what’s up guys thanks for joining us
today in our previous video we showed
you how to build a body of a crossbow
using a 2×4 some PVC for the bows and
some paracord for the string well today
we’re going to cover how to build the
trigger mechanism and how to build your
arrows the trigger mechanism has two
main parts and we’re going to be
building those out of this 3/4 inch
plywood we also have a couple of wooden
dowels and these have two purposes first
they’re going to be used as the hinge
points for the two pieces of the trigger
and then we’ll also build our arrows out
of them we can’t very well use our
crossbow until it’s got a trigger so
let’s get started to get some basic
measurements for our crossbow trigger
pieces I’m going to remove the two bows
from the body now I’m able to lay the
body of the bow down flat on the table
which is gonna make this easier as I
said before the trigger mechanism has
two main parts one of them is going to
be a sort of wheel with teeth on it on
an axle and that’s going to be what
actually catches the drawstring when you
pull it back
the second piece will be what we
actually think of as looking like a
trigger and that will be another piece
of wood that’s on a hinge that stops the
first piece from rotating it until we
want to I’ll draw out the shape of the
first piece of the trigger on this piece
of plywood but before I do that I’m
going to drill a hole into the piece of
plywood the right size for the axle the
hole is going to come first because I
need everything else lined up around
that bowl correctly I’ve got a 3/8 inch
dowel so I’m gonna be using 3/8 inch
drill bit to match
all right after a quick test our 3/8
inch dowel fits into that hole very
snugly probably end up sanding down the
dowel just a little bit to make it so it
can spin a little more freely on that
axle here we have the basic shape of our
trigger mechanism the hole will be down
inside the body of the crossbow this
notch down here is where the trigger
mechanism will stop this whole device
from spinning until we want it to you
can see that the notch on top is in
front of our axis and the notch on the
bottom that stops it from spinning is
lined up with the middle of the axis
I’ll do a rough cut to remove this whole
block of wood and then I’ll start
getting in the details and the curves
[Music]
[Applause]
there we go we’ve got that basic shape
cut out it’s looking pretty good
since this little notch is what the
bowstring is going to wrap around we
want that sticking up above the body of
the crossbow I now have this flat
portion of the trigger mechanism lined
up with the body of the crossbow I’m
just going to mark where that hole is
there we have it now I’ll drill that out
on the drill press I’m using a drill
press rather than the handheld drill
because it is important that the drill
hole goes straight up and down as much
as possible now it’s pretty good use a
piece of this dowel and fit it through
both the trigger mechanism and the body
here just to hold the trigger in place
as we measure for the next piece for all
the moving parts to fit together well we
need to be pretty precise on how our
next trigger piece fits into the first
one so I’m going to use this piece of
paper so we can trace the exact
intersection of where the two pieces
meet now I’ve got the paper lined up so
the corner fits right into this first
notch that was cut sort of folding the
paper around the body of the crossbow a
little bit so we can tell where the wood
ends now we’ll have our main trigger
come down just a little bit below that
first notch right about here and we’ll
have it extend about an inch and a half
long right about there
we know that we need our hinge point to
be in the middle of this extended piece
of wood it shouldn’t matter extremely
precisely where but we want the whole
hinge mechanism to be behind the first
piece of our trigger that’s an
approximation for it we’ll go all right
now we know about where our hinge hole
is going to go and we know that it lines
up perfectly with the first piece of our
trigger now we can remove the piece of
paper and finish out the shape of our
whole trigger mechanism I’m going to cut
out the piece of paper with the drawing
of our trigger on it and I’m going to
use some spray glue to adhere that to
our 3/4 inch piece of plywood alright
and once again I’m going to drill out
the hole first and then cut the rest of
it out
[Music]
with the first piece attached with the
temporary dowel and the second piece all
cut out with the hole drilled I’m going
to mark where to drill the second hole
into the body
you can now see the basics of how the
trigger mechanism is going to work when
the bowstring is drawn back and behind
this notch it will be holding pressure
which is pushing against our trigger
when we pull our trigger it drops the
bottom piece out of the way and the top
piece is then able to swivel letting our
bowstring fly and launch our arrow now
we have our two pieces cut out and we
have the holes drilled for the axles to
make them work but we need them to fit
inside the body of the crossbow properly
