Why did the the Ming crossbows become so weak compared to earlier Chinese ones?

[Roma_Victrix]

In all honesty, despite the heated rhetoric, you two old rivals provide not only great entertainment but a lot of great information on the development of military tech in both East Asia and western Eurasia. You honestly have to admire the Chinese ingenuity here, going back to the Warring States Period, in a time when contemporary ancient Greeks were developing the similar but much larger, bulkier gastraphetes style crossbow. By China's Ming dynastic period, though, gunpowder technology did supersede the crossbow in both theaters, Europe and Asia, to the point where by the 16th century the practice of archery as a sport somewhat waned or at least was challenged by sharpshooters using barreled rifles in competitions proving they could hit targets from a fair distance. The gradual improvement of gunpowder tech had to have sapped the energy, wherewithal, or concern for improving or even maintaining the standards of other missile weaponry like crossbows.

Τhis is an important point, one that cannot just be ignored in this discussion. You know, the whole pew, pew, pew, pew, gunslinger black powder stuff. How do you say "we'll head em' off at the pass!" in Chinese. YEEHAW!

[Common Soldier]

In all honesty, despite the heated rhetoric, you two old rivals provide not only great entertainment but a lot of great information on the development of military tech in both East Asia and western Eurasia. You honestly have to admire the Chinese ingenuity here, going back to the Warring States Period, in a time when contemporary ancient Greeks were developing the similar but much larger, bulkier gastraphetes style crossbow. By China's Ming dynastic period, though, gunpowder technology did supersede the crossbow in both theaters, Europe and Asia, to the point where by the 16th century the practice of archery as a sport somewhat waned or at least was challenged by sharpshooters using barreled rifles in competitions proving they could hit targets from a fair distance. The gradual improvement of gunpowder tech had to have sapped the energy, wherewithal, or concern for improving or even maintaining the standards of other missile weaponry like crossbows.

When you look at the numbers, even the early hand cannons could produce projectiles with kinetic energy far higher than even powerful crossbows. While an arrow from a crossbow or how might have more penetrating ability fo the same energy, a lead ball will do a lot more damage when it hits, and if the lead ball didn't have enough penetrating ability, there was the option of using arrows with the early hand cannons.

One question I would like.to see the answer to is the accuracy of shooting arrows out of a hand cannon. Unless you spin the ball, you are going to have some inherent accuracy issues for shooting long distances with a round peojectile out of a handgun, so for long distance shooting, crossbows would seem to have the advantage in accuracy, at least if the gun is shooting round balls and is not rifles, as none of the Chinese guns were as far as I know. But perhaps guns shot from a gun were similar in accuracy to the crossbow bolts, in which case it would take away even that advantage.

In the case of the Greeks, whenever you have skill.in the bow, there is less interest in using crossbows, and people with a strong archery tradition tend to regulate the crossbow defending fortifications and sieges. The English did use crossbows, but since they had had a large supply of archers available, their use of a crossbow was a lot less than on the continent, where a strong archery tradition of shooting heavy bows was not as common. In the case of the Greeks, their ballistas occupied the niche the crossbows would have fitted, which is why I think you don't see.the crossbow used in ancient Greece much. For things like defending fortifications and sieges, the Greeks had ballistas, some which could be hand held size.

Guns offered the same advantages and drawbacks as crossbows, only guns could be more powerful, and guns were likely easier to make than the crossbows. Bows retained their advantage of faster firing rate over guns, which they did not lose untill the 19th century with repeating rifles.


For a lot of Europe, there doesn't seem to be as strong an archery tradition as other cultures, so crossbows helped fill in the gap, which is why they became popular weapons in Europe. In areas with a stronger archery tradition, like England crossbows were less popular.

[Common Soldier]

Because the exact dimensions are not the same here the Loshult gun, and the those tested in the Knight and the Blast Furnace table of kinetic energy and barrel length, you cannot go strictly by barrel length. We cannot say that the results ofnthd Loshult gun must be closer to the results of 254 mm barrel than the 381 mm barrel simply because the length of the Loshult gun is closer to 254 mm than 381 mm.

Also, because the kinetic energy increase is highly non linear, we cannot rule out the possibility that the kinetic energy could have changed from 440 J to 1000 J going from 254 mm to 280 mm, and going from 280 mm to 381 mm results in the energy going from 1000 J to 1100 J. In which case the Loshult gun would far more closely match that of thr 381 mm test results.

