speed, impact-angle, thickness of the armour, type of bullet and structure of the armour - for instance) bullets used to bounce off armours in comparably many instances back in the days. But as things developed armours became obsolete later on.
gnhtd1 People don't want to walk around in armor. We're lazy. I have a buddy who went to Iraq and his joke is that he could always tell who was from the northern hemisphere, they were unarmored and shirtless. Couldn't take the heat. btw......I consider that amazing moreso then almost anything else. Chainmail overheats you on a warm day and freezes you on a semi-chilly day. The stuff underneath doesn't get nearly enough respect. I still don't know how they cooled down though. Temperature regulation is serious stuff. I'm pretty sure they had a system that would shock us all........I have no idea what it would be though. Hell! Chainmail "breathes" and it still sucks to wear on either a hot or cold day. Maybe I would have had to be a berserk on default =P
Hey Skulla, nice vid! I have a little advice for you, when you shoot guns or even crossbows, keep both eyes open. It takes practice, but it increases your awareness, and our eyes are Binocular vision based, two eyes open, closing one limits the brain's ability to process the images from what I hear. Keep both eyes open, if you shoot with the right eye, squint the left eye minorly as you're aiming. Hope it helps!
The reason they didn't put the knot further back is accuracy. That much of power would just shoot the arrow into a random direction, while having shortened the distance, what the arrow needs to cover until it's "fully charged up", the arrow starts "freeflying" sooner, so it will not fly off the rail...or how you call it.
And you can get a barbed arrow out of someone without killing him/her or amputating the limb: You get a little hammer, and hammer it trough, so it will penetrate to the other side, THEN you pull it out, so the barbs will not be in the way...or at least wont the amount of damage that would be caused when you pull it from the entering side.
***** Checked them out, and the turkish tool just adds a rail behind the bow, the end of the rail is still where the arrowhead is "locked"(this probably doesn't make any sense in english). The korean though is a bit tricky. I haven't seen too much footage of it, but it seems very inacurrate(but that can be the archers fault, idk if they were professionals). The "rail" restricts the arrow to the point to that it can only move foward and to the right, OR if you use the bow horizontally, it can go foward and upward, which can be used for long range shooting. But as you can see in medieval crossbows, the bolts are not restricted that much, the "rail" is just a shallow hole in the body. Also, crossbows have more force behind them, if you increase the draw lenght, the construction can break, given the crappy materials they used, so it kind of "had to" place the knot the way they did, so the user isn't in any more danger then he should be.
another strong advantage of the crossbow over the recurve/longbows of similar periods was the comparable penetrating power at short distances. i have done a small test in my back yard once comparing my 150 lb crossbow with my 50lb compound bow, and i can definitely say that at a distance of approximately 25 yards, the crossbow bolts buried themselves into the target down to the fletching, whereas the arrows would only penetrate a few inches. these crossbow bolts i was using were easily 18" long. the only time the arrows came remotely close to achieving the same penetrating power as the bolts is when the arrows were outfitted with broadheads. the bolts stayed with field points. with that said, the crossbow's accuracy diminishes exponentially as the range increases. up to a certain point, you will notice a very significant drop between the aim point and the striking point
The limitation of draw length on a crossbow like that is that when the limbs bend back you get diminishing returns. That is, drawing it back farther takes a LOT more effort for not a whole lot more power. It's just a limitation of that sort of spring. This is why longbows used really long limbs to increase power. Shorter bows from some cultures got around this limitation with the re-curve, which allowed for a shorter bow to be drawn back farther with more efficiency. They wanted crossbows to have fairly short limbs for a less bulky weapon that was easier to handle and shoot from formation. A long bow oriented sideways just gets awkward. Modern hunting crossbows have a compound bow mechanism (using pulleys) that allows the string to be longer than the width of the limbs.They typically draw back all the way back to where the rear sight mounts.
Great videos man!!! I started to watch them 2 weeks ago and I can't stop! BTW, I think you didn't talk about the range. longbows can go up to 300 effective feet, crossbows up to 100 only.
Your cinematography looks really good in this one. Everything is sharp and well lit, and you look like a pro presenter. With that resolution, the cloth on the wall is more distracting than usual. I vote for a background more like your "villain study" room.
