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Our neighbor downstairs randomly gave me this crossbow today
(thelemmy.club)
Which is really ironic, as my late father is the formal registered inventor of the Folding Crossbow.
https://patents.google.com/patent/US4926834A/en
No, this one isn't a folding crossbow, but it does seem powerful enough to potentially be deadly. It's raining today so I'll have to wait for a good weather day and find an old used slab of wood for target practice.
I gotta warn you. That kind is prone to being fragile, assuming my eyes aren't fucked.
I've run across a handful of the no name hand crossbows over the years, and only luck has kept people from injury when they break under load.
I hear ya, I have no expectations, so I'm gonna play it as safe as I can.
I do know where the safety is and do know how to properly cock and load it. I've blank fired it (no arrow, not loaded) a few times, seems solid..
I don't think you're supposed to do that. Firing it with no bolt can cause a lot of stress because the released energy isn't transferred into moving a projectile.
It's a important rule generally, but with steel arms at this small size and light draw weight it doesn't really matter.
Yeah was gonna say. Dry firing a trad longbow is a no-no because of this
Had to try it a couple times, because they had it strung up backwards (looped in front of the bows, not behind as supposed to be). Yeah I fixed that already.
Not like I'm gonna blank shoot it hardly ever, but I had to try it a few times tonight to make sure I got it strung up correctly.
I have one just like that and the strings will break and eventually the bow arms will bend, but you can use it for quite a long time. They are a lot of fun.
So, get rid of it?