haul out space for our two trigger
mechanism pieces inside the body I’m
going to use this drill bit to make two
holes that go all the way through the
2×4 and then use a jigsaw to connect
those two that should give us a nice
slot all the way across just measuring
how far you need to have space that
should be in front of the first trigger
mechanism very back of the second
trigger mechanism it’s right about here
and out there so we need to remove a
slot about that size for a trigger
pieces to fit inside
seems to be working pretty well I don’t
have a very deep plunge depth on this
particular drill so it’s gone down as
far as it’s able so I need to now raise
the platform up so that I can drill the
rest of the way through
build a fair portion of the way through
but another problem I have is that this
drill bit is not actually small enough
to fit through the hole in the plate I’m
just going to leave this hole started
with the drill press and then I’ll
finish it off with the hand drill now
I’ve got these two holes drilled out I’m
going to use a jig saw to cut out the
gap in between them
[Music]
[Applause]
there we have it we now have a
hollowed-out portion where our two
pieces of the trigger can swivel and
function see that the pieces fit through
pretty easily got lots of good range of
motion there everything we want with all
of our pieces cut out and ready let’s do
a test fit I’ve got a couple of pieces
of dowel and I’m gonna sand them down in
the middle so that our trigger pieces
will swivel more easily on there we go
that’s swiveling just how we want it
perfect tension on this tooth up here
when I pull the trigger it releases
there we go you can see the string is
being held by the trigger see what
happens when we pull hey that’s what we
want to happen perfect now that we know
the bow is working and the trigger
mechanism is working let’s make an arrow
and make it fit on the bow to start
making our arrow we’ll use a 3/8 inch
dowel to measure the total length that
we want it to be from the back of the
notch and our trigger mechanism to about
an inch and a half maybe 2 inches in
front of the crossbow I know a hacksaw
isn’t really designed to cut through
wood but on small pieces like a dowel it
actually goes very quickly they just
have to stick the price tags on so well
now they got the price tag off let’s add
a knock to the back of our arrow a knock
is the little gap that fits over the
bowstring
[Music]
now that I have the knock carved into
the wood I’m also going to sand down the
two different faces so that it fits on
the bowstring more easily now when our
drawstring is around our trigger you can
see that at this point the arrow doesn’t
really have a way to reach on to the
drawstring itself so what we need to do
is cut a small notch out of this piece
of the trigger with the notch cut our
arrow can now fit onto the bowstring
without the interference from the
trigger mechanism with the knot cut I’m
just going to quickly hit the rest of
the arrow with some sandpaper to smooth
it down one more step to make it
slightly easier to use a crossbow as we
want to carve a shallow channel from the
front of the crossbow to the trigger
mechanism that our arrow can rest in
[Applause]
[Music]
there we go the knock is cut into our
arrow we’ve grooved out a little bit of
a channel on the body of the crossbow
now let’s add some fletchings or
feathers to the back of our arrow now
using tape with rubber gloves it’s kind
of a nightmare so I’m gonna lose them
for a second as I make the fletchings
for this arrow the design is pretty
basic we’re just going to take a folded
over piece of tape with edges left on it
and attach that to the arrow itself fold
this nicely in half if we have our arrow
fit inside the crossbow the way we want
it with the nock pointed up and down we
want one of the fletchings to be
pointing straight up obviously I have a
little bit more tape here than as
necessary trim some off
now that doesn’t look very much like an
arrow so let’s take our knife and trim
it down to smaller and give it a little
bit of that classic feather shape to it
we’ve got one feather on our arrow let’s
add two more on the sides
[Music]
it’s looking pretty good now let’s add
some weight to the end of our arrow so
it will fly point first every time now
as a weight I’m going to try and put
this screw into the end of the dowel so
I’m gonna pre-drill a hole and then add
the screw now of course it is pretty
tricky to drill perfectly straight into
a dowel I’m giving my best shot I tried
to pick a drill bit that was almost as
large as the threading on the screw so
that well it does still bite into the
wood it’s not really pushing it apart
any because I think it would just split
if it did that there we have it it’s not
the most dangerous Arrowhead to ever
made but that’s actually my goal I don’t
want to make something that I’m
accidentally gonna kill someone with so
this will still give it some weight
it’ll fly true it’ll Pierce into fairly
soft targets but I’m not likely to
really cut anything up I’ve marked off
on this dowel a couple of spots that are