On a check, going from 254 mm to 1372 mm saw a 5.2 times increase in power. If we accept that the Loshult gun results was closer to the 254 mm gun, that would imply we could get 8000 J if we increased the length of the Loshult gun sufficiently. If we increased the Knight and the Blast Furnace 2.5 times to match the amount of thr amount used in the Loshult gun,. 50 g, we would see only 2.5 x 2300 = 5750 J. It is not logical or probable thst a Loshult gun would produce 39% more power on the same amount of gunpowdered, especially since it was agreed that the formula used for the Loshult gun testing was not a particularly powerful formula, with a much lower percentage of saltpeter than optimized modern gunpowder.

While we cannot assume the results of the Loshult gun would match the test rests of the Knight and the Blast Furnace, we can say it is likely that the results will follow the pattern seen in those test, with a sharp rise in kinetic energy of the projectile in a short increase in gun length, followed by a much longer range of lengths where the energy rises only slightly, followed by another sharp rise in kinetic energy with increased length. This means, that depending on where on the kinetic energy sv length curve you are at, increasing length would only result in minor increases in length. The European would likely know this, and so have the length long enough that the Loshult gun was in the power curve near the 381 mm length, where further increase in length gained only minor increased in kinetic energy, until you greatly increased the length ( more than 500 mm), and that would have made the gun much heavier and much less easy to transport due to much higher weight.

While the reason for the sharp initial rise in kinetic energy with length seems pretty obvious, it took more thinking figure out why, after a relatively flat section of kinetic energy increase versus increase gun length. The kinetic energy again increased sharply with increased length. The sharp initial rise is likely due to the gun not being long enough to allow the gunpowder to burn completely burn before the bullet exit the barrel. Hence the 2.5 times rise in kinetic energy from 254 mm to 381 mm. The relatively flat section of.incrrssed kinetic energy vs length is due to the gunpowder having been already been burned, little additional enrrgy was being added to the bullet during this range, hence only 1100 J to 1300 J in going from 381 mm to 914 mm.

But the increase from 1300 to 2300 J going from 914 mm to 1372 mm is possibly due.a backward moving pressure wave from the burning gunpowder reflecting off the rear of the barrel and rebounding forward. When the gunpowder burns, the gas expands in all directions and as much gas expands rearward as forward, so that when the rebounding gas eventually catch up to the moving ball and adds it's energy to the projectile, it nearly doubles thr balls's energy, minus friction losses, etc. One thing to be learned from this, isnif you a gun barrel long enough, you might be able to produce the same kinetic energy with a smaller projectile than a gun with a much shorter barrel but larger projectile. It won't necessarily make the gun lighter, but it does mean your ammunition could be lighter and cheaper using less metal.

Longer barrels would lead to better accuracy. While after seeing a number of medieval hand cannons illustrations, they did apparently sight down along the barrel.fornaiming, either with the pole of the hand cannon tuckrd under the arm, or the hand cannon resting on the shoulder, that still won't be quite as accurate as looking down the barrel with the gun on the shoulder or resting against the cheek.

I managed to find Alan Williams original article on kinetic energy vs barrel's length he referenced in his work "Might and the Blast Furnace", and we can pretty much scrap my speculations above.

It turns out, if you look the curve of the kinetic energy vs length/bore ratio (which Williams calls "Calibre""), you find that the apparent differences in kinetic energy for the different barrel lengths is because some of the kinetic energies fall above and below the energy vs Calibre curve, probably due to the unevenness of the serpentine gunpowder. The components of the serpentine (uncorned) gunpowder have a tendency to separate, which effects its performance. Based on the curve of kinetic energy vs calibre, the change in energy from going from a 300 mm to a 420 mm barrel length would not be that much. Right after the 254 mm barrel length the curve flattens out, and goes up only slowly with increased calibre (length/bore)

[HackneyedScribe]

That's not what he said. It seems you are hiding by caliber now. According to the curve given by Alan Williams, changing the barrel from 300 mm to 420 mm would affect the caliber from 8.3 to 11.7 and according to the curve given, the change takes place at the point which the curve did not flatten out and hence would affect the velocity significantly. I also don't see where Alan Wilkins said that the change in velocity for this test was due to the uneveness of serpentine powder. Please quote where he said that and the page number.

