Category Archives: Personal

Tutorial: Making my own Arrows

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As I mentioned in an earlier post on Bow Maintenance, Richard promised to teach me how to make my own Arrows from scratch. I have documented the entire process below with pictures which you can see in more detail on flickr.

To begin with you need a number of items:

  • A fletching jig
  • 12 x 11/32 Wooden shafts .
  • 24 x 3″ Parabolic Black Fletchings.
  • 12 x 3″ Parabolic PinK Fletchings.
  • 12 x Plastic Nocks
  • 12 x Field Points ( 100g )
  • A tenon saw
  • Super Glue
  • Taper Tool

I bought all my equipment from  Perris Archery and Quicks Archery. I should point out that you don’t need to buy pink and black feathers, you can buy an color you like but what you need to ensure is that you ave 3 times as many fletches as arrows you are making, and that each arrow will have two fletches of the same color, and single fletch, the cock feather, which should be a different colour. Below is a picture of all bits and pieces layed out on the table before we started …

 Step 1 – Taper and Nock the Arrows.

The first thing I had to do was Taper one end of each arrow. The Taper Tool is basically a special pencil sharpener that is designed to sharpen the end of a wooden shaft so that you can fit a plastic nock to it perfectly. The first picture below shows me using the Taper to sharpen the arrow, and the second picture shows all twelve arrows sharpened and the Taper Tool.

Ok at this point I am now ready to add the nocks to the arrows. Richard told me that with a dozen arrows I should have five with red nocks, four with white nocks and three with blue. This is because in field archery when you shoot at a target there are three coloured pegs from which you shoot – red, white and blue. Which denote the three distances from which you attempt to hit the target and thus score points. The coloured nocks denote which peg each arrow was shot from.

We fit each nock to the sharpened point by first pouring a few drops of super glue into the plastic nock and then twisting the nock on to the shaft. Any excess glue needs to be wiped off. The glue will dry very quickly so it’s important to ensure its a secure as possible. The first picture below shows me fitting a nock, the second shows all twelve arrows nocked.

Step 2 – Cutting the shafts to the required draw length

Once the arrows are nocked, we then had to work out what my draw length was and then cut each arrow to that length. To determine the draw length Richard asked me to draw one of the nocked arrows on my bow and took some measurements ( didn’t take any pictures of this ). Richard then showed me how to cut the arrows to this length using a tenon saw, pictured below:

Step 3 – Fitting the points

Once the arrows are cut to the same length we then need to use the Taper tool again to sharpen the other end of each arrow. The metal points are fitted in the same way as the nocks, the only slight difference is that the taper tool sharpens to a longer point. Instead of pouring glue into the fitted point you spread the glue on the sharpened shaft to ensure maximum coverage. The fitted point is harder to get on and you need to ensure that you twist it on very carefully, if slip you might drive it into your hand which hurts:

Step 4 – Fletching the Arrows

This is the slowest and most tedious of the activities. The fletches must be glued onto each arrow using the fletching jig. You first glue on the cock-feather. When you shoot and arrow the cock-feather always points away from the bow at 90 degrees, this ensures that the other two fletches dont strike the bow full on as the arrow flies off the string, as a result many archers choose to use a different coloured feather to ensure their arrows are always shot consistently.

You insert the fletching into a clamp and apply a thin layer of glue to its edge. The clamp and the fletching jig are magnetic this ensures that each fletching can be positioned perfectly. As you glue each fletching and remove the clamp you twist the end on the fletching jig which rotates the shaft to the next position and repeat this until all three fletchings have been glued on.

Once the arrows are flectched your basically done. However Richard and I spent some time designing and printing out some decals on transparent film for our arrows – these have the club logo on them and, in this instance, my name, in case I loose any arrows during a field shoot the organisers can always send them back to the club if they are recovered by other archers. Here’s a couple of pics of the finished product …

All in all it took about 90 minutes to make these from scratch under Richard’s expert tutelage. I found myself feeling a surge of pride when I finally strung one of the finished arrows on the bow, although the pink + black fletchings might not be to everyone’s taste they are certainly … distinctive … and look quite stunning. I can’t wait to shoot them! I found the experience to be very therapeutic, it’s the sort of thing you can do whilst watching a DVD ( as we did this evening ).