the same width as our 2×4 so when I cut
those they should work as the hinge
pieces for our trigger without extending
to the sides at all
[Music]
[Applause]
there we go that spins fairly easily
just I want it let’s install this right
string this back up take it outside and
see if it’ll fire there we go we’ve got
our trigger mechanism working we’ve
built our arrow we’ve got a target let’s
fire this thing at it Oh Oh short get a
little bit more loft to it this time
since I was a little low before shooting
into the wind now – that’s not gonna
help ha
hit the target again take that target
almost the bullseye three two one
oh that almost went through a shot I’ve
already taken see that do that just
turned into one bigger hole Oh
oh it’s like half way worse that steam
hole again that’s a three-fer I still
missed bullseye
got it ha turns out I am NOT very good
at archery even with a crossbow all
right we know that our crossbow works
our trigger mechanism works our bow
works and our arrow works so I think the
last step is going to be decorating this
thing to make it look really nice
[Music]
there we go we’ve got our crossbow fully
decorated
I used a rubberized paint on the bows so
hopefully that won’t crack as the bow
bends my wood stained everything that
was wood and I think this looks pretty
slick now like we’ve got nice green wood
nice dart boughs this thing looks great
some of the design of this crossbow was
shared with me by my friend Taylor I
want to give him a quick shout out Thank
You Taylor there you have it now you
know how to build a trigger mechanism an
arrow for your crossbow in a different
video we showed you how to make the body
the bow and the strings so you put all
this together and you will have your
very own functioning crossbow a couple
of notes of safety that I hope you’ve
already realized but never point your
crossbow at a person or another living
thing don’t point it at things that can
get broken or damaged point them only at
designated targets when you’re in a safe
area and you can’t accidentally hurt
anyone this is not an ultra-powerful
crossbow with a 100 plus pound draw
that’s gonna shoot right through a lot
of stuff and it has a blunt tip so it’s
not the most dangerous type of bow and
arrow in the world but it can still hurt
someone so if you build one be very
careful with it
thanks for joining us for this video
today and we’ll see you in the next one
talk to you then it just pops the foam
at leas like assortment of foam cones on
the ground everywhere ow
you
you
today in our previous video we showed
you how to build a body of a crossbow
using a 2×4 some PVC for the bows and
some paracord for the string well today
we’re going to cover how to build the
trigger mechanism and how to build your
arrows the trigger mechanism has two
main parts and we’re going to be
building those out of this 3/4 inch
plywood we also have a couple of wooden
dowels and these have two purposes first
they’re going to be used as the hinge
points for the two pieces of the trigger
and then we’ll also build our arrows out
of them we can’t very well use our
crossbow until it’s got a trigger so
let’s get started to get some basic
measurements for our crossbow trigger
pieces I’m going to remove the two bows
from the body now I’m able to lay the
body of the bow down flat on the table
which is gonna make this easier as I
said before the trigger mechanism has
two main parts one of them is going to
be a sort of wheel with teeth on it on
an axle and that’s going to be what
actually catches the drawstring when you
pull it back
the second piece will be what we
actually think of as looking like a
trigger and that will be another piece
of wood that’s on a hinge that stops the
first piece from rotating it until we
want to I’ll draw out the shape of the
first piece of the trigger on this piece
of plywood but before I do that I’m
going to drill a hole into the piece of
plywood the right size for the axle the
hole is going to come first because I
need everything else lined up around
that bowl correctly I’ve got a 3/8 inch
dowel so I’m gonna be using 3/8 inch
drill bit to match
all right after a quick test our 3/8
inch dowel fits into that hole very
snugly probably end up sanding down the
dowel just a little bit to make it so it
can spin a little more freely on that
axle here we have the basic shape of our
trigger mechanism the hole will be down
inside the body of the crossbow this
notch down here is where the trigger
mechanism will stop this whole device
from spinning until we want it to you
can see that the notch on top is in
front of our axis and the notch on the
bottom that stops it from spinning is
lined up with the middle of the axis
I’ll do a rough cut to remove this whole
block of wood and then I’ll start
getting in the details and the curves
[Music]
[Applause]
there we go we’ve got that basic shape
cut out it’s looking pretty good
since this little notch is what the
bowstring is going to wrap around we
want that sticking up above the body of
the crossbow I now have this flat
portion of the trigger mechanism lined