From Alan Williams:
Changing the caliber from 13 to 20 changes the velocity to the extent that joules increase by 2.5x.
Ergo changing the length of the Loshult gun from 300mm to 420mm (all else being equal) increases its caliber from 8.3 to 11.7. On an all else being equal basis this would increase joules considering both 8.3 and 11.7 are below the caliber of all the guns conducted in the test, hence both the Loshult gun's caliber and barrel length is at a place that's before when the curve flattens out.

[HackneyedScribe]

In the case of the Greeks, their ballistas occupied the niche the crossbows would have fitted, which is why I think you don't see.the crossbow used in ancient Greece much. For things like defending fortifications and sieges, the Greeks had ballistas, some which could be hand held size.

What is the evidence for Greek hand held ballistas and what is the evidence for the tactical niche of the Greek ballista?

[Common Soldier]

That's not what he said. It seems you are hiding by caliber now. According to the curve given by Alan Williams, changing the barrel from 300 mm to 420 mm would affect the caliber from 8.3 to 11.7 and according to the curve given, the change takes place at the point which the curve did not flatten out and hence would affect the velocity significantly. I also don't see where Alan Wilkins said that the change in velocity for this test was due to the uneveness of serpentine powder. Please quote where he said that and the page number.

From Alan Williams:
Changing the caliber from 13 to 20 changes the velocity to the extent that joules increase by 2.5x.
Ergo changing the length of the Loshult gun from 300mm to 420mm (all else being equal) increases its caliber from 8.3 to 11.7. On an all else being equal basis this would increase joules considering both 8.3 and 11.7 are below the caliber of all the guns conducted in the test, hence both the Loshult gun's caliber and barrel length is at a place that's before when the curve flattens out.

Where did Alan Williams say this? You are definitely making this out to be a quote by Alan Williams, yet I can't find where he says this. Can you give the page where he said this? It definitely is not on the page with the chart below.

[HackneyedScribe]

Where did Alan Williams say this? You are definitely making this out to be a quote by Alan Williams, yet I can't find where he says this.

I gave you a picture from the book. I did not "quote" from Alan Williams, I showed you the result of the test he displayed. Every time I quoted before I used a quote box or put the words in italics, and I did neither that time. To avoid future confusion this rule still applies to my future posts. Moving on,
The chart shows that the gun with a caliber of 13 shot to a velocity of 149 m/s, resulting in 440 Joules
The chart shows that the gun with a caliber of 20 shot to a velocity of 239 m/s, resulting in 1100 Joules

440 Joules to 1100 Joules is 2.5x the joules.
The chart is a direct picture from his book. Ergo when I said: "Changing the caliber from 13 to 20 changes the velocity to the extent that joules increase by 2.5x.", the truth of this can be seen from his chart.
The Loshult gun's caliber is 300/36 = 8.3, which is below the caliber of any gun shown in the chart.

Now please take the time to answer my questions that I just asked previously:
1. What is the evidence for Greek hand held ballistas and what is the evidence for the tactical niche of the Greek ballista?
2. I also don't see where Alan Wilkins said that the change in velocity for this test was due to the uneveness of serpentine powder. Please quote where he said that and the page number.

[Common Soldier]

I gave you a picture from the book. I did not "quote" from Alan Williams, I showed you the result of the test he displayed. Every time I quoted before I used a quote box or put the words in italics, and I did neither that time. To avoid future confusion this rule still applies to my future posts

Sorry, but that is not good enough. When you says "According to Alan Williams:" you are implying that what follows comes from Williams. That was clear not the case here, but hear are youe own ideas that you are giving a false.impression were from Williams when they were not, and the lack of quotes does not accuse you from being wrong. Quotes would be needed only if you were repeating Williams exact words. You still implied that the ideas were from Williams, by using "according to".

In the future, younmust do a better job clearly distinguishing your own ideas from your sources, which youndo not always do.

[Quote]

. Moving on,
The chart shows that the gun with a caliber of 13 shot to a velocity of 149 m/s, resulting in 440 Joules
The chart shows that the gun with a caliber of 20 shot to a velocity of 239 m/s, resulting in 1100 Joules @!

I don't know if your ignoring the graph of velocity vs caliber that shows up the next page is deliberately being dishonest or you just don't understand what the graohnis showing.

