The cross-section of this wood is purplish-black. Although I don't know its name, it has a very fine and solid texture.
I once tried to cut down one of these trees, which wasn't very big, with a machete and found it extremely difficult.
I used a plane to trim the piece of wood into a strip about fifty centimeters long, which I will use to make a crossbow mount.
Then, a horizontal groove was chiseled out on one side of the wood to hold the bow arm of the crossbow.
Insert the bamboo strips used to make the bow arm and the bow arm support into this groove. Make a groove at both ends of the bamboo strip. Then take out a piece of thick hemp thread, twist it into a bowstring, and hang it in the groove of the bow arm.
Pull the bowstring hard to its limit, then make a mark on the wooden block.
Remove the bow limbs and support. Next, mark the starting point on the bowstring and make another mark five centimeters behind it to mark the ending point.
One centimeter is roughly the width of an index fingernail, so you can use this method to measure the distance between five fingernails.
Then, a rectangular groove, 2 centimeters wide, is carved out along a length of 5 centimeters to pass through the wooden block. This is where the protective pot, one of the four major components of the crossbow, is located.
Divide the wooden block into two equal parts and draw a straight line. You can use an ink line or a bamboo pen to draw this line directly against the crossbow frame.
Next, a straight groove is carved out of the line using a round chisel; this is the arrow path to place the arrow.
After hollowing out the basic opening of the crossbow frame, the wood is slowly dried by the fire to prevent it from shrinking and deforming.
Now we need to process the bamboo strips used to make the bow arm into a reverse curve shape, so that the crossbow can store more power and be more powerful.
The method of processing bamboo strips is to bake them with fire, and to evenly adjust the reverse bending distance and curvature of the two sides of the bamboo strips.
A properly adjusted bow limb should be symmetrical and uniform on both sides, with consistent curvature.
The next step is to work on the most complex part of crossbows: the crossbow mechanism. Here, I plan to make the crossbow mechanism from the Qin Dynasty of the Warring States period.
The crossbow is divided into four parts: the protective pot, the sight, the hook, and the serpentine blade.
The protective shell is equivalent to the entire outer shell of the crossbow, while the sight is a vertical triangular iron block with a toothed hook and a sight-like scale.
This triangular iron piece was cast in bronze during the Qin Dynasty. Because it resembled a mountain, it was named Wangshan (望山). In ancient times, it was an important object used for aiming.
The tooth hook is the hook on which the crossbow string is attached and ready to be fired.
The hook is a device that connects the watchtower and the sword through a horizontal groove. Its function is somewhat similar to that of a semi-automatic cocking mechanism and a safety mechanism.
As for the Xuan Dao, it's easier to understand; it's what we now call a trigger. The Xuan Dao is named so because its shape resembles an ancient knife-shaped coin.
Its operating principle is that when the drawn crossbow string touches the triangular device of the sight, it triggers the linkage between the hook and the dagger. The hook then presses against the groove below the dagger to complete the safety and ready-to-fire functions.
Once the arrow is drawn, simply hook the Xuan Blade backward like a trigger, and the safety mechanism will instantly disengage, releasing the arrow.
I still have quite a bit of that black substance that looks like iron powder. In order to make these crossbow parts, I plan to use the old method of casting molds to make them.
Since the rigidity requirements of the crossbow are not as high as those of my machete, it does not need to be forged; it can be cast directly and used after some repairs.
My new furnace works quite well; the black powder quickly melts into molten iron under the high temperature of the charcoal.
All the parts for the crossbow were made in just half a day. By then, the crossbow frame had been dried. I planned to install these parts on the crossbow frame with the pot guard cut out and test it.
However, I found that the cast pot was slightly too large, and the groove couldn't fit it at all, so I had to make the groove even bigger.
After placing the protective pot inside, I used a drill bit to make a small hole on each side of the crossbow mount at the corresponding pin hole position on the protective pot, to connect the protective pot and the crossbow mount.
Next, the other three crossbows were placed into the protective pot, and iron pins were used to thread through the crossbow frame and the protective pot to secure them together.
I tried moving the watchtower backward by hand, and the hook below easily engaged the safety mechanism of the Xuan Dao, putting the mechanism into a ready-to-fire state.
Pulling the trigger with my finger, the safety was released smoothly, and the fangs also moved forward with a silky ease. The crossbow is quite well made, and the effect is as expected.
I reinstalled the recurve bow limbs and struts into the limb slots, and then reinforced them with hemp rope nearby.
To increase the lifespan of the bowstring, I straightened the bowstring I had made and carefully wrapped it several times with thin hemp rope about four centimeters from the center.
I coated the entire bowstring with a mixture of pine resin and glycerin, after melting the finely wound hemp rope. This treatment makes the bowstring more durable and stronger.
With the bowstring attached, this powerful Qin crossbow was complete. Looking at the powerful crossbow in my hand, I felt that my life was now safer.
However, I can't test the crossbow's effectiveness yet because suitable crossbow bolts haven't been made. Whether it's a bow or a crossbow, you need arrows to test it, otherwise you'll damage the bow limbs.
Crossbow bolts and bow arrows are slightly different because they are fired in different ways, which leads to a problem.
Crossbow bolts have no fixed length; they can be fired regardless of length. Bows, on the other hand, cannot be fired if they are too short.
This is also why the crossbow is more advanced than the bow. It is not only much more powerful than the bow, but also much more labor-saving and adaptable to different types of arrows.
However, crossbow bolts are generally about one foot in size, in order to maximize their damaging effect.
The crossbow was already very powerful, and the short arrows could penetrate the prey more quickly, causing the arrow to leave the prey's body so that the prey would bleed to death more quickly.
The arrows are still made of bamboo, but this time the requirements for the arrows are higher than those for blowguns.
For this, I need to make a rounding tool using a small piece of forged iron. The method is very simple: just use a homemade compass to draw a semicircle on the edge of the iron block.
I wanted to increase the manufacturing speed, so I drew two adjacent semicircles on the edge of the iron block.
The next step is to use a knife to deepen the semi-circular scratches so that the scratch locations can be easily identified during later processing.
After heating the iron block until it is red-hot, place it on a flat stone anvil and use a special narrow-headed chisel to chisel it into a round shape along the drawn semi-circular marks, just like chiseling wood.
Next, the iron is forged at a low temperature along an inclined angle. The iron block cannot be heated to red-hot, otherwise it will be too soft and difficult to shape.
Continue forging until the edges of the two inner circles of the semi-circle become thinner, which will make the subsequent inner circle push-cutting and sharpening work much easier.
Continue read on readnovelmtl.com