up with the body of the crossbow I’m
just going to mark where that hole is
there we have it now I’ll drill that out
on the drill press I’m using a drill
press rather than the handheld drill
because it is important that the drill
hole goes straight up and down as much
as possible now it’s pretty good use a
piece of this dowel and fit it through
both the trigger mechanism and the body
here just to hold the trigger in place
as we measure for the next piece for all
the moving parts to fit together well we
need to be pretty precise on how our
next trigger piece fits into the first
one so I’m going to use this piece of
paper so we can trace the exact
intersection of where the two pieces
meet now I’ve got the paper lined up so
the corner fits right into this first
notch that was cut sort of folding the
paper around the body of the crossbow a
little bit so we can tell where the wood
ends now we’ll have our main trigger
come down just a little bit below that
first notch right about here and we’ll
have it extend about an inch and a half
long right about there
we know that we need our hinge point to
be in the middle of this extended piece
of wood it shouldn’t matter extremely
precisely where but we want the whole
hinge mechanism to be behind the first
piece of our trigger that’s an
approximation for it we’ll go all right
now we know about where our hinge hole
is going to go and we know that it lines
up perfectly with the first piece of our
trigger now we can remove the piece of
paper and finish out the shape of our
whole trigger mechanism I’m going to cut
out the piece of paper with the drawing
of our trigger on it and I’m going to
use some spray glue to adhere that to
our 3/4 inch piece of plywood alright
and once again I’m going to drill out
the hole first and then cut the rest of
it out
[Music]
with the first piece attached with the
temporary dowel and the second piece all
cut out with the hole drilled I’m going
to mark where to drill the second hole
into the body
you can now see the basics of how the
trigger mechanism is going to work when
the bowstring is drawn back and behind
this notch it will be holding pressure
which is pushing against our trigger
when we pull our trigger it drops the
bottom piece out of the way and the top
piece is then able to swivel letting our
bowstring fly and launch our arrow now
we have our two pieces cut out and we
have the holes drilled for the axles to
make them work but we need them to fit
inside the body of the crossbow properly
haul out space for our two trigger
mechanism pieces inside the body I’m
going to use this drill bit to make two
holes that go all the way through the
2×4 and then use a jigsaw to connect
those two that should give us a nice
slot all the way across just measuring
how far you need to have space that
should be in front of the first trigger
mechanism very back of the second
trigger mechanism it’s right about here
and out there so we need to remove a
slot about that size for a trigger
pieces to fit inside
seems to be working pretty well I don’t
have a very deep plunge depth on this
particular drill so it’s gone down as
far as it’s able so I need to now raise
the platform up so that I can drill the
rest of the way through
build a fair portion of the way through
but another problem I have is that this
drill bit is not actually small enough
to fit through the hole in the plate I’m
just going to leave this hole started
with the drill press and then I’ll
finish it off with the hand drill now
I’ve got these two holes drilled out I’m
going to use a jig saw to cut out the
gap in between them
[Music]
[Applause]
there we have it we now have a
hollowed-out portion where our two
pieces of the trigger can swivel and
function see that the pieces fit through
pretty easily got lots of good range of
motion there everything we want with all
of our pieces cut out and ready let’s do
a test fit I’ve got a couple of pieces
of dowel and I’m gonna sand them down in
the middle so that our trigger pieces
will swivel more easily on there we go
that’s swiveling just how we want it
perfect tension on this tooth up here
when I pull the trigger it releases
there we go you can see the string is
being held by the trigger see what
happens when we pull hey that’s what we
want to happen perfect now that we know
the bow is working and the trigger
mechanism is working let’s make an arrow
and make it fit on the bow to start
making our arrow we’ll use a 3/8 inch
dowel to measure the total length that
we want it to be from the back of the
notch and our trigger mechanism to about
an inch and a half maybe 2 inches in
front of the crossbow I know a hacksaw
isn’t really designed to cut through
wood but on small pieces like a dowel it
actually goes very quickly they just
have to stick the price tags on so well
now they got the price tag off let’s add
a knock to the back of our arrow a knock
is the little gap that fits over the
bowstring
[Music]
now that I have the knock carved into
the wood I’m also going to sand down the
two different faces so that it fits on
the bowstring more easily now when our
