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The Craftmans Shop => Backyard Ballistics => Topic started by: Toolshed on May 04, 2016, 12:05:58 PM

Title: Slingshots
Post by: Toolshed on May 04, 2016, 12:05:58 PM
Another habit of mine is making, shooting, and trading slingshots.

Here is an aluminum cast of a natural someone traded me.

Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: RobWilson on May 04, 2016, 01:24:41 PM
 :thumbup:   Looking good Toolshed , Thats a  canny casting project  and I fully understand the time ,effort and skill involved in producing that casting  :clap: :clap:


There is only one thing that spoils your good work , the photo is out of focus  :bang: , if you had only took the time to stop and think , looks like you have set the shot up on a chair  . if you have had rest your arms on the chair back to steady yourself and took the shot ,this also would have framed your work better  , take several shots in this digital age and picked the best of the bunch .

Above is meant to be  constructive ,not a dig . I see lots of lads good work spoiled by bad photos .

Rob  :wave:

Ps Andrew will soon be on your case
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: RobWilson on May 04, 2016, 01:30:33 PM
Oh ! forgot welcome to the forum  :nrocks:



Rob
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: awemawson on May 04, 2016, 01:33:14 PM
Welcome to the forum.

(Don't mind Rob - he means well  :lol: )

640 x 480 is a good size for pictures to allow everyone to enjoy them
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: DavidA on May 04, 2016, 05:14:53 PM
Being a bit picky now, but I would call that a catapult.

To me a sling shot is a leather pouch to hold a rock. And this is fitted with two lengths of cord .

You spin it around then release one of the cords. And the rock flies off at a tangent and kills Goliath.

What do the rest of you think ?

Dave.
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: awemawson on May 04, 2016, 05:17:31 PM
Yes David that's also my understanding - perhaps it's a difference in nomenclature either side of the Atlantic  :scratch:
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: Brass_Machine on May 04, 2016, 05:40:26 PM
Yeah... We call them things slingshots over here.
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: Alan Haisley on May 05, 2016, 09:10:40 AM
Sometimes we call the other a "sling". Hopefully the context identifies the difference between the giant killer and the thing to holde a broken arm   :scratch:
Alan
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: mattinker on May 05, 2016, 09:37:37 AM
I'm a Brit and I would call a sling a sling, and a slingshot a catapult!

Regards, Matthew
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: Jonny on May 05, 2016, 11:40:27 AM
As far as I can remember and used to make em as a kid early 70's, known as catapults.
Catapults been around since 3rd century, slingshots after 1844.
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: mexican jon on May 05, 2016, 03:50:31 PM
Welcome to the forum.

(Don't mind Rob - he means well  :lol: )

640 x 480 is a good size for pictures to allow everyone to enjoy them

What's wrong with the size of his pictures  :scratch: :scratch: They look fine to me on my 90" monitor  :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: Toolshed on May 06, 2016, 12:55:30 PM
Yah.  I'm still getting used to the picture posting.  This was posted before I got the little resizing application.

Anyway, here are a few more (Hopefully in focus) 

I am NOT a photographer by any stretch and I couldn't set up a shot if I had a micrometer to do it with.

Rappelling carabiners that some slingers cut the top part off to make the forks.

A bent wire slingshot I made for another fellow.

One I cast in trade for a handmade dream catcher for my wife.
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: RobWilson on May 06, 2016, 01:47:17 PM
 :clap: :clap: Nice one toolshed  :thumbup:


Those castings look great . 


Rob
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: DMIOM on June 02, 2016, 07:25:24 AM
As far as I can remember and used to make em as a kid early 70's, known as catapults.
Catapults been around since 3rd century, slingshots after 1844.

Actually slingshots date back to at least the Romans http://www.archaeology.co.uk/articles/features/burnswark.htm
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: Alan Haisley on June 03, 2016, 12:04:54 PM
As far as I can remember and used to make em as a kid early 70's, known as catapults.
Catapults been around since 3rd century, slingshots after 1844.

Actually slingshots date back to at least the Romans http://www.archaeology.co.uk/articles/features/burnswark.htm (http://www.archaeology.co.uk/articles/features/burnswark.htm)


It's a question of naming conventions again. The Romans used what today is called a sling. The slingshot mentioned refers to the forked stick design with rubber bands. These couldn't have really come in until vulcanized rubber was commonly available - probably not until the first inner tubes wore out and were replaced.
Perhaps we should post pictures of slings, staff slings, slingshots, and various ancient weapons that used either torsion, flat spring, or gravity to propel objects - each captioned with its currently accepted name, but that seems like overkill.  :loco:


Alan
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: nrml on July 23, 2016, 05:49:36 PM
This thread brings back great childhood memories of cutting forked branches off trees and ripping up bicycle inner tubes to make catapults (or slingshots). Guava trees made the best handles. If you were were posh, you bought square rubber cords instead of using strips of inner tube.

