For use in a WIP, I have a female character who's less than 5 feet tall and weighs less than 100 pounds. Could such a character use a crossbow - incuding cranking the crossbow herself?
For use in a WIP, I have a female character who's less than 5 feet tall and weighs less than 100 pounds. Could such a character use a crossbow - incuding cranking the crossbow herself?
I would think that would depend on a lot of factors.
Is this a modern story, or a fantasy story?
How much does the cross bow weigh? Medieval crossbows can be pretty heavy, bulky things. A modern crossbow can be as light as 5 pounds. Not that hard for a woman to handle.
What is the draw weight? Modern crossbows are in the range of 150 to 400 pounds from the listings I've looked at on Bass Pro Shops. Medieval cross bows can be as low as 100 pounds for a crossbow with wooden arms to (from what I've read) up to 1500 pounds for a heavy crossbow with steel arms.
What is the draw method?
Manual?
Manual with a foot loop?(pull up with both arms while your body weight holds the bow down.
Lever?
Winch?
For a lever or winch, how much mechanical advantage does it have?
Not all crossbows have a crank, but the point of the mechanism is to provide that mechanical advantage. If she is not exceptionally weak, she should have no problem cranking it. Short, wiry people are often quite strong.
Depending on the position she's shooting from, I'd be more concerned about holding it steady when it fires. The reload time is also a concern if she has to fire a second bolt.
As others have said — it depends.
Just because the character is slight, doesn't mean she's weak. I don't think a gymnast that size would have an issue, given the strength needed for some of their moves. A girl who's never picked up anything heavier than a book, though, probably couldn't.
Given good mechanical advantage in the cocking mechanism and a modern stock, I think most girls that size would be good for at least one shot.
I wouldn't worry about it. After all the stories an author posts are fantasy to one degree or another. Besides height and weight does not equal strength.
There is no reason why she couldn't.
The reason for crossbows becoming more in use during history is that they where in a sense easier to train with and use.
Even some of the heavy crossbows used in war weighed under 25 pounds and have a shooting draw weight of 150-900 pounds depending on the model and these where armed (loaded) using a windlass. The only real problem is if she has never been trained or seen how the loading (using the windlass) to arm the crossbow is done.
here is a quick video that may help you
https://youtu.be/2IdfmaC_t-Q
There are books on history stating that it took 5-10 years to train an archer with bow
BUT it only took a week to train anyone to use a crossbow and remeber the train also included moving and fighting in formation.
A crossbow is the original point and click weapon.
This is the kind of nit that the nit-pickers here like to pick, so I understand your concern. My advice is not to worry too much about it.
This is like asking, "Can she pick up a rock?" Well, uh, maybe, depends on the rock?
Crossbows come in a wide range of draw weights. Lighter ones are just spanned by hand, like a regular bow but with a trigger latch to keep them spanned instead of having to actively hold it, and the heavier ones have levers or cranks to provide mechanical advantage when spanning them. A small woman could span a 2000-pound ballista, if the spanning mechanism provided enough mechanical advantage. She just might need a longer lever arm or more turns of the crank to do it.
I own and shoot a pair of medieval recreation crossbows. They have a foot loop and you generally have the power from the legs available to pull the string to the nut.
A girl that size is just as effective with my crossbows as I am, it would come down to accuracy, not body strength.
Just to back up whitedruid's comment. If a crossbow has a foot loop, then it relies on leg strength to reload. Speaking generally, a woman walking in off the street with no strength training will usually have greater leg strength than in any other part of their body. So even a relatively tiny woman should still have the leg strength to load a crossbow with a foot loop mechanism.
Once the crossbow is loaded, it would take a tiny bit of practice to get them holding the crossbow in a way to allow them to aim effectively. Crossbows are generally heavier at the front end than a long gun is, so there is a bit of compensation needed to hold the front end up, but as whitedruid says, even a slightly built woman shouldn't have any problem doing that.
Of course, if they can rest the front end of the crossbow on a convenient rock or stump, then I imagine aiming would be easier.
I own and shoot a pair of medieval recreation crossbows.
What kind of crossbows, and what's the weight (carry weight, not draw weight)?
I can't find what I would consider good numbers for the carry weight of medieval crossbows, but I've seen claims of as much as 24 pounds for a heavy crossbow like an arbalest.
There's more to being able to effectively use a crossbow than just being able to draw it.
I can't find what I would consider good numbers for the carry weight of medieval crossbows, but I've seen claims of as much as 24 pounds for a heavy crossbow like an arbalest.
That all generally goes back to the leverage and how the force is applied.
On a crossbow, the width of the bow is normally from 6 to 30 inches. While on a bow it could run to over 60 inches. Like with a pully or fulcrum, the added length aids in drawing the string back.
The pullies in a compound bow work in the same way to increase the pull strength without adding bow length. Bows all are simply an application of leverage. The longer the bow the more powerful it can be, but also adds the length to draw it back as well as the strength applied.
Also some crossbows are now compound bows. Giving the advantages of the pull weight of a compound bow to a crossbow. I have a buddy that uses one for hunting.
That all generally goes back to the leverage and how the force is applied.
No. you are talking about the draw weight. I was very explicitly not asking about draw weight.
I was asking about the carry weight. How much would the crossbow weigh if you put it on a scale?
Any of the sporting good stores that carry modern crossbows have physical (not draw) weights for them. But I can't find good numbers for medieval crossbows.
How much would the crossbow weigh if you put it on a scale?
That would mostly depend on what it is made out of. Ancient materials like hardwood and steel, or modern composites?
@Dominions Son
How much would the crossbow weigh if you put it on a scale?That would mostly depend on what it is made out of. Ancient materials like hardwood and steel, or modern composites?
