Ah interesting.
Hi, it's Tod at Tod's Workshop and Tod Cutler here and today I'm back with a spread of
lockdown longbow simulators. 80 pounds through to 160 pounds, gambeson handmade maille by Isak
Krogh. Beautiful stuff. Type 16 arrowheads and sharp, like sharp. What's the difference, well,
much to my shame especially as a knife maker I didn't think that making very sharp arrowheads
would make that much difference when you're going against flesh or against fabric but,
actually, they're the only type of arrowheads we have physical evidence for that had steel
in the heads. So that of course gets you thinking; and then one of you lot out there,
a guy called David Jones, has done some fantastic work. He's written a paper, link in the notes,
about the importance of sharp arrowheads against maille and fabric armour and he said something
which gave me a eureka moment and very simply is, if you make your arrow head a little bit sharp
it penetrates the fabric, if you make it sharp it goes straight through the fabric armour but
of course if you can blunt the arrowhead i.e you put maille on the outside, your arrowhead
is going to pass through the mail, get blunted, not go through the fabric armour very well.
If you do it the other way around, the arrowhead goes clean through the fabric armour.
Not that the maille is not that resistant against arrows and the arrows go through the mail
so actually you wear your mail on the outside. That of course gave me this eureka moment which
is well if you can keep your arrowhead sharper as it goes through the maille, stands a better chance
of going through the fabric. Is that why they put steel in the heads of these sort of arrowheads?
it's a theory and that's all it is it's a theory, it's my theory, it's an idea,
it is not fact but it does answer some interesting questions and that's what we're going to test here
now. It means that I can't test the mail today because i want to see what the fabric does on
its own with these arrowheads so I'm going to take two layers of the gambeson just to magnify
any effects up I'm going to shoot them as you know, sort of reasonably sharp, munition grade
from the forge arrowheads and then ones which have had considerable care in the sharpening
of them and we're going to see if there's a difference because if there was a difference,
they would have sharpened them up properly. But, before we carry on just very simply, what is this
whole lockdown longbow thing? I've been running these films for a year, so if some of you aren't
familiar with, it if you're not, go back to the first couple of films and hopefully you'll get it.
But, these bows here shoot at the same speed that medieval longbows did, as far as we know and they
shoot the same weight arrows, the target doesn't care, so i'm just going to put them through the
chronograph now so we can just have a look at it, make sure i'm not fibbing and then we can carry on
with the film. Sharp and not so sharp arrowheads against fabric 160 pound equivalent 85 gram arrow.
192 feet per second 125 pound equivalent
65 gram arrow 193 feet per second 80 pound equivalent 65 gram arrow.
155 feet per second. I''m down on the range now with my type 16 bladed heads. Not super sharp,
but not super blunt, then I've got two layers of gambeson here. I want to highlight any differences
between a blunt and a sharp head, really sharp head, so that's why I've got the two layers, bit
of insulation foam, bit of plywood, it's time to go shoot some stuff, 80 pound longbow equivalent
ah interesting
huh okay
Right that is interesting, now, that is really interesting actually because from the sound i
thought it was hitting the backboard it wasn't hitting the backboard look at that it's in.
25 millimeters one inch one of them bounced out.
20 millimeters three quarters of an inch so when they're not super sharp
this defeats them 125 pound longbow equivalent.
Well, certainly in.
Oh, just, just in I think.
Yes, okay good, let's go check that out. Well, here's a little bit of a story. So, this one
just clipped, it basically didn't and we've got 10 centimeters, 4 inches sticking out the back.
This was the first one I did. It has not penetrated the backboard
so that is marked depth of 15 centimeters 6 inches. This one, the head is still poking out,
you can see, so this one, it's pretty marginal about it going through i'm going to add a bit here
by complete chance and chance is what happens when half a million arrows get thrown at you
that has gone through a previous cut hole from a previous bladed head
so actually that one's not really a true sample. We're going to shoot one more of those.
It's in, but, I think we can tell not that much
and yep, sure enough, still got 10 ml of the head sticking out actually as is the nature
you're gonna have to take my word for it. You can see here, I've got to cut it out with a knife.
Fabric armour for you. We have our original lockdown longbow the 160 pound longbow equivalent
Nice, well it's in, it's in.
Again
And again. Right, let's go, see what we got, so here we are with our three. I can tell immediately
they're not into the wood. This one's got a depth of about seven centimeters on it. Uh,
I can't turn that one but it looks to be a little bit more. That's about nine and this one is about
10 centimeters so that's the deepest of them and it is just about touching the wood I would think
but let's pull them. We'll sharpen them up proper sharp and we'll do the test again. I
stopped filming and then i pulled it off the foam, but, I got to show you this. So there we are.
That is the penetration from our biggest bow through the back so this one here to
give you a sense of scale three quarters of an inch, 20 millimeters, uh, this one
two inches six uh 55 millimeters about that. I'm back now with all of my sharpened heads.
