Greetings everyone! Yesterday I made a sling at a buddy of mines house, he is a leatherworker so he had all kinds of materials around and so I got lucky and found this piece of leather that was the perfect shape for a sling pocket. I asked if i could use it and he was like "For what?" I replied "To make a sling", he (being a mideval weaponry fanatic) immediatley decided that he would make one too. So we both made slings and spend the rest of the afternoon slinging, (and dodging) rocks. Now I have never made a sling before, although I did have one as a kid. I just kind of took what I know about physics and applied it to throwing rocks(or glands as I have recently learned they are called). Anyway, I came up with a design using braided cowhide for stings. I figured this would add some rigidity and weight to the strings so that t when I let go of it it would snap out all whip like and not get wrapped around the gland. Which was problem I remember having with the sling I had when I was a kid, which was just a couple leather thongs tied to an oval shaped peice of deerskin. So I cut six thin strips out of a big piece of cowhide and braided two strings. One longer than the other because I reasoned that I would want something to keep the sling from flying out of my hand. I thought that putting a ring through the end of one string(the longer one) and and putting the extra length through my fist against my palm and then putting the ring on my little finger would do that. I also tied a fat knot in the end of the shorter release string so that it would not come flying out of my hand until I wanted it to. Then I began wondering what I was going to do about attaching the strings to the pocket securley, figuring that whatever I did had to be strong. I ended up putting three holes in each side of the pocket and running the three strands of the braid through the holes. then I put the three braid ends flat together and punched 2 holes in them. Then I needled some sinew through one hole and wrapped the ends of the braid together tightly with the sinew up to the next set of holes in the thongs, then needled the sinew through that hole and then knotted the sinew off. I followed this procedure for both sides. The result sinched the leather of the pocket perfectly and caused the pocket to be a in a slightly more concave shape. Once I had the finished strings FIRMLY attached to the pocket I went and tried my new sling out, VIOLA! I whipped a golf ball sized rock a my buddies rusty burn barrel so hard it broke through both sides of the barrel. That was my first, and best shot to date. I have barely been able to hit anything I was aiming at by quite alot since then. That was before today when I decided that mabey there would be other weirdos out there who liked slinging as much as I do. So I searched google and found this rockin site. Spent the better part of the morning reading through the guides area and checking out videos. I have already tried out several of the diffrent techniqes and improved my accuracy and power considerably. I especially liked the part about incendiarey rounds. ( I thought that rubber cement glue would work well since it's A. highly flammable, B. sticky as heck, and C. comes in a nice slingable glass bottle. however it's not very period). So as not to make this post to horribly wordy I will get to the point. I am a beginner and until recently had no knowledge of slings at all and I assume that because of this, my sling may be flawed or inefficient in some way. I would greatly appreciate any advice or pointers that anyone could give me about making my next one. I have included pictures of my sling to aid in the visualization process.
This pic is the whole sling
This one is a closeup of the braid I used for the strings
This one is a closeup of the stationary string
This one is a closeup of the release knot
This one is a closeup of the pocket/string joint, it is like this one on both sides.
This one is the back of the pocket showing both string joints.
This one is the inside of the pocket showing how the strings go through the front and out the back
This one is a view of the string next to q-tip and a sharpie marker to give perspective on the size of the strings.
This one is a veiw of the whole front of the pocket showing how the strings connect.
These are pics of the ammo I am using and a penny to give perspective on size and wieght.
So I hope all these picks are usefull to you in some way. And I anxiously await your replies.