Slingshot Forging

Description

http://www.selfrelianceoutfitters.com

http://astore.amazon.com/davecante-20

Dave Canterbury, David Canterbury, The Pathfinder School,Bush Craft ,Survival skills, Historical Lore, Primitive Skills, Archery, Hunting, Trapping, Fishing, Navigation, Knives, Axes, Fire, Water, Shelter, Search and Rescue

Tags: Bushcraft,Survival,David Canterbury,Dave Canterbury,Pathfinder,The Pathfinder School,Archery,Hunting,Fishing,Camping,Primitive Skills,Fire,Water,Shelter,Navigation,First Aid,Search and Rescue,Signaling,Prepper,Preparedness,Self Reliance,Survivability,The 10 C's,Knives,Axes,Saws,Bow Drill,Ferrocerium Rod,Ferro Rod,Tarp,Hammock,Canteen,Cooking,Longhunter,Trapping

Video Transcription

today we're going to make a slingshot with three a three bar alright so first of all let's talk about the slingshot for a minute you might think because it's things made out of rebar then it's really really heavy well it's made out of 3/8 inch rebar and most of your wire type slingshots marksmen and all of us are made out of quarter-inch steel rod anyway so you're talking about a little bit thicker diameter rod but you've also got a little less material in this because you don't have so many bends and twists you don't have the back bars to support bars and all that stuff so let's see the weight really comes out pretty close to a marksman wrist rocket or something along those lines this doesn't have the plastic on it for the grip and things like that to add weight as well so it's really not as heavy as you might think I guess the point I'm trying to make and because it's got some weight to it it's very very stable in your hand for shooting and even with these heavy duty bands on it that we sell software on it's Outfitters for the pocket hunter this thing just feels great in your hand it really really does so this is a really simple project we've got a 20 inch piece of 3/8 rebar and I've tapered both ends I've combed it down just a little bit and then bevel it off so that it's not going to hurt the bands any from movement this director of this direction but it's also allows you to get those things to fit up on there better and because as rebars got some knurling on it where the hollow where bars made when you slide that band up on it gives it a better grab in the end too the fans don't want to come off of there so this 20 inch piece of rebar is what we're going to use to make this slingshot stay with me and we get the forge fired up because it's pretty simple

okay so we're going to use a bending fork in our hearty of our amp we've got 10 inches marked on our April here which is our halfway point we're going to use this to make all of our bends and you could mock something like this up fairly easily or you can just make all of your bends in a vise but this makes it quick and dirty

and once he fed this that looks like we're our bed is a little bit off we're going to do is we're going to count down on the high end just like that

then we can close that thing up about everyone it as far as the width of our grip

get it heated back up now we're open that up just a little bit and then we're going to get the fork it hit up in all right yeah we're looking for remember five inches which the stop right there right there

right

keeping everything symmetrical wise we go

it looks pretty good we might come in here bed those out just a little bit but I think we're going to go ahead and put our beds in here on the front first and see what we're at see what that looks like before when your solves it want to bed this out so we're doing these front seated up again

then we're going to put that in a vise to bend those over to 90 degrees so now we have the basics you're going to have to do a couple of things first of all we're going to make sure that these are straight up and down and that may mean put it in a vise and bending the knees out for now what we want to do is we want to make sure that we are happy with our bends

and our beds are exactly what we want them to be I'm going to come out here and I'm going to bend this out just a little bit here just a little bit here widen that up just a little bit get that as even as I can then I'm going to come in here get these straight now I'm just looking at this thing for symmetry by putting it on something that it will rest on and I can look at both sides you see how even they are this way this way good my bends are here and how good I'm centered with my handle here everything looks pretty good I just want to do one tweak to this handle because I feel like it's a bit just a little bit that way so I'm just going to take this and switch it a little bit while still cool we're still onna me why do you heat it up just a little bit more to do that every slingshot design is going to be a little bit different you're probably not going to make two of them exactly alike to try to get everything straight here actually I want to bend that this direction think

that's a really good-looking slingshot okay that looks pretty good we're nice and flat we don't have any problems there everything's laying about the same thing looks good this direction this direction we got even bends so we got good symmetry like I said no two slingshots are going to turn out exactly the same now we're going to let this thing cool down on its own it's normalized state is plenty hard for a slingshot if we try to cool it down quicker with oil quench or water quench it's going to make it brutal we don't want that we want this thing plenty strong best way to do guys just let it air cool before we continue alright so once we've got our basic frame formed now we want to see kind of how it fits in our hand because at this point we can always heat it right back up and make changes if we need to so grab it in your hand and hold it see how your hand wraps around it bear in mind you're going to probably put something on here for lacing material whether it be back line or paracord leather wrap rawhide whatever you choose but think about that as well cos it's going to increase the grip a little bit this actually feels pretty good in my hand it comes out to the bottom down here which is what I want it doesn't quite feel as good as the other one that I made but it's pretty close and again it's not wrapped yet so may feel better once wrapped but as far as the spread of the forks go they look nice and even the handle looks good it feels good so now we're going to just polish these up a little bit on the belt sander and put a band on it set of bands on it test it out and then if it's exactly what we want then we go ahead and wrap it up alright so we're just going to use a set of these heavy-duty bands from self-reliance Outfitters and what I generally do is I get this wet and I get the band's a little bit wet and then I let it dry it makes it easier to go on so let's talk about putting those bands on real quick basically you want to look at your pocket and you want to put those bands on so that your pocket stays pretty straight and you want to get that slit on there to the point where it goes to the end of that up right if you can or even a little bit over the top these fat uprights will hold really really well it's not like a thin piece of wire because you're actually pulling against a cone in the end which self tightens it here makes it very difficult to come off there now you want to make sure that you turn this thing before it dries so this hangs like this you could always turn the one inside here if you need to but if you can do it do it while you're putting it on and while still what you'll be able to turn it cos hanging straight now now I want to do the same thing with this side and get it to hang string so I'm going to rewrite that and slide out and on grab it with my shirt slick and push it on there just like that

get them on they're about the same distance if you can that way your bands are even is that's important you want to make sure when this thing's hanging and you fold this thing in half that that pocket is even that pockets not even it's not going to shoot right for you so that's important that looks pretty good now I would just let it dry just tuck that right down the handle for now we'll let this thing dry a little bit so that nothing's wet in here and then we'll test the slingshot all right guys well let's test this dude out I got some just regular 30 caliber ball ammunition here from marksman again we want to make sure that that pocket is hanging even so that when we put our ball in there it automatically goes straight to the center we've got a cup sitting out there you know about ten paces where we were out a few minutes ago when we started the video there this one feels a little bit different in my hand pulling on the uprights might be a little bit too long on this one not too bad for the first shot on a brand new one I nicked it folks I'm Dave Canterbury with self-reliance Outfitters in the Pathfinder school when I appreciate joint matter today for this quick video on forging a slingshot again don't be afraid that these things are going to be too heavy because they're really not very heavy now this 3/8 round stock is lighter a little bit than the rebar the rebar is a little bit heavier metal but the rebar looks a whole lot more scrapyard

rustic than just the round tubing does and rebars a lot easier to get hold of for free this is a great project to introduce a young person to blacksmithing it's also a great project to get started in blacksmithing yourself because it teaches you how to bend and manipulate metal which to me is a very very important part of self-reliance and if you can make a hunting tool then you're one step ahead of the game I appreciate your views I appreciate your support I thank you for everything you do for our school for our family and for our business all our sponsors instructors affiliates and Friends and I'll be back with another video as soon as I can thanks guys