Sling Torsion - Internal Ballistics of the Sling

Theory on the internal ballistics of the sling. Torsion oscillations, damping and responsiveness. Theory for spiral throws.

#slinging

[IronGoober]

This was a very needed breakdown of sling physics. Excellent explanations and demonstrations.

[crunchyman]

This is incredible, this guy is the hero we all need.

[TW_SlingStone]

Absolutely loved the old training video style intro

[MrFalcon]

FANTASTIC analysis of the physics of the sling motion. The more I practice, the more I have noticed these effects, and your video is just what I needed to piece together the concept in an explainable and understandable manner. Thank you for this fantastic and entertaining deep dive in to sling physics!!

[SaveliyShabanov]

You are the best slinging content maker ! Thank you for you work, it’s inspires me a lot

[othelloperrello]

Amazing analysis. Gonna have to watch this a few more times to totally understand that last triad diagram. Thanks for your work

[jonburgart]

what an incredibly valuable breakdown. this is the kind of thing people need to study and I will be returning to review as I continue to develop my sling building and usage skills.

[Javier-ectc]

I can tell you invested a lot of time and effort in this video, chapo!
Keep the good work going, always interesting to watch your videos!

[schlingellore]

Please keep making content like this. These are physical insights that seem familiar to many active slingers, but if you get the physics explained well again you have a much better understanding of whats goning on. You should teach courses followed by a discussion

[nathangrueber]

Thanks so much bro!! This is the video i was asking you to show again. Information helps you design a sling for you. Thanks again!!

[marqis]

Hi, great video, keep making content like this. I have been watching you since the pandemic started, and you are a refference in sling throwing.

It would be cool if you could make a video showing execises to practise slinging. In 4 years i'm still struggling to get the rocks on point, and would love to achieve half the consistency ur shots have.

[Wolfstrapp]

Amazing how much work you put in this video, great work

[jaylerms]

Amazing! This is high level work that very few (if any) seem to be actively doing right now, especially on YT. Please keep it up, Acro!

[MitchMersa]

Dude this is awesome!! I hope you continue to do videos like this. Loved it

[williamholm]

Enjoying the videos you've been putting out😊

[IndigoBees]

Great video, thank you! I have some data to add.

I do figure-8 style, and like many figure-8 style slingers, I struggled with top-spin causing my projectiles to dive to the ground (and to the left) quicker than gravity would alone. Very pronounced arcs, even though I was throwing fast. I always used a wide grip, thinking to better control the angle of the pouch, and I would try to throw with the thumb-side of my hand leading, little finger following. This made a difference, but it felt awkward, was physically straining, and I had mixed success at best. But now I can pretty consistently throw with back spin resulting in a much straighter flight path (curves a bit to the right now), and without straining to turn my hand in awkward ways.

To my surprise, the thing that solved it for me was using a more narrow grip. When I moved the loop from my ring finger to my middle finger, my top-spin problem improved. From there I experimented with sling lengths. I made many slings that were the same except for their length, and found that they each tended to spin the projectile differently. I settled on one that gave it the backspin I was looking for, and have been happy since (30 inches/ 76 cm when folded in half, though I'm sure the ideal number would be different for everyone). This of course feeds in to what you were saying about frequency and lengths. But it was interesting to me that I found success when I stopped fighting the physics, and instead just found a sling that puts itself in the right position for my technique. It has thin cords, and I'm definitely not always consistent. But it's so much better. You've got me curious how much more consistent I would be with thick cords.

One aspect you didn't touch on: a wide grip causes the projectile to roll back and forth in the pouch more. Not because the pouch wraps around the projectile less, but rather because throughout the motion, the cords will be lengthening and shortening by the distance between your little finger and your thumb. While spinning, when the pouch passes the thumb-side of your hand, the release cord will effectively be longer, and when the pouch is passing the little finger side of your hand, the retention cord will be longer. If your grip is narrow, this effect disappears. I'm not sure how this might affect flight, but it is interesting to think about.

Hope that made sense. Keep up the good work!

[jamesmcconaghie]

I'm just learning slinging. I've been slinging a dog toy that sometimes get returned.😊
Would a large tassel on the release line give the projectile a cleaner release from the air drag?
A slow motion video would be very interesting.

[johnjacomb]

I was lucky enough to be able to buy the linen Egyptian sling you were selling on your etsy store, not only is it my favourite sling by far but I'm also terrified if I lose it, I don't think you'll be making any more of them although I think it would be a great idea to (plus I can buy more)

[jlasud]

One could make a sling with a brass knuckle tied to the retention cord, and make a wider grip, than possible with bare hand. By adding a sidebar to the "brass knuckle" wihich should be light, maybe aluminium.Adding vanes to the pouch could help achieving more constant rifle spins. I had these ideas, that I never tried..IF you're interested you might try it..

[tylerbrown]

Do you think you could rig a sling to throw a disc golf driver? I think this would be a really interesting project to try, I have disc golf drivers and some slings but the question I have for you is whether you think rotation around the length of the sling (and just the power of the throw in general) can be translated into a rotation parallel to the plane of throwing (i.e., the disc golf disc is released cleanly, spinning with no wobble). It seems like naturally a sling throw would attempt to force the disc golf disc to "tumble" end over end, not spin correctly like a frisbee but it still seems like with a bit of tweaking of throwing mechanics and a nice cradle mechanism that it could work.

Obviously a forehand disc golf throw is the most intuitive to translate to a sling, but somewhat surprisingly it also seems entirely possible to do a more traditional frisbee backhand throw with a sling as well.

I think this could be a really interesting development in throwing disc golf drivers, I mean on one hand disc golf drivers are specifically kept from becoming too sharp and thin so that they don't become too dangerous, and a sling is kind of a way to just get around that artificial limitation, but on the other hand if throwing disc golf drivers with slings is possible it would be fun as hell and totally safe so long as you didn't try to roll through a normal disc golf course built in public parks throwing wayyyy harder than the course was safely designed for.

What I do know for sure is if someone can figure out how to throw a really beefy disc golf driver HARD with a sling, I think it would really turn a lot of peoples heads and catch their attention who have never even bothered to check out slinging. Also, I bet slingers would have a blast slamming disc golf drivers 500+ feet as it would open up a whole new world to explore with slinging discs.

You would think someone would have tried throwing discs with slings at some point in history and if it worked it would have taken off, but before modern plastics and disc golf driver design the distance potential of a disc throw was never really a serious one, and any material that was light enough to make a throwing disc was probably far too brittle to withstand any kind of throwing impact... so maybe this is an entirely new discovery awaiting modern slinging that just wasn't possible before? It is an exciting idea, specifically because the point of a high speed distance driver is to store a ton of energy in the spin of the disc, and slings are incredible at producing spin.