drawstring is around our trigger you can
see that at this point the arrow doesn’t
really have a way to reach on to the
drawstring itself so what we need to do
is cut a small notch out of this piece
of the trigger with the notch cut our
arrow can now fit onto the bowstring
without the interference from the
trigger mechanism with the knot cut I’m
just going to quickly hit the rest of
the arrow with some sandpaper to smooth
it down one more step to make it
slightly easier to use a crossbow as we
want to carve a shallow channel from the
front of the crossbow to the trigger
mechanism that our arrow can rest in
[Applause]
[Music]
there we go the knock is cut into our
arrow we’ve grooved out a little bit of
a channel on the body of the crossbow
now let’s add some fletchings or
feathers to the back of our arrow now
using tape with rubber gloves it’s kind
of a nightmare so I’m gonna lose them
for a second as I make the fletchings
for this arrow the design is pretty
basic we’re just going to take a folded
over piece of tape with edges left on it
and attach that to the arrow itself fold
this nicely in half if we have our arrow
fit inside the crossbow the way we want
it with the nock pointed up and down we
want one of the fletchings to be
pointing straight up obviously I have a
little bit more tape here than as
necessary trim some off
now that doesn’t look very much like an
arrow so let’s take our knife and trim
it down to smaller and give it a little
bit of that classic feather shape to it
we’ve got one feather on our arrow let’s
add two more on the sides
[Music]
it’s looking pretty good now let’s add
some weight to the end of our arrow so
it will fly point first every time now
as a weight I’m going to try and put
this screw into the end of the dowel so
I’m gonna pre-drill a hole and then add
the screw now of course it is pretty
tricky to drill perfectly straight into
a dowel I’m giving my best shot I tried
to pick a drill bit that was almost as
large as the threading on the screw so
that well it does still bite into the
wood it’s not really pushing it apart
any because I think it would just split
if it did that there we have it it’s not
the most dangerous Arrowhead to ever
made but that’s actually my goal I don’t
want to make something that I’m
accidentally gonna kill someone with so
this will still give it some weight
it’ll fly true it’ll Pierce into fairly
soft targets but I’m not likely to
really cut anything up I’ve marked off
on this dowel a couple of spots that are
the same width as our 2×4 so when I cut
those they should work as the hinge
pieces for our trigger without extending
to the sides at all
[Music]
[Applause]
there we go that spins fairly easily
just I want it let’s install this right
string this back up take it outside and
see if it’ll fire there we go we’ve got
our trigger mechanism working we’ve
built our arrow we’ve got a target let’s
fire this thing at it Oh Oh short get a
little bit more loft to it this time
since I was a little low before shooting
into the wind now – that’s not gonna
help ha
hit the target again take that target
almost the bullseye three two one
oh that almost went through a shot I’ve
already taken see that do that just
turned into one bigger hole Oh
oh it’s like half way worse that steam
hole again that’s a three-fer I still
missed bullseye
got it ha turns out I am NOT very good
at archery even with a crossbow all
right we know that our crossbow works
our trigger mechanism works our bow
works and our arrow works so I think the
last step is going to be decorating this
thing to make it look really nice
[Music]
there we go we’ve got our crossbow fully
decorated
I used a rubberized paint on the bows so
hopefully that won’t crack as the bow
bends my wood stained everything that
was wood and I think this looks pretty
slick now like we’ve got nice green wood
nice dart boughs this thing looks great
some of the design of this crossbow was
shared with me by my friend Taylor I
want to give him a quick shout out Thank
You Taylor there you have it now you
know how to build a trigger mechanism an
arrow for your crossbow in a different
video we showed you how to make the body
the bow and the strings so you put all
this together and you will have your
very own functioning crossbow a couple
of notes of safety that I hope you’ve
already realized but never point your
crossbow at a person or another living
thing don’t point it at things that can
get broken or damaged point them only at
designated targets when you’re in a safe
area and you can’t accidentally hurt
anyone this is not an ultra-powerful
crossbow with a 100 plus pound draw
that’s gonna shoot right through a lot
of stuff and it has a blunt tip so it’s
not the most dangerous type of bow and
arrow in the world but it can still hurt
someone so if you build one be very
careful with it
thanks for joining us for this video
today and we’ll see you in the next one
talk to you then it just pops the foam
at leas like assortment of foam cones on
the ground everywhere ow
you
you
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