Longbow v 1415 plate

[Erpingham]

As a slight digression we tried flat shooting against clankies and were surprised by the punch delivered by the arrows hitting

Would have been even worse against bows with the sort of weight Joe Gibbs was using. 

[Imperial Dave]

I can still see the impact now 

[Nick Harbud]

Dave,

What strength bows were being used and at what range?

I am not surprised about the effect of firing flat-head arrows at live targets.  My ballistic calculations for 'Behind the Curve' indicated that the kinetic energy could be significantly more than what is normally considered lethal for blunt objects hitting the human body.  (The French determined this by shooting cannon balls at people.)  Of course, plate armour tends to dissipate the effect over a wider area, but I can imagine firing bodkins, even without penetration, might cause more than a few bruises.

[Imperial Dave]

we used 40lb draw weight with rubber blunts at decreasing distance so starting at 100 feet down to around 40-50 feet

[Imperial Dave]

arrow weight approx 100g

[Nick Harbud]

Really low power then.  A good job you did not start off with 140lb longbow!  One can imagine the embarrassing conversations afterwards...

    "Oh look at at that dead crash-test dummy!  Maybe we should have started with the 40lb bows?"

[Imperial Dave]

oh yes, we didnt want to over egg the custard too much......we were being filmed after all 

[Erpingham]

Did you know that the lethal blunt force trauma criterion widely used today was derived, not from experiment, but from conversation with 19th German artillery officers?

Rohne, H ; Schiesslehre fur Infantrie, 1906
"to remove a human from the battlefield a kinetic energy of
8mkg is sufficient according to the prevailing view of the
German artillery community"

8mkg would be rendered 80J in modern SI.  In fact, as you might expect, it depends where you are hit.  There is an estimate that 80J is only lethal in 31% of cases and you need 103 J for a 50% chance.

Of course, you then need to factor in the effect of armour which, as Nick says, doesn't just have the job of stopping the projectile but also dissipating the energy.  There is plenty of stuff on the internet on ballistic protection which shows a mix of hard and soft armour (say plate over arming garment) is pretty good at this.  If you observe the video you will also see that the arrow "wastes" a lot of impact energy disintegrating, deforming the head and making a loud noise.

I think the bottom line is, if the arrow hasn't enough energy to penetrate the armour, it doesn't have enough to kill by blunt trauma unless you are very unlucky.  It will, however, hurt and repeated hits will impair performance.  The one area I think I'd want more data is about head trauma.  We are much more aware recently about potential of head blows to cause both temporary impairments and long term damage in sport.  If the former can cause such concerns in football it may have been relevant on a battlefield.  More study required with ballistics heads and sensors inside helmets I think.

[Imperial Dave]

I remember when I did other reenactment (modern FIBUA) with airsoft rifles we were limited by a very low kinetic energy threshold as defined by the firearms act. here is a brief tract:

1 POLICING AND CRIME ACT 2017 – Detailed Briefing New definition of lethality If the muzzle energy of a firearm is over 1 Joule (0.737 ft. lb) it is considered to be lethal and thus  caught  by  the  definition  of  firearm  in  the  Firearms  Act  1968.  This  new  legal  threshold imports clarity into the law. It simply enacts current practice into law. It does not alter the higher energy thresholds for air weapons as defined by s1(3)(b) of the Firearms Act 1968 (i.e. the 12ft lb and 6ft lb rules for air rifles/guns and pistols respectively).

[Erpingham]

There's quite a bit out there on non-lethal projectiles and policing/riot control.  Perhaps more relevant to ancient battlefields is the stuff on behind armour trauma (or Back Face Deformation/Signature), which also provide images of what our man-at-arms might look like if he survived to take his armour off.   

Add : On second thoughts, look at them after Christmas .

[Imperial Dave]

 

[PMBardunias]

Next up in the occassional series - the one some of us have been waiting for.  Tod Todeschini's reconstruction of a 1415 man-at-arms in plate v. a 160lb longbow at around 10m on You Tube.  Lots of loud clanging and smashed arrows in slo-mo.  Interesting commentary from the ever enthusiastic Tod, plus top experts and craftspeople.  Well worth a watch.

The key to this one was they reproduced what was probably the standard plate armour in 1415, not the top of the range.  It was not impervious (too much mail still in use) but pretty effective.  Our man-at-arms would not necessarily have been killed but could easily have been wounded or stunned.  He would certainly start at a disadvantage when he got to handstrokes with his English equivalent.

Hi guys, What I found most surprising is that at min 36, the experienced archer shot 12-13 arrows at a stationary target, at a range where in my experience the archer has to either turn and run or switch to his sword and shield, and did not score a single debilitating hit. I am not sure those strikes to the head had enough force to disorient a man with his adrenaline pumping. You have probably seen boxers take much harder strikes and keep moving forward. If we were to compress the time, this would be the equivalent of 12 archers shooting in a volley. It would be interesting to see how the momentum transfer stacks with coincident strikes.