New member from the Netherlands

Hello,
For years I'm planning to build myself a crossbow. I have now ordered a prod and other things at alchem.
I'm still busy reading a lot about crossbows; I have the book written by Sir Ralph Payne, and hope to receive today " die armbrust" written by Egon Harmuth ( I could buy this book for Euro 21,00, at the internet sellers ask up to 300,00 Euro's for this book which is rediculously high, luckily my German is much better then my knowledge of the English language).
Also I will visit the armymuseum in Brussels soon to make pictures of the crossbows there. Unfortunally the Dutch army and weaponmuseum is closed; 't was in Delft in an old building which suited this collection very well, they are planning to bring the collection to an existing airforce museum in a couple of years. I know there is a book written about the crossbow collection in this museum; so a warning; the collection can't be visited at the moment
In the south and east of my country, in Flanders too, there are a fair amount of clubs for crossbowshooting. Many of these clubs are centurys old and were originally founded as militias. These old clubs shoot with ancient style crossbows and keep alive old traditions, the new style clubs shoot with modern material.
The crossbow I will make will have engraved horn inlay ( i made musical instruments in the past with pearl inlay, so I know how to do it for the most part).
As soon as the building starts i will write about it in this forum together with pictures. Maybe i sometimes need advice from other members

Welcome Dulcimer! Sounds like you're getting started right. You'll have to link up with Ferdinand here - he's a countryman of yours, I believe.

I gotta ask -- with your "handle" - Dulcimer - do I know you from Everything Dulcimer -- www.everythingdulcimer.com or Friends of the Mountain Dulcimer -- http://mountaindulcimer.ning.com ??? If no, why not? I've been building and playing the mountain dulcimer for nearly 40 years!

Hello Kenh,
thank you for welcoming me.
I saw I made a little mistake in my message; "luckily my German is much better then my knowledge of the English language", I hope members understand this is not an insult for the English speaking members . What I meant is that it is a benefit knowing the German language for to be able to reed this book .
This a forum about crossbows, not dulcimers, so I reply shortly about the dulcimer; I have built three dulcimers with inlay and woodcarving, but, after they were ready I always came to the understanding that I miss any capacity to play any musical instrument at all( think about trying to play the French bagpipe for five years, almost every day; it was a torment for my wife and kids). It could be that you have met me at everything dulcimer some 5-7 years ago. I had contact with Don Pedi who I think is a well known mountain dulcimer player in your country.

No one here is going to get insulted over linguistics. I think we all realize that being multi-lingual is a good thing, even if some people aren't. Your English is very good, BTW.

Three dulcimers. Pretty good. I've known Don Pedi for a number of years. I'll have to see if I can find you in the Everything Dulcimer archives. If you were here, I can teach anyone to play dulcimer in a hour or less, if you can count to ten without taking off both shoes!

bojour dulcimer et bienvenu. BIOU.

Hey there! Nice to have another dutch guy here! I'm pretty new to building crossbows myself. I just finnished my second bow wich csme out pretty well i believe! Although i must add that i am still making adjustments and aditions. I've just discovered the art of forging metal and i must say it gives me quite a lot of satisfaction making the parts for my bow.
Inlay is something i am not that good at so i might be needing ur advice down the road. Could be a great advantage to be writing in our native tongue!
So my friend, u sir have hit the jackpot of knowledge with this forum.
Ontzettend verslavende bezigheid, kruisbogen maken!
Alchem staat nier erg goed aangeschreven hier vanwege de lange levertijden en slechte service, ik hoop dat het voor jou wel goed uitpakt.

Back to the universal language:
Welcome and i hope u enjoy reading the various topics and be able to use it to yout advantage!

Ferdinand

Bon soir Bijou,
merci, je m'excuse parce-que je ne parle pas votre language bien. Vous vous lire les textes en Anglais? Pour moi les textes Anglais ils sont difficiles pour les mots techniques. Je souhaites vous beaucoup plaisir sur le forum.

Hello Ferdinand, fellow-countryman, as you've read I have to do much more study on crossbows before I will begin to start building one, though I've ordered already some parts at alchem ( if they take their time, that's not bothering me much, I'm not in a hurry).
I do hope to learn a lot when visiting the army museum in Brussels, I think you also knew the Dutch army museum which is closed now because the Hague wanted it to remove ( I my opinion our politicians are idiots, I suspect them of being addicted to heavy drugs)). May be we can be of help for each other. It would be a pleasure to be of any help in the art of inlay; although I haven't any experience in engraving bone; I hope some members can help me at some issues concerning bone inlay.
The goal I'm looking for in constructing a crossbow is a medieval appearance with as much as modern techniques as possible hidden in it, but not in my first crossbow, I want to develop my skills and knowledge gradually; there isn't another way I think.
In our own language: Mogelijk kunnen we elkaar in de toekomst eens bezoeken om van elkaar te leren. Ik woon zelf in Rijsbergen ( zuidelijk van Breda). Weet jij of er meer Nederlanders, Belgen of Duitsers actief zijn op dit forum?
Groet et bienvenue
Frans(Dulcimer)

Welcome Frans,

I am envious of your access to such museums! I look forward to sharing ideas.

