These are always amusing these bits.
Hi, it's Tod from Tod's Workshop and Tod Cutler here and I'm back with Michael Allison our
resident spear thrower. It's good to be back Tod. Good to have you back Michael, thank you
very much and we're back to throw pilum again. But actually just to explain our little location here,
it's a trebuchet, my trebuchet, nothing to do with pilum, but just so you all know I can't shoot it
at the moment because look at the crop field behind, so that's why you haven't seen it for
a while. But the other thing you need to know is I'm going to put it on eBay so watch out for that,
it's coming. Anyway enough of all of that you'll get to hear about it. So Michael throws javelin
for team GB, it's a really simple premise. I can't throw for toffee, I am useless, waste of time.
Michael's not. So if you want to investigate spears or in this case pilum, you need somebody
who can actually throw and Michael can actually throw. And the thing is Roman legionaries trained
with them, they even had indoor training halls so they could train over winter. Pilum were really
important to Roman legionaries but we have in the archaeological record this part, the steel,
as far as I know and please correct me if not, we haven't got the woodwork. So
if you know it out there and you can send me a reference I'd love to know,
but there is one reference that I know of which is to a pilum with a breakable wooden peg in it.
Now I have to confess I've forgotten but it's probably Vegetius, but I couldn't find it when
I came looking for this video. It's a really simple premise, this pilum here you throw it,
it sticks in a shield, sticks in a person, sticks in the ground, may or may not bend. But you've
thrown it back bent haven't you? I mean yeah it, I mean it makes it a little bit harder, but it is
still usable, still less functional, but a usable weapon. You wouldn't want to stand in front of it.
The idea behind this one is that when it strikes something it breaks the peg, gives way and it is
utterly, utterly useless. So what we're going to be testing out is my interpretation of it,
but the first off we've got a regular non-breaking. 10 meters. Throw away Michael.
oh
Well that worked oh Gosh they're intimidating aren't they? That's there actually such a good
weapon. We've just pulled this out of our poor unfortunate chap and there
is nothing wrong with that. No so that can go straight back again. So obviously
the next one is let's find out with the breakable link what difference that makes.
Oh broken on launch. Yeah okay I wasn't anticipating that. Right mark one failure.
So I think we caught that on camera so what do you think happened? From my perspective
what I think there was is you you're never pulling perfectly along the line of the spear,
there's always going to be a little bit of sort of pulling sideways and I'd imagine I pulled....
I accelerated it too quickly such that it went like that. Yeah and the acceleration at
this point just was too much and it broke that. So what happened in the workshop,
which is stuff that you didn't see it wasn't relevant to that and you haven't seen either,
is I actually tested different woods here. So I tried things like oak and beech and ash and poplar
and actually I ended up settling up on walnut. Now what I was looking for is a wood that was
strong enough that I could handle it and move it around and it'll be fine in a non-athletic way,
but it would be weak enough that when it impacted it would crack it, would break.
So I set it on walnut and that seemed to work really well. So I've brought
walnut rods with me, I have nothing of any other kind of wood, so that is slightly
annoying. I think that you were throwing it in that orientation yeah yeah could we try just
throwing it in that orientation? 90 degrees different, because then we're not getting the
same loadings on the pins. Because of course this is exactly the same issues they'd be dealing with
yeah but that is the nature of all these things isn't it? That's what I love about this work
is you just learn these things; I have just learned I think I've just learned
that actually it depends how you throw the thing in terms of what orientation it is which is not
something I was thinking about at all. So next up we've got the pilum with the breakable pin in it
see what it does
oh!
That could not have been better that would pierce the helmet. Yes,
sometimes when I do this kind of stuff I just get really surprised, amazed and this is one of those
moments. Just look at this. So the first thing is the breakable link; that works, definitely worked,
that works there is no throwing that back. The next thing is this helmet here, straight,straight
through that's quite a thing isn't it? And this is, I measured this before, it's it's
1.6/1.8 millimeters at that area, mild steel but still better than an awful lot of the armour that
would have been found on the Roman battlefield that is for sure. Clean through. Goodness sir.
Right let's look at this pilum. This pilum, it exactly, brilliantly worked. There is no
throwing that back, I mean he's not throwing it back anyway, but there's no throwing that back
it really does exactly what it says. I mean what I'd like to do is see it a couple more
times. You're happy to throw it a couple more times see if we can impact it on the shield or
something less hard basically, the shield the body and actually even the ground just
just a simple strike upon the ground and that's just going to tell us something about it as well.