The graph shows a curve. Where velocity rises quickly with caliber then flattens out. The 381 mm data point is significantly about this curve... If the 381 mm point was on the curve, the velocity of the 381 would be less, and the increase in energ from 251 mm would be less. The 914 is below the curve, suggesting the 914 velocity and hence energy should be greater that what is shows. Since the energy is proportion to velocity squared, this amplifies the variation in energies seen in the chart.

There may have been errors in velocity measurement, or variations in the mixture od thr powder. Williams did say in his paper where he performed the experiment thst the sperpetine powder wouldn't explode at all if not packed down tightly. Perhaps the output could very somewhat depending on hard it was packed down.

Anyways, this is just a long winded way of pointing out that someofnthd charts results could be thr result of measurement error...instead of a dramatic jump at 381, we see less of a rise, and more of a rise between 382 and 914.

Note, you act as if I.said there would be no increase in in.going from 300 mm to 420 mm, which I did not. .one thing you totally seemed.to have missed was the importance of the change in calibre to kinetic energy. Because the 1415 gun has a larger increase in bore, the increase in caliber is less that just what the increase in length implies

If you actually read Williams work closely, you would find that change in caliber, not just length, is what he finds important. The Loshult gun was 300 mm/30mm bore for a 10 caliber, while the Ming gun was 420/40 mm bore, a 10.5 caliber, virtually the same. The increase in power due to the longer barrel length would provide very little extra power, since was offset by a larger bore.

The larger bore of the Ming gun would allow more gunpowder and a larger mass projectile, which would increase the energy, but the length would not be a significant factor just as I said.

Note, I.am not hiding behind caliber, as you falsh accuse me of. It was Alan Wiliams who made caliber important, that it is not just the length of barrel, but the ration between barrel length and bore diameter that is important.

2. I also don't see where Alan Wilkins said that the change in velocity for this test was due to the uneveness of serpentine powder. Please quote where he said that and the page number.

Please show me where I saisnthat Alan Williams said that. I never said, or unlike you, implied that Williams had.. I merely used that to explain why the results did not fit evenly on the velocity to caliber curve as they should. The results ofnthr chart on 920 were very odd, and counterintuitive. If younassume some of the variation seen was do to experimental error, the results would make more sense, and fit better along a velocity to caliber curve graph he had on the following page.

As for your other question, there is something I would like to look up first that I recall reading. When I find the article I read, I will get back on that. There is one point I would like to point out. A lot of cultures that have a strong archery tradition, or have access to archers, do not rely on crossbows. The English, who had a strong archery tradition, strongly preferred their bows over crossbows. And the Turks, who also has a strong archery tradition, likewise relied on their bows rather than crossbows. Likewise for the Japanese, you see bows used much more than crossbows.

But the English, and the Turks, and others, even though they preferred bows, still found crossbows useful at times, in defending fortifications and sieges. In those applications, thd ballistas could take over those functions and uses. The Romans did have handheld ballista called the manuballista. What may be the same thing, was the cheroballiata which was mounted on a stand.. Both based on written accounts of individuals being targeted and recreations bases on actually remains. The these small ballistas were quite flexible in how they could be aimed. Since this is not a thread on ballistas, I don't intended to spend more time on discussing these small ballistas until I happen to find the links I am.looking for.

.

[HackneyedScribe]

Sorry, but that is not good enough. When you says "According to Alan Williams:" you are implying that what follows comes from Williams.

I implied what followed came from Williams because what followed DID come from Williams, please don't imply that it doesn't. You claimed I "quoted" from Williams, which I did not. Just because I didn't quote him word for word and you somehow toss the accusation that my idea didn't come from Williams. What I did was state the results shown by the test Williams displayed, ergo it came from Williams' book. What I said was correct, it just wasn't quoted word-for-word from Alan Williams, but I never claimed I quoted him word-for-word in that post.

That was clear not the case here, but hear are youe own ideas that you are giving a false.impression were from Williams when they were not, and the lack of quotes does not accuse you from being wrong. Quotes would be needed only if you were repeating Williams exact words. You still implied that the ideas were from Williams, by using "according to".