I was asking about medieval crossbows. For modern cross bows that are actively on the market, I can go to the website of any sporting goods store, look at the specs for the cross bows they have listed and it gives the weights. What I can't find is what I would consider reliable numbers for the weight of medieval crossbows.
If you really want an answercheck the musuem collections. The Met in NYC or Worcester Museum of Art (MA) Royal Armouries in the UK.
In my experience a phone call to a curator would give you more information than you would ever want.
I don't want an answer badly enough to bother a museum curator with a phone call.
The only reason I asked in this thread is that the person I originally replied to with that question said that they had a couple of reproduction medieval crossbows.
I would have left it at that since I didn't get an answer from that person, but then mushroom replied to me with a discussion about the factors that determine the draw weight when I had very explicitly asked about the carry weight.
The Smithsonian Institute has a search feature to look up information on artifacts in their collection.
I don't want an answer badly enough to bother a museum curator with a phone call.
Believe me. it is much more likely that they would love to talk about it than they would consider it a nuisance.
And you might get more information than you were looking for. Just try getting a historian to stop talking about something they are interested in. My father was a history buff and would talk endlessly about something, especially American history.
Spelling corrected.
And you might get more information than you wee looking for.
Definitely. Just over a year ago I filled out an errata card at a museum, pointing out an error in one of their displays. I didn't expect anything to come of it, but thought I'd try.
Last January I got an email (they asked for contact information on the card) from the curator of the natural history portion of the museum. He could have just said thank you, it's been corrected, and I would have been thrilled. Instead I got a full background on why the mistake happened, what the person who had done the research hadn't taken into account, how various mammals are classified, etc... It was an information dense email, and I learned at lot from it.
I can just imagine what would have happened if I'd been standing there talking to him!
I was asking about medieval crossbows. For modern cross bows that are actively on the market, I can go to the website of any sporting goods store, look at the specs for the cross bows they have listed and it gives the weights. What I can't find is what I would consider reliable numbers for the weight of medieval crossbows.
This is just one site but if you search for sites that make replica weapons you can get the shipping weight of a crossbow from the time period or style you are looking for.
https://www.by-the-sword.com/c-57-crossbows.aspx
but to me it looks like a crossbow that can be loaded by hand is under 10 pounds, useing a goats foot to load under 20 pounds, and above that you are using a Windlass or crannequin to load the crossbow.
Even with the foot loop, it still takes a fair amount of upper body & arm strength to pull the string to cock the crossbow. The foot is just anchoring the body of the crossbow and the arms are doing the pulling.
I love that out of all the topics on this board, this one has produced so much sincere and useful knowledge.
For what it's worth, there's a dead tree series by SM Stirling where time travelers in the past introduce a ratcheting mechanism to their crossbows so that even the weakest among them could easily cock one. So it really does depend on the circumstances.
I love that out of all the topics on this board, this one has produced so much sincere and useful knowledge.
I can't wait to read PotomacBob's story to see how he uses this pool of knowledge.
I can't wait to read PotomacBob's story to see how he uses this pool of knowledge.
For many, many years now PotomacBob asks questions here in the forum about knowledge to use in a WIP. Looking at the broad spectrum of all his questions, it must have been many WIPs over the years, not just one.
Does anyone here know the pen name(s) he uses for writing? It can't be PotomacBob, 'cause a search returns: "Sorry! We have no authors whose name starts with potomac... yet".
Conclusions:
• he publishes under another pen name.
• he hasn't yet posted any story here, all those many WIPs are either abandoned or still unfinished.
HM.
And so what?
While some of his questions have become repetitive and many are borderline naive or ignorant, the discussions they spark are often worth a read.
he publishes under another pen name.
he hasn't yet posted any story here, all those many WIPs are either abandoned or still unfinished.
How do you know. He may have multiple author names, but doesn't link them.
How do you know. He may have multiple author names, but doesn't link them.
That's why I asked:
Does anyone here know the pen name(s) he uses for writing? It can't be PotomacBob, 'cause a search returns: "Sorry! We have no authors whose name starts with potomac... yet".
I would like to read one of his stories, but to do this I would need to know at least one of his author names.
OTOH, I started a WIP over 50 years ago – a space opera with FTL space travel combined with travel between parallel worlds – and it's not really progressing. I put it aside more than a decade ago, after having worked out at least some details of the universe. I've tried some other stories and am now convinced my writing talent is limited to writing user manuals and concise technical documentations.
So for me the thought there could be others similarly handicapped isn't so far fetched.
HM.
I've tried some other stories and am now convinced my writing talent is limited to writing user manuals and concise technical documentations.
Everything Ernest Bywater wrote came across like government reports, but it didn't do the popularity of his stories significant harm.
And you've chosen a low-bar to success with a space opera story.
Please try to finish the story so you can share it with us. I think you'll be pleasantly surprised.
AJ
Thanks for prompting me to do some research about crossbows, fun rabbit hole.
EDIT: there is supposed to be links in here, but they don't want to work, probably user error...
Edit of the edit: was user error, now they work
According to a reddit post the typical carry weight was 14 pounds.
Heavy crossbow weight reddit
I also recall from my history lessons in school that there where heavy crossbows that required a crew of 2 people, I imagine these where a lot heavier to carry around.
Regarding modern crossbows, found a site for people that hunt with them and they talked of carry weights from 6,5 to 15 pounds. crossbownation crossbow weight
After having read about them on wikipedia I found that the crossbow as such needn't be that insanely heavy but that the mechanism for drawing it would contribute to a lot to the total weight.
Wikipedia crossbow
So to answer your actual question, your female character can very likely use a crossbow, you just have to design it for her so it is of reasonably light weight and having an appropriate draw mechanism.