Hi I've just interrupted the film for another Tod Cutler-related interesting fact and today
is the bauernwehr with byknives or actually it's really about International Trade,
because that is ebony. Now a little bit of ebony well it costs a lot of money, but in little pieces
perfect for the cutler trade and it just shows how flash you are. Anyway this and loads of similar
pieces available on Todcutler.com and now back to the film. When it comes to replacing the pin
it really it's no problem at all. So you just have a wooden rod kind of diameter put it through, you
could snap it off obviously I own pliers so I'm going to use them and that's it. Pop. You go again
oh
So basically what happened there was on launch the the pin,
the shear pin sheared which is of course not what you want because now the pilum
is going down range all crooked and bent. However the first one worked so fingers
crossed we'll try again and see if we can get another one to do it. Let's go again
Well it didn't break good and it told us something else as well because that's hit
the ground. Has it broken? I don't think so. So just pulled it out of the ground
still perfectly usable so in fact go again.
Okay miss again but that time it has snapped. Yeah but I suppose
it's all about marginal gains and if it snaps one time, two times in ten
it's better than not snapping at all because those one or two times in ten it can't get thrown back.
oh
Result so into the neckline here, missed the mail on the front, through two layers of gamberson,
mail on the back and through the archery foam target, which from my own tests from
Arrows vs Armour2 trials is exactly the same resistance against arrows and presumably roughly,
spears as ballistic gel, so it's actually it's a good analogue for that. But then the pilum itself,
well it did exactly what we wanted it to do,
so the shear pin broke and as you can see there is no throwing that back for this
guy or anybody else for that matter. These are always amusing these bits.
Oh again, lovely shot, lovely shot. I think we can see the use of the shield there's if you get
a square on impact we've seen from other videos that it'll go straight through the shield and
through your armour so you're done, but if you get one near the edge just that rocking of the
shield takes all of the velocity off the pilum. It does it um well it absorbs the energy, this one's
I mean it's gone through the shield but yeah, but not a lot and it's a you know heck of a lot
less resistance. This guy's still alive so yeah anyway let's go again see how we do. So what's the
intention on this one are you gonna throw it a bit harder? I'm just going to throw a bit harder see
the breaking point of the pin really on on launch all right.
Well that last throw was lovely uh really square onto the shield exactly what we wanted to see but
unfortunately the pin broke again so what's your take on all of that the whole system basically
I think in principle the system works it's just I mean this this was our first try that need to be
further tests on the wood type the diameter of this pin so you get to point that it breaks on
impact but not in your hand and if you've if you make your wood like that I think it'll work. I was
trying to achieve it breaking every time on impact but actually maybe that's just an unrealistic ask
but if it breaks 30% of the time on impact it's cost you no more to manufacture, or very little
more, it's not a difficult or a cumbersome thing to sort out and to set up. So there's lots of good
things about it it's just not 100 effective. But 30% effective is better than zero percent
effective. That I suppose, that's my take so yeah back to the not quite the drawing board, but back
to the test bench I think. Well maybe we'll end up rerunning this again with boxwood pins yeah
um how about that for an exciting video you'll see the whole thing again except for a different
coloured bit of wood. But uh no, but that's how we learn things isn't it. But anyway,
Michael good day for you? Yeah. So it is amazing to see the guy the power of what you've turned
into a sport coming from its root origins. But uh yeah I mean these are proper weapons,
yeah you don't want someone throwing these at you. No, no but anyway Michael again thank
you very much and for those who have enjoyed the film don't forget sign up to the channel,
put your bell notifications on, come to the websites, sign up to the newsletter, come and see
what we do because if you like this kind of stuff you will like what we make and what we do there.
All right thank you very much guys, see you again. I'm just back because I've got some different
woods for my pins so we've got the walnut we had before, box, oak, holly and laburnum. So those are
all woods that they could have used, they're all strong, I would say stronger than walnut,
but anyway we'll find out. Very unscientific test this so we're just going to pop a walnut peg in.
I'll show you what it looks like, I'll comment about what it feels like. So that's our pin
there you know it's nice and secure but obviously not secure enough we saw that with Michael so....
All right okay so that's our standard so we got boxwood now.
It's harder yeah. Okay Holly.
Hmm actually I'd say no better than the walnut for that one. Next up is oak
Okay better than walnut but box is the winner I think and then laburnum.
yeah so I'm just gonna try in our very unscientific way
box again see what I think about it you can probably see from the film as well.
Yeah so in my very unscientific trial, boxwood pins definitely harder to shear
than walnut and that's what we need, so next time we see Michael, boxwood. See ya.