Regards from Canada,

Ernest (Hotspur)

Thank you Ernest,
I hope to visit the army museum in Brussels in the middle of april, surely I will post pictures of interesting crossbows at this forum. Concerning my ideas; as the idea came to my mind I wanted to make a "simple" medieval crossbow but my ideas are heading for a more complicated crossbow; I'm thinking of a heavy German renaissance or Barock crossbow with a tumbler lock with engraved bone inlay. I won't make something like a cranequin or a windlass; for me that's too complicated because I am a novice in metalworking. Maybe later on another crossbow. The coming project is already complicated enough. When I start the topic about the building process I want to illustrate the interesting parts with pictures.
For you and others who are interested I discovered an interesting PDF from the Budapest university; unfortunally it's in German but has many illustrations. I'm willing to try to translate up to two pages ( please not more; I'm a bit busy at the moment) for those who don't understand the German language:
http://bucavasgyuro.net/data/publikaciok/egyeb/Die%20Geschichte%20der%20Armbrust%20und%20die%20Herstellung%20einer%20Armbrustreplik.pdf

Regards,
Frans( Dulcimer)

Made a small mistake again; " unfortunally it's in German". Ich hoffe nicht das ich hiermit Deutsche Gäste beleidige, das war keineswegs meine Absicht ( I do hope I didn't offended the German guests with this sentence, it isn't meant to be an offence).
Grüsst euch,
Frans

AH, don't worry about linquistics. We're international here and mess up everyone's language! Crossbows are enough to worry about.

Hey Frans

Welcome here.

An interesting link above.

Especially the language itself is a bit "weird".
You should not bother to translate this manually.

In my opinion it is obviously translated from Hungarian to German via translating software.
So you will save some energy by using similar techniques back to English without losing too much relevant information.

His work generally bases on Harmuths book, by the way congratulations to your cheap buy.

Rizzar

Thanks for the link, Frans!...and thank you, Rizzar for the "heads up" about the language.

http://bucavasgyuro.net/data/publikaciok/egyeb/Die%20Geschichte%20der%20Armbrust%20und%20die%20Herstellung%20einer%20Armbrustreplik.pdf

It looks like the author has built a nice bow. He seems to have had trouble with the string loops, and then gone back and done it the right way. I will run the part about shaping the bone through a translator and see if it contains any "goodies".

Mac

Hello Mac,
In the case you encounter any problems with translating the part about shaping the bone I'm willing to translate it for you and for others interested. In this case give me a notice.

Regards,
Frans

Frans,

I spent some time with that earlier today. I had some trouble with the formating of the PDF. It broke up the words strangely when I tried to cut-and-paste into the translator; but I got it sorted out.

It looks like he is boiling rib bones in acetic acid to make them flexible enough to glue to the tiller. He claims that they harden back up in a few hours. I had not thought that they would do that, but I have not tried it.

Thanks for the translation offer! If I find anything I can't fight my way through, I will take you up on it.

Mac

Hello Mac,
You are right; he uses rib bones of a cow. They were sawn lengthwise to remove the inner part of the bone. With as knife the inner site of the bone was removed because this is briddle. The pieces had a length of 400-500 mm., 30-50 mm. wide and 3-5 mm. thick.
They were greasy so they were boiled in water with a bit of natriumphospat( a lye). After this the bones were white and the grease was removed. ( Note; I myself gave the bones first to my dog; she cleaned the bones before I boiled the bones; both my dog and I were happy with this procedure)
Bones can't be bended, excepted when boiled for a few hours in water with acid (vinegar/acetic acid); after this you can bend the bones but this will last no longer then half a day; after this the bones become hard again.
The bones were glued to the wood with bone glue to be applied very thin because boneglue tends to shrimp when it cools down. Boneglue was applied at a temperature of 40-50 degrees Celcius, the wood had to be heatened at 50-60 degrees Celcius to prevent the glue to cool down too fast. The bone and wood had to be tightened together for two days; for this you could use rubber ( like the inner tube of a bicycle). The engravings were first chiseled with a small chisel; then wiped in with charcoal and linseed oil.
Hope this helps you a bit further.
Regards,
Frans

Dank je, Frans!

Mac