Now, they're not razor sharp but they are sort of kitchen knife sharp you know
you're not going to want to run your hands over them but you're not going to shave
my hairy beard off with them. I chose that kind of level of sharpness deliberately actually because
I think once you buy a hundred thousand of these they'll be transported all the way
across Europe into France whatever they're not going to end up being razors
but they're not also going to be just straight off the anvil. Pretty much as I thought they were
I think they're going to be a bit better than that and we're about to find out but before we do that
time for another shameless ad. I'm afraid Tod''s Workshop crossbows. There are a couple available
on the in stock page on Todsworkshop.com. This one is a 350 pound draw weight munition grade crossbow
so basically it's for soldiers you know it's fairly basic fairly simple fairly straightforward
but 350 pounds it packs a punch, need to span it with a goat's foot lever because you ain't going
to do it by hand even the infamous Eddie Hall. I'm thinking maybe he could anyway, comes back
pretty easy really and then it shoots these big chunky bits of wood and steel.
Packs a punch right we're back after that word from our sponsors
sharp arrowheads properly sharp and the weakest of our bows
It's in doesn't look very deep though.
Just off. I've pulled the one that went off because something
interesting has happened and I want to do that third shot, I want to get it in.
It's in, let's go have a look. Now something interesting has happened here. This is not
amazing science it's a sample size of three but here we go. This one here, the socket is just
covered by the gambeson. Before, all the sockets had about a centimeter exposed. These two though,
very different story. So this one is in, about 13 centimeters and this one in about nine centimeters
very, very different. Don't forget, this gambeson turned the arrowheads before, now they're going
through sharp does matter those are mortal wounds that that have 125 pound equivalent.
It's in but it doesn't look deep. oh, just over
And in. We'll do the miss again I think.
Yeah, end in good, should we see what we got. So, these two are both in at about 15.
This one is in at about nine but i guess maybe there's a difference, you know between
sharp and what you think is sharp uh but, anyway either way definitely, definitely
deeper because they weren't really penetrating off this bow before so we'll have a look at the
big one. And now for the last of our bows, 160 pound equivalent with properly sharp arrows.
it's in.
Right, all three in let's go see what we have. And here we have our three arrows, properly
sharp this time and they've gone in. 15, 16 centimeters as opposed to 10 centimeters or less
but, also, they've gone through that 12 millimeter half inch strand board sort of cheap plywood stuff
and they're sticking out about so far out the back side so an inch to a half centimeters something
like that a very significant difference. It really does count. There's one more test I have to do for
my own curiosity. Those arrows were clean. There was no wax on them no grease on them because I
didn't want that kind of variable in there I've greased this one up, bit of wax on the head,
let's just see what it does because earlier films showed it penetrated better.
Well, it's in no surprise I wanted to try this because i thought it would make
a significant differenc. My earlier films showed against shields and things it did
against this target it hasn't. 17 centimeters 15 centimeters before not that exciting. Back at
base now to have a think about what we've learned and the first thing is sharpening your arrowheads
matters and I feel so very very foolish right about now for not thinking it mattered that much
but it really did, so it turned, I can't explain my thinking. It turned the light bow,
the 80 pound bow, into giving you a pin prick, to let's go see the surgeon
and he turned the heavy one from, you know, reasonable penetration probably gonna kill you,
to that much more. It counts but oh sorry that much more also through 12 millimeter half inch
of wood so it really, really matters that's important I learned that the other thing is,
the gambeson. What that means is, if your sharp arrowhead meets the gambeson sharp, it will go
through, but then we come to the armour. Because the armour is a composite system, it is maille and
it is padding gambeson, do you wear the maille over the top or underneath. Well, that is going
to be the subject of the next film because I think it's going to make a difference but, the
last thing I'd like to consider is the gambeson itself and the role that that played. Now, I think
one layer that I had here, which is what 11- 12 millimeters thick, something like that.
5.8 kilos for a full-size garment you could wear that, you can wear that in conjunction with maille
but, if you don't have maille you could make it thicker because you can carry
more weight of course so that would take it up if you doubled it like I was today,
to about maybe 10 or 11 kilos for that garment for the whole gambeson that is going to afford
you very good protection because also don't forget that I took great care to sharpen those arrowheads
but also the distance I was shooting at was only about 20- 22 meters. Now, we know from distance
tests that I've done as well, previous film, check it out that after 100 meters we're losing quite a
lot of velocity I can't remember what it was now but it was like, 12 percent or something.
That might be enough to save your life. So, basically even if you can't afford maille, a
heavyweight gambeson, make it proper make it thick and it is resistant to incredibly powerful bows
even with cutting edge arrows. Cutting edge arrows with cutting edges. Anyway, been a bit of a long
one this time I hope you enjoyed it but I'll catch you next time for gambesons and mail and
sharpened arrowheads. Do you wear the gambeson under the mail or over the mail? let's find out.