In mount and blade, one really annoying thing about crossbowmen is when shooting at them with arrows, they are ducked 40% of the time so you are more likely to miss as their torso is moving frequently so ducking is not actually a disadvantage. Especially as you will be surrounded by many other troops and likely to be protected by melee troops who will hopefully be paying attention.
First off, wanna thank you for uploading this, really cool crossbow. I want one! I might be wrong, but the reason why these crossbows have such a short draw length is because having a draw length around the same as a typical bow would require longer limbs or different material like wood or someone mentioned bone in the comments therefore making the crossbow wider. Another possible reason is lengthwise, the stirrup (I think I spelt it right) could be sawn off.
Perfect focus, useful video. That's perfection. Also: if they made a longer draw on a crosswbow the metal, wich is much harder and less flexible than wood, would bend.
In many iteration of D&D, bows have a stat called "Mighty" which is indicated by a bonus, like +3 or +4. Normally, bows use the character's Dexterity bonus for accuracy, but don't gain any damage bonuses from any attribute. The "Mighty" stat is intended to indicate that the bow has increased draw weight, and allows a character to get their strength bonus to their bow attacks, so a "Mighty +4" bow means that the character can get up to +4 damage from Strength when using the bow, indicating that the bow was designed for characters with enough raw power to draw the bow back to its full potential.
I'm so glad you mentioned recoil, or rather, lack thereof. I find it hilarious in some works of fiction when someone fires a crossbow or handbow and they jerk their hand back as if firing a gun.
Aim for as long as you want :P. I have been shooting longbows since I was 10, so a little over 30 years, my main bow is a 105 lb at 32 inches, its a sweet thing, a close friend of mine made it for me, red stained yew, the king of bow woods. One thing you CANNOT do is hold your aim too long! Interestingly, most actual medieval longbow target practice is not aimed at what we consider a traditional target, so that nice bullseye say 100 - 400 yards down range (depending). Rather it was close to what is now known as clout archery. A flag is placed at relatively long range, say 400 or so paces, and the scoring zones are defined by the distance from the flag the shafts land. This is a direct consequence of the longbows role on the battlefield. It was an area of effect suppression weapon, think the Medieval version of the modern MLRS. The idea was to get as many shafts in an area as possible, to kill horses, impede progress and to break up the attack so the disciplined foot knights could meet it head on. It was not until an armoured target got within maybe 50 paces that even the heaviest longbows could penetrate heavy armour with a decent chance at a kill shot. And to give an idea of draw weights of some of these medieval bows... some of the staves pulled from the Mary Rose were tested to 160 lb draw weight at 32 inches, after being on the bottom of the sea for some 500 years, likely weight was probably at least 180 lb at 32 inches... though it may be the actual effective draw weight was somewhat lower as the draw length of the medieval archers may be a few inches shorter... maybe 28 - 30 inches. And yes, some were indeed tested to destruction....
One reason I know why you always span a crossbow facing towards the ground is so you don't shot the person in front of you by accident, plus it is better if you do have a misfire so your bolt doesn't go flying into the wilderness lost forever. Love the video, and that crossbow is awesome.
Great video, thanks! I have some doubts on the physics of the argument about draw-weight and length (which I heard also on some Matt Easton video). Consider that when the string reaches its resting position, the full energy corresponding to the draw-weight has been passed to the arrow / bolt (except for friction). The comparison with a a rifle /pistol barrel sounds convincing, but the physics are fundamentally different (gas expansion in confined volume). Just my two bits... Thanks again for all the interesting stuff!
Cool crossbow Skall. I saw a documentary once about crossbows (or "arbalest" used predominantly by the French) and Longbows (as famously used by the English). You pointed out exactly the pro's and cons- Longbowmen had to be trained and later on in the hundred years war the French could simply field more crossbowmen (which don't need a lot of training). The Longbows had the range and power advantage (could sometimes penetrate plate armour of knights) but they only had the advantage if they had the necessary trained bowmen. I am looking forward to some armour penetration tests! I am sure there must have been some crossbows able to penetrate plate, but as you said they would probably have had to be very large and clumsy...