I bought one from a local craftsman a few years back to do some plinking but I never used it because I feel bad about scattering lead or steel balls in the environment. Does anyone have any suggestions for environmentally friendly ammo that is consistent enough for target practice? It would be nice to relive some childhood memories
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: Joules on July 23, 2016, 05:54:16 PM
Acorns...
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: Will_D on July 23, 2016, 06:02:50 PM
Bio-degradeable airsoft ammo: 6 or 8 mm diameter and will seriuosly test your aim

I think these are just starch balls with a shinny starch outer wrap
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: Pete49 on July 23, 2016, 10:31:38 PM
We would use what is called pebbles or gravel, as near to eviro friendly as you could get. We seldom here in our patch used a forked stick but used single length strip of bicycle tube with the pocket (?) tied at the back. Very accurate but a misfire certainly had its moments. Best thing was it was easy to put in your pocket and have fun to and from school. Ahhh the days of our youth.... wouldn't be dead for quids. The rubber(?) tubes now seem a lot less stretchy.
Pete
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: modelman1938 on July 24, 2016, 04:43:34 PM
They are known as catapults here in the UK and we always made from a fork stick cut from our privet hedge in the garden, we used 3/16 or 1/4 square rubber which we purchased from our local sports shop and a yard length always worked out about 34ins. long, a nasty piece of work was Mr White.
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: Will_D on July 24, 2016, 05:29:32 PM
IIRC; The square rubber (3/16 or 1/4 inch) was always called "Rabbit Elastic"

Why?? I have no idea!

In the good old days you could also go into the hardware shop and buy snares (for Wabbits!)

Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: tom osselton on July 25, 2016, 04:23:59 PM
We just used surgical tubing for ours, or buddy would hold a piece over his head while kneeling letting you shoot a bent nail fairly acurate!
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: Alan Haisley on July 29, 2016, 01:26:15 AM
We had the original "Whammo" slingshots in addition to the home made ones.
The dumbest thing I remember doing with one  :doh:  was to shoot a 1/4 inch steel ball (standard Whammo ammo) straight up. You can see it go a ways and then disappear ... quick run in the house so as to not get hit on the head.

Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: Fergus OMore on July 29, 2016, 03:22:46 AM
I recall 'Catty-Why's' usually made from a bit of planking. The rubber was either push bike inner tubing or posher square rubber.
  There was also 'carbide guns' made from the calcium carbide bits from coal miners knocking the remains from miner's lamps when they 'came to bank'. We put it in lemonade bottles and urinated in it, to fire the corks.
I'm quite ancient and we had steel ink pens and ink. This was about 1940-41 and there still pre-war rubber bands which could be joined up and would fire broken nibs. The Y was made from finger and thumb. There was a time when one missed the headmaster and impaled itself in the blackboard. I had a rather interesting childhood. One graduated into- Borstal( or others in my class did)

The most serious remark- however- is the origin of 'ballistics' and I would put it- not in the Romans- but in the Balearic Islands( Balleares, Espana) whose incumbents were the stone throwers to the Roman Armies. Certainly, there was and is plenty of limestone available.

And then there was 9mm Sten guns- made for 'half a dollar' from bed springs and steel piping. Another misspent youthful activity.

Norman

Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: Toolshed on October 11, 2016, 02:36:15 PM
Nowadays we have sheets of latex we cut our bands from. 
Still use mostly leather pouches. 
Ammo is all over the place from rocks -- we have competitions called "Dennis the menace" where you try to hit a target using NON UNIFORM rocks.  Even the best can barely hit 1 or 2 times --
marbles, steel ball bearings, lead of all shapes (though this isn't all that common), basically anything that can fly somewhat straight.

If y'all get a chance, stop by http://slingshotforum.com/ or http://www.theslingshotforum.com/ and check out some of the BRILLIANT craftsmanship....
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: polecat on October 12, 2016, 09:45:51 AM
yes toolshed check out (polecat ) on your slingshot forun and you'ii see what i used to make px and brass laminates even sold them to usa
polecat
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: A WELLWISHER on December 22, 2016, 04:03:42 AM
Gentlemen, this is my first post, however I feel that I am qualified to comment on catapult matters, firstly ammunition, a lady neighbour told me she used ice cubes to discourage cats from using her garden as a toilet, hmm a bit inconvenient when required at short notice but disapear without trace, my own choice of biodegradeable ammo is the humble Aniseed ball ( an old fashioned English sweet ) don't know if these are available worldwide, nice size, hard, shatter on impact with hard surfaces, food quality so wont damage the environment & you can eat them! what more can you ask? One day my best friend in the whole world brought a Barnett Black Widow catapult because he didn't think it was accurate, after I smashed 3 aniseed balls one above the other on a clothes post 90 feet away he concluded that it wasn't the catapult that was at fault.
Where I worked at the time we had a sort of catapult club & during the dinner hour we would go through the car park to a river which ran past the factory, carefully selecting useful pebbles from the drainage channels alongside, we then walked along the river bank assaulting targets of opportunity using a mixture of pebbles,glass marbles, ball bearings & my own particular favourite to be to be used only against metal containers & rogue bull elephants, spent carbide throw away lathe tool tips! we would then surface at the other end of the factory, & clock in satisfied with our target practice. There is more to discuss but right now dinner calls.
A.Wellwisher
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: Toolshed on February 01, 2017, 02:59:06 PM
BRILLIANT WellWisher!  Thanks for the story.  I haven't been doing much of anything since the knee surgery (except crocheting) but I'm getting healthier and winter is almost over....

Polecat, I haven't run across a Polecat on the boards as of yet.

I need to start working on some new ideas for castings, decisions decisions....
Title: Re: Slingshots
Post by: polecat on February 07, 2017, 02:52:39 PM
try putting a search into the slingshot forum under polecat mind it was 2012 i tried and they all came flooding back to me the clear px one was a good one the chalice designed by dayhiker amongst some others
polecat