With my experience using Balearic style sling for a while, (You can check out my pics of my braided Balearic style slings) doesn't agree with your first sentance. All of my tapered slings will handle heaver weight rocks ( 1-200 grams) if I increased the size of my pouches to the full 17cm they would handle 500 g rocks all day long.
I tend to sling 50 to 200 gram rocks out of my balaric style slings. Most of them are landscaping rocks I pick up at one of the local hardware stores.
I have never had any of my tapered braided slings give under load. Can't say the same for my leather pouches. All the braiding I do is with Jutte and Sisal I purchase from hardware stores. For the slings I enter in Historical Arts and Science competitions I use hemp twine I pick up at Wal-Mart for those. And I also do sling with those display models, same thing.
Have to remember that in the ancient armies there wasn't a lot of the sneak and peek that you see today, and trust me by the time ya hear those loud crack the stones are only seconds away from landing.
JerrySlinger wrote on Oct 12
th, 2009 at 2:43am:
The only problem I see with tapering is that it weakens the sling. In war time I would want the most durable weapon possible. Also I don't see why a loud crack on a war sling is an advantage. Except for intimidation there may be times when you might not want to give up your position to the enemy with loud cracks. I really became curious to this question after seeing T.J. Potter's Balearic style sling which isn't tapered
http://www.seekyee.com/Slings/gallery/bal1.htm and it doesn't appear tapered in wikipedia either
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Balearic_Slinger.jpg . I have very little knowledge as to how slings were used in war so I am very curious.