Hell in a Handbasket

Steve gives us a heads up to a nifty new Swiss crossbow.

I never owned crossbows, though I think they are neat in a military history sort of way. One of the roommates I've had over the years was an avid crossbow hunter, though, and I've picked up a few things.

The main selling point of the new bow is in how easy it is to cock the thing. This is not to be dismissed, as most crossbows require you to use your back to draw the string back to the cocked position.

This can be a real pain, particularly for smaller people. This design seems to have mostly eliminated that problem.

They used to measure the power of a crossbow by pointing it at the sky and counting how many pounds you had to hang off of the string to cock the thing. They still do that, but the most popular methods are power stroke in inches, and arrow velocity on FPS.

Sometimes they tell you how much energy the quarrel has when it first leaves the bow, which is more precise since it gives you a general idea of how much punch it has when the projectile hits the target. (You really can't call it "muzzle energy", now can you?)

According to the technical specs at the Swiss Crossbow website, this weapon delivers 99 foot pounds. That is actually pretty good! Most modern hunting crossbows are in the 70 to 95 ft/lbs range.

Would I buy one of the new bows? It seems that the price will be rather steep, more than $2,000 USD. I might think it is neat, that doesn't mean I'd spend any money on it.

Click on over and read Steve's post. He has a video from the manufacturer, showing the ease of use.