Awesome Skall, love that crossbow. Someday I wish to have a medieval design crossbow. The stock looks almost like it was designed for the cheek rather than the shoulder as well, I was always curious why they had such small point stocks, but now I think it makes sense. I have a suggestion though, I am very familiar with archery, and also have some modern crossbows. I think if you want to attain much better groupings you should be shooting the same kind of bolt each shot, you might be surprised just how much of a difference a different point can make to arrow flight. Maybe these short medieval bolts are not as finicky as I am use to, or maybe they are, maybe you could test it. If you only have one of each, shoot, mark the spot, and use it again, see if it is more consistent. I would love to do a power test between that crossbow and my 75# Martin Hunter recurve, I would like to see first hand the pound per pound power medieval crossbows had. The speed looks slower than my bow, but the impact is solid enough. Do you have a digital scale? I am curious what the weight of those chunky little bolts are. If you enjoy shooting this enough, maybe someday you could also try a modern crossbow, it would make an interesting video as well, you could compare and see what hundreds of years of evolution of the crossbow looks like. To save cost if you were interested, if you get something like a higher end model Man Kung crossbow you wouldn't have to pay much for very good quality. They have very similar quality and design as the much more expensive brand models. I have the Man Kung 300 AC (marketed as the Velocity Lionheart in the US), it is built like a tank, no plastic, aluminum rail, very comparable to a much more expensive ten point crossbow. Much of the parts are even interchangeable. Local archery shop was amazed at the quality of the thing.
11:15 A bullet gains speed by the explosion that also "pushes" the back end of a rifle, that push is recoil, in a crossbow you are only releasing tension so there is no cause-effect like that, the trigger mechanism doesn't exert a force to the crossbow, so there is no recoil. Loving the 60fps!
I noticed sometimes as you shoot it, the nut doesn't always return back to starting position (sometimes even winds up upside down). Do you have to correct it before you pull the string back, or does the string knock the nut back into place? (Or is there something on the puller that does that?)
Which would you say is more fun to shoot with, bow or crossbow? And I notice that the string on the crossbow could be considered more so a rope. Is that because you need it to be sturdier or maybe because the crossbow needs the extra tension it provides?
Hello. I would like to ask a question about quivers, mainly arrow quivers. As far as I know, there are two ways to wear(carry?) one, on the back and on the hip. Which do you think is superior and why?
Just something I've been wondering since I watched your first Crossbow video where would the soldiers have kept the goats foot lever when in battle? I mean would it be a special pouch or something or just tied to a string and on their belt? also I know this may sound like a stupid question but where would they keep the bolts as in where would the pouch/quiver be?
Is your foot in the path of the bolt when you're using the stirrup to load it? Any worry about getting an accidental foot wound due to either negligence, slippage, or mechanical error?
I have a question. What would happen if a crossbow was fired at point blank range, say 2 or 3 feet away from the target? Would the damage done to the target be anything exceptionally different compared to the damage done from the distance you were using in the video?
I'm curious how crossbows compare to something like harpoon guns. Like would it be possible to make something like a crossbow only with a more musket profile using something like a spring or some other more parallel mechanism? Edit: I realize water is different from air, but I mean adapting the projectile and anything else away from wonder considerations. I ask because it seems like there would be advantages to a more staff like profile.
Quick question, how fast would a bolt travel when fired from one of these things? I know modern reverse-draw crossbows can have extremely long (for a crossbow) draw lengths, so they can fire bolts at well over 400 feet per second. I'm just wondering how a more conventional crossbow would stack up.
I've just seen your very interesting video on your crossbow. It looks and shoots superbly. I have just made a medieval style crossbow but to simplify the build I bought a modern 40lb pull prod and some 14 inch bolts/arrows. This has a draw length of 10 inches, so a little more than the medieval bows. I was wondering, given your comparisons to long bows if there is any way of comparing bolt/arrow energy as a function of draw weight and length of draw for a given projectile weight.
Would it be possible to saw off the end bit to the trigger mechanism (the stock (i think you referred to it as the tiller)) and in doing so produce a much more compact crossbow, if so would it have the same effectiveness?
