[Tex-Shooter]

I have tried both folded bands and the double strips. The double strips shoot longer and more accurately for me than folded bands. The Saunders band set that have over 1000 shots on, is 9 1/4 inches from the ball pocket to the contact point on the fork tips and is shooting about 180 FPS. They are on my Target Star and are still shooting. It has 2 1/2 inches of fork extension. By the way, the cover clips on the Saunders pouch broke off at about 300 shots, but it was a prototype pouch. I think that that showed that the clips were not needed. There are three main reasons for early band breakage and they are all related to each other. 1) Kinking where the band is tied to the pouch. 2) Bruising the rubber when it hits the fork tips especially where the rubber is tied to the pouch. 3) Shooting too light of weight for the rubber's strength, therefore not using the energy and banging the tips harder. Saunders band and slingshot designs address all of these problems. There bands have no tie, so no kink at the pouch. There fork tips are ramp style, so the rubber don't hit so directly. There bands are designed to shoot 1/2 inch balls from about 175 to 215 FPS (hawk to WRP) when not trimmed. A great misconception is that even moderately tapered bands are the main cause for band early band breakage (radical ones are). It has mostly got to do with tip, pouch, connection design and keeping the band taper moderate. -- Tex