[pop shot]

i cut this piece of green mesquite off of a young tree in february. bored, i put it in the freezer to make bark removal easier, debarked it, and barely did any shaping. I wanted a no frills, smooth as glass worker natural with tabs. this young mesquite is very strong, and has a deep yellow tint to it reminiscent of osage. sanded to 220 then 2 ca coats steel wool rub, one more coat, then rubbed with steel wool. i'm really liking tabs lately, they shoot like an OTF setup. tabs are laminated leather fastened with rigging floss and coated with a hard shell of CA glue. dressed up with dubdub orange and a supersure rockstar pouch.

 

[newconvert]

great looking natural, freezer to remove bark interesting! i like tabs too but i am digging on your style of tabs mucho! you even do a CA coat on the last layer of floss? if so how do you keep the CA off the leather?

 

[Danny0663]

i put it in the freezer to make bark removal easier

Nicee!

 

[pop shot]

i use the little tubes of CA with the pointy tip, just go slow, do a section at a time. i rub the wax off the surface of the rigging floss first then do 1/4 of the circumference at a time. if you do a small section at a time and take care around the edges, you won't get any on the leather. if you do get some on the leather, nobody dies. tabs are semi-permanent, so i take it slow and do it perfectly and make it nice and solid. here's how i learned. TABBING the 2 things i do different is i use rigging floss, which is 3-5 times thicker than dental floss. i also wipe the wax off the outside layer of the floss (with the grain of the floss wraps) before the CA glue so it can glue the nylon floss to itself.

 

[newconvert]

thanks steve, very good info i want to give it a try!

 

[treefork]

I like it. Was thinking a super braid fishing line would work also and give a different appearance.(Darker). I assume that's thera red. Never used it. How does it shoot?

 

[pop shot]

it's dubdub orange, shoots well fast and lasts FOREVER, but it's pretty expensive and kinda hard to get. i think it's 8 pounds a meter. enough for maybe 3-4 bandsets. gkj sells it i think. i got mine from marcus. i've got about 800 shots on this set, and i just put it on a brand new sling. there's no wear at all, no cracking. just a little oxidation. for the tabbing, i don't see why braid wouldn't work, it'd just be harder to get it to lay smooth like floss.

 

[Chepo69]

Since I watched the slingshots of jmplsnt Jamie, and Nico, he had not seen that style of tying the spring, I like the whole green mesquite fluoresente often takes a color very nice, like lime green.

I liked it!

 

[pop shot]

I was shooting the dub orange next to the pc444 chain, the chains felt better for me, I don't like the way large tubes "stack" so I changed it out to chains.

 

[Dayhiker]

I don't know how I missed this one. Interesting post and a very nice slingshot! That wood must be awesome, too.

 

[pop shot]

This wood infests certain areas here, it grows in thickets, and it's great for smoking meats

 

[Btoon84]

Great post Popshot, real nice fork too. Gonna have to try the freezer debarking..... Interesting. How long you leave your (already dry I'm assuming) fork in there?

 

[pop shot]

I just put a fork in the freezer for a few days and convince myself it's easier to debark

 

[newconvert]

I just put a fork in the freezer for a few days and convince myself it's easier to debark

we do this at work! the cuts from the ends of big wire is trash, money making trash! the copper is worth more bare so in the winter we leave it outside for a short while, once it gets to temp. we just drop it, the insulation cracks like glass and literally falls off.

 

[e~shot]

Nice fork Steve!