Disney on Ice

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Me, Rich and Alex went to watch Disney on Ice on Thursday, it was a great show. Having been ice skating for the first time ever the night before ( and I’m still nursing the bruises! ) I had some appreciation for the skill involved by the performers who were skating, dancing and doing acrobatics all the way through the show ( I’ve put some pics up on flickr, click on the image below ).

It was a great night, I had a lot of fun felt like a big kid which I probably need to do more often. If you get the chance to see the show then I do recommend it, it’s a couple of hours of heart warming fun and I guess we all need that from time to time.

Learning to maintain my Bow

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Earlier this week Richard taught me how to maintain my bow and arrows. It might sound pretty simple but it’s a labour of love. He first taught me how to dismantle and re-assemble the 28lb recurve bow I’ve been using. When it’s dismantled it looks like this (mines the lighter one):

Assembling the bow isn’t as easy as it sounds. Getting the arms on is trivial but stringing the bow is actually very hard. Richard showed me a number of techniques to do this and whilst I eventually did manage to do this, I have to admit I struggled a lot it requires strength and also letting go of the fear that you might snap the bow if you bend the arms too much – although he did stress that with all these things I should get better as I get used to doing it. Once the bow is assembled it looks like this:

In the picture above you notice a small metal T Square positioned on the bow. Richard taught me how to use this to work out the correct position to put a nocking point onto the string. The nock is found at the base of an arrow and is used to keep the arrow in place on the string, the nocking point on the string is therefore the point against which you ready your arrow before shooting. A nocking point ensures that your consistently releasing your arrows from the same point on the string which aids in consistency and therefore accuracy.

Once the nocking point is found, you then create the point by wrapping cotton thread around the string at that point until you have a small ball of string that the nock at the base of each arrow can press against. The pictures below show me and Richard doing exactly this …

Once the strings were nocked, Richard then taught me how to wax the strings to waterproof them this basically involved rubbing copious amounts of wax into the string. Whilst you can do this with the string off the bow, Richard taught me that its easier and better to do it with the string on the bow where it’s being stretched and therefore makes it easier to work the wax into it, heres a pic of Richard doing exactly that …

Once we’d finished doing this we put the bows down and then Richard taught me how to maintain the arrows. This basically involved checking each arrow and ensuring that all the fletchings were in place, that the point of the arrow was in tact, and that the nock at the base of each arrow was also in tact. He showed me how to replace broken points and nocks, and also how to use a Fletching Jig to perfectly place fletchings on an arrow:

I learnt a great deal during that that evening from Richard, and it gave far more of an appreciation into how much effort I need to put into maintaining my archery equipment. We ordered some new shafts, fletches, points and nocks so I can create my own set of arrows … I cant wait for them to arrive, I’m actually really looking forward to creating my own arrows from scratch.

You can view all the pictures above, and more, here on flickr.

Remember, remember the fifth of November …. kind of …

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Had a wonderful weekend – probably because I was ordered not to switch my laptop or computer on! lmao … I have this tendency to not switch off from work which probably isn’t very healthy but I love what I do so I don’t often think about it. Sometimes I need to be told to stop!

Rich and I spent most of Saturday doing chores and sorting out bits and pieces around the house as well as visiting his folks and then having lunch with mine. The day seemed to fly past, until the evening that is.

That night Richard, Alex and me went to Pype Hayes park to see the bonfire and watch the fireworks spectacular and it was awesome, I took a load of pictures on my dinky little camera ( kind of wish I had Rob’s camera on the night lol ) anyway some of which came out quite nice and others were a bit blurred but still they look kind of cool. Here’s a couple of my favourites from the night …

It’s been a long time since I’ve been out to see a fireworks display and it was a lot of fun.

Alan joins the Talis Platform Advisory Group

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Last week Alan agreed to join our Talis Platform Advisory Group. Here’s the official announcement over on our Nodalities blog.

