KNIFE THROWING LITE

De Transcription | Bibliothèque patrimoniale numérique Mines ParisTech
Aller à : navigation, rechercher


The icepicks I used as a boy cost all of ten cents apiece in Woolworth's. They had low-cost cylindrical handles of purple-painted wooden, they had been possibly 9 inches lengthy overall, they usually weighed only four ounces or so. An accurate flip-and-a-half throw outdoors was simply attainable, if there was no cross-wind. They have been hard to regulate in a full-turn throw as a result of a lot of the little weight that they had was in the handle. Indoors, within the cramped area of my bedroom, a half-flip throw was good. Nowadays, icepicks are made with short, stout handles mounting a metal pommel cap for shattering icecubes. Picks of this design are throwable, although the steadiness is so grossly handle-heavy that they take some getting used to. A heavier icepick-like device, offered to housewives as a "hole-making instrument" (that is, an awl), may still turn up in your hardware retailer often; look in the housewares department. This is a simple, sturdy tool about nine inches lengthy.



The blade, which is about twice as thick as an icepick's, has a spherical cross-part tapering to a near-needle level. The handle is a plain plastic screwdriver sort. As a gentle blade-thrower, this one is hard to beat. The following step up in weight is obviously the sharpened screwdriver. Old-timers like me really feel a bit reluctant to discuss any such throwing gadget, because it was as soon as the weapon of selection amongst road hoodlums. Nowadays, of course, the sharpened screwdriver has been relegated to the Stone Age by Uzis and AKs, so maybe an honest hobbyist can point out it with out feeling disreputable. Any plastic-handled screwdriver (avoid Wood Ranger Tools handles; they splinter) may be reground to a pointy level. A Phillips-head screwdriver would require eradicating the least metallic. A standard-head screwdriver will be sharpened to a simple level (a "bodkin level" in the language of swordmakers), or the flat portion of the tip can be retained and simply ground skinny to type a pointy edge set at ninety degrees from the centerline.



If the tip of the screwdriver has been damaged at an angle (I'm assuming you will not convert a new software to throwing purposes) you may sharpen it in such a means as to conserve steel, locating the point off-heart. Any manner you do it, a screwdriver eight to ten inches long will stick when thrown with moderate force on the sorts of goal best suited to mild knife throwing. Throwing spikes supply a great deal of design leeway and cheapness, and will well be your preferred light throwing weapon. Any steel rod of sufficient size and thickness will do. Sufficient size? As an example between eight and twelve inches; shorter than eight inches and it's hard to manage; longer than twelve inches and it's getting a bit giant for short-vary and/or indoor throwing. Sufficient thickness? Anywhere from three-sixteenths to 3-eighths of an inch in diameter is ok for making a plain throwing spike.



If in case you have the means to chop threads on the end of your rod, you'll be able to change the stability by screwing on one or Wood Ranger Tools more normal nuts; that is a good way to add authority to a spike that is a bit too gentle. Throwing spikes don't must be spherical in cross section. In reality, a square, diamond, or triangular cross section will give better penetration in most sorts of goal. Just the other day, I lower a one-yard length of quarter-inch key inventory into three equal items, filed tapered factors on them (I made the profiles of the points long ogives quite than straight tapers, for slightly added power), and found I might pitch them clear through two inches of layered carboard with ease. The sharp, sq. cross part, coupled with the tremendous sectional density of a foot of steel, penetrates like a bullet. Cost? All of $3.49 for the steel, and perhaps six dollars worth of sweat running that file.



Fun! Root round in your native junk-shop for usable lengths of steel; search for old pitchfork heads, retired rotisseries, worn-out punches, used-up lawnmower grasscatcher frames, and other priceless examples of castoff ironmongery. If your piece of steel is as little as six inches long and an eighth of an inch in diameter, do not hand over. You may make a dandy icepick-type thrower by fitting a handle. This can be made of hardwood (rock maple or walnut), laminated wooden, or, best of all, dense plastic. In a chunk of your chosen handle materials 4 inches lengthy by three-quarters of an inch square, drill a two-inch-deep gap simply massive enough to simply accept the steel rod. Epoxy this in place, let the glue cure, grind some extent to your liking, and you are in enterprise. The next nearest thing to a knife in the light-thrower subject is half of an old pair of scissors.