I was over-the-moon when I discovered that Alan had agreed to join our advisory group, I wasn’t sure whether he would due to his other commitments but after spending a wonderful weekend with him and his wife Fiona up in Kendall following HCI 2007 (some pics), I knew that there was so much he could help us with. We spent a long time talking about some of the work we’re doing here at Talis and Alan kept offering me his insight, and sharing his ideas with me and it became apparent that he could offer our team a unique perspective which is something they all seem to agree with … it was Paul, one of our resident evangelists (all round nice guy … and the keeper Cadbury’s Creme Eggs), who suggested asking Alan to join the group.

Alan has been more than just a wonderful friend to me over the years, he’s been a mentor, a muse, a confidant, in many ways he’s been like a father to me … the idea of collaborating with him again to build something special, like we did at aQtive, feels inspirational … 🙂

Whilst were on the subject of inspiration …. consider for a moment who the other members of the advisory group are …

That’s a pretty special group of people each of whom brings a wealth of experience and knowledge that will be invaluable in helping us grow the platform, they’ll tell us when they think we’re right or tell us when they think were making mistakes. I know were all looking forward to working with them.

Rough Crossings

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I was fortunate enough to see Rough Crossings at The Birmingham Rep last week. The play was adapted for the stage by Caryl Phillips and was based on Simon Schama’s book of the same title.

In summary the play tells the tale of a group of slaves who join the English army during the American war for independence – on the basis that the English have offered them their freedom from slavery and a new home in England. However at the end of the war the English, who are retreating, abandon the ex-slaves in Novia Scotia which is a harsh place where they suffer much hardship and death. One of their number (Thomas Peters) travels to London to fight for better conditions for them and to try to English to honour the promises they had made. John Clarkson, one of a group of anti-slavery campaigners, agrees to help him. Clarkson sets up the Sierra Leone Company and the Novia Scotia settlers are assisted to move back to Africa and settle in what is aimed to be a society based on democratic principles. However when they arrive in Sierra Leone they discover that the lands promised to them have not yet been acquired from the locals and the English who were sent in advance are both corrupt and prejudiced, which leads to disputes between Peters and Clarkson’s about the nature of the latter’s leadership of this colony.

The play at its core is about the nature of what it means to truly be free, to Peter’s that means self-determination and its this that creates the tension between him and Clarkson who Peter’s views as a white moses leading them freedom.

There is no doubt in my mind that Schama’s book ( which I have since started reading ) is a revisionist examination of the American War of Independence which touches on some important issues about the founding principles of the United States … for example if the War of Independance was fought for freedom and it was such a wonderful thing, why did all these black people want to fight for the British? They did so because they knew that the American Republic was grounded in hypocrisy. Where the play succeeds is that it examines these issues through characters and relationships. As a result the characters are complex and don’t easily fit into cliches or the kinds of stereotypes I suppose we are used to seeing when dealing with such an emotionally charged subject … I guess what I’m trying to say is that they aren’t polarised … they’re not just black or white.

In order to develop these characters the play switches from scenes depicting the struggle of the abolitionist movement in England with scenes depicting the struggles and hardship suffered by the blacks during the war of independence in America, yet I did find it disturbing that the abolitionists solution to the problem of ending Slavery wasn’t to free the slaves and give them lands here in England the attitude that seemed to prevail was … its right that they should be free but that doesn’t mean we want them living next door to us.

The play showed two attempts to create a colony in Sierra Leone the first failed when one of the Black Slaves, wanting to be rich, wealthy and powerful, like the white men he saw in England and America conspired with local tribes to sell his fellow emancipated slaves back into Slavery. This resulted in the destruction of the colony. This was largely because the abolitionists only considered that their mission was to commission some boats, and gather some wealth so that they could ship the slaves to Africa and leave them to sort themselves out, they have their own little democracy, they never considered that these people would need protection or some kind of oversight … does this sound familiar to anyone?

The second expedition led by Clarkson promised self determination for the Slaves but with protection from England the Sierra Leon company.  Clarkson believed that they couldnt simply abandon the slaves to fend for themselves, that their responsibilities to these people ran deeper than that. Yet whilst this new colony thrived , it was still, largely, whites ruling over blacks. It’s the dynamic between Peters and Clarkson at this point in the play that was so captivating … and finally led to Clarkson to ask the question

how do you balance benevolence with authority?

It was a wonderful, captivating and moving production which is well worth watching. I believe the play is now touring around the UK, I thoroughly recommend seeing it.

House by the side of the Road

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Watching the story of Hiumara Kenshin got me thinking a lot about atonement and also forgiveness. I really hate it when I get all introspective but that’s a whole different story. However whenever I do think about atonement or forgiveness I try to remind myself of this wonderful poem by Samuel Walter Foss … I’m not sure if the sentiment is one I’m ready to try to live by but I guess it’s something to aspire towards … 

      House by the side of the Road
                    by
            Samuel Walter Foss

There are hermit souls that live withdrawn
In the place of their self-content;
There are souls like stars, that dwell apart,
In a fellowless firmament;
There are pioneer souls that blaze the paths
Where highways never ran-
But let me live by the side of the road
And be a friend to man.

Let me live in a house by the side of the road
Where the race of men go by-
The men who are good and the men who are bad,
As good and as bad as I.
I would not sit in the scorner's seat
Nor hurl the cynic's ban-
Let me live in a house by the side of the road
And be a friend to man.

I see from my house by the side of the road
By the side of the highway of life,
The men who press with the ardor of hope,
The men who are faint with the strife,
But I turn not away from their smiles and tears,
Both parts of an infinite plan-
Let me live in a house by the side of the road
And be a friend to man.

I know there are brook-gladdened meadows ahead,
And mountains of wearisome height;
That the road passes on through the long afternoon
And stretches away to the night.
And still I rejoice when the travelers rejoice
And weep with the strangers that moan,
Nor live in my house by the side of the road
Like a man who dwells alone.

Let me live in my house by the side of the road,
Where the race of men go by-
They are good, they are bad, they are weak, they are strong,
Wise, foolish - so am I.
Then why should I sit in the scorner's seat,
Or hurl the cynic's ban?
Let me live in my house by the side of the road
And be a friend to man.

Great weekend with my buddies from {TWR}

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For those of you who don’t know I’ve been an active member of a FPS Gaming team for over four years: Team Wolfenstein Resource. We play IdSoftware’s Return to Castle Wolfenstein, its follow up Wolfenstein : Enemy Territory and the soon to be released Enemy Territory : Quake Wars. Over the course of the last four years I’ve gotten to know some of my team mates very well and formed some wonderful friendships. The team has members in the UK, all over mainland Europe and in the US. Our members aren’t as active as they once were but were still proud of the fact that we haven’t lost a competitive match in almost two years!

Two of my friends Wim ( along with his gf Julia ) and Alan came to visit me this weekend, and we all had a wonderful time just catching up and chatting.

I guess the three of us started off as guys who played for the same team but we became very good friends, we try to get together fairly regularly away from the computers to just hang out, eat, drink and be merry I guess. The team has had some interesting events, we had an official LAN party in Port Jervis, New York a couple of years ago, followed up by a looong sight seeing weekend in Belgium where close to twenty of us descended on a lovely little town called Ghent. We followed that up eight months later with another great weekend in Oxford, where Matt and I entertained the others with our laughable attempts at punting! Then earlier this year we had another big weekend in Bristol, were we hooked up with friends from another team and spent the weekend touring some of the sites in the south and bowling … a lot …. badly! :p

We don’t actually play as often as we used to so it’s important to us try to get together regularly, Wim and Alan have both been wonderful friends over the last few years ( and Matt and Dom but they’re in the US so we don’t meet up as often as we’d like). There have certainly been times when things haven’t been going so well, I recall when I was laid up in hospital and both Wim and Alan would call me up and try to cheer me up … or in Alan’s case constantly remind me not to do anything stupid … the old fella get’s very sentimental!

Were currently trying to plan our next expedition I think were going to hit mainland Europe again in October, probably the Netherlands, but where ever it is I know it will be fun. As long as no one brings a Monopoly board with them …. *shudder* ….