The idea DID come from Williams. You claimed I "quoted" from Williams, which I denied. In the same exact sentence I told you that what I said still came from Williams' book, I merely didn't quote from him. I did not misrepresent what Williams said. I said:
From Alan Williams, Changing the caliber from 13 to 20 changes the velocity to the extent that joules increase by 2.5x.

His Chart showed this in page 190, and I have given the chart already. I'm doing it again below. Do you deny that in the following chart, changing the caliber from 13 to 20 increases joules by 2.5x?



Last time I checked, 1100 Joules is 2.5x that of 440 Joules. Ergo what I said did indeed come from Alan Williams' book. Anyway, these repeated false accusations of yours is not something I appreciate.

In the future, younmust do a better job clearly distinguishing your own ideas from your sources, which youndo not always do.

As stated above, what I said is just a reflection of what my source said. You're just not reading. All I said was that I "didn't quote" from Alan Williams, and you somehow got the idea that what I said wasn't FROM Alan Williams. This is despite the fact that I made it very clear that what I said came from Alan Williams in the same exact sentence. I don't appreciate this habit of blaming me for things that's actually due to you not reading.

I don't know if your ignoring the graph of velocity vs caliber that shows up the next page is deliberately being dishonest or you just don't understand what the graohnis showing.

The graph shows a curve. Where velocity rises quickly with caliber then flattens out. The 381 mm data point is significantly about this curve... If the 381 mm point was on the curve, the velocity of the 381 would be less, and the increase in energ from 251 mm would be less. The 914 is below the curve, suggesting the 914 velocity and hence energy should be greater that what is shows. Since the energy is proportion to velocity squared, this amplifies the variation in energies seen in the chart.

There may have been errors in velocity measurement, or variations in the mixture od thr powder. Williams did say in his paper where he performed the experiment thst the sperpetine powder wouldn't explode at all if not packed down tightly. Perhaps the output could very somewhat depending on hard it was packed down.

Anyways, this is just a long winded way of pointing out that someofnthd charts results could be thr result of measurement error...instead of a dramatic jump at 381, we see less of a rise, and more of a rise between 382 and 914.

I don't believe you read the graph correctly. Also you cut off my quote and responded in a way that changed the context of what I said. So it's a low-blow move when you accuse me of being dishonest while cutting off my quote. This was the part you cut off:
The chart shows that the gun with a caliber of 13 shot to a velocity of 149 m/s, resulting in 440 Joules
The chart shows that the gun with a caliber of 20 shot to a velocity of 239 m/s, resulting in 1100 Joules
440 Joules to 1100 Joules is 2.5x the joules.
The chart is a direct picture from his book. Ergo when I said: "Changing the caliber from 13 to 20 changes the velocity to the extent that joules increase by 2.5x.", the truth of this can be seen from his chart.
The Loshult gun's caliber is 300/36 = 8.3, which is below the caliber of any gun shown in the chart.

^Ergo what I said was explaining to you that what i said came from Alan Williams' book, specifically a chart in his book. As for the graph on the very next page, it only helps my argument.

This is the graph from Williams showing the curve:



I don't know what you mean by mentioning barrel length. The graph's x-axis shows the caliber. The graph's y-axis shows the velocity. Why are you talking about putting gun barrel length on the graph? The 381 mm gun have a caliber of 20. A caliber of 20 is when it shows velocity starting to flatten out.
However, the Loshult gun have a caliber of 8.3. At this point velocity increases significantly when caliber (and hence barrel length, because the test used the same bore diameter despite all guns having different barrel lengths) increases. The graph doesn't dissaprove my argument, if anything it proves it.

Note, you act as if I.said there would be no increase in in.going from 300 mm to 420 mm, which I did not.

Perhaps you forgot I stated the following in post 201:
The 1415 Chinese gun has a cylindrical bore with a hollow-vase shaped gunpowder chamber (which you admit helps with muzzle energy). It has a longer barrel and uses a sabot (and you admitted a sabot helps propel the arrow forward). The Loshult gun does not have a sabot, and a shorter barrel. You haven't admitted that a longer barrel helps a lot, but you admit it helps a little. Ergo if the Loshult gun was capable of shooting an arrow at 1600 Joules, then that's a good minimum bar of what the 1415 Chinese gun was capable of.

.one thing you totally seemed.to have missed was the importance of the change in calibre to kinetic energy. Because the 1415 gun has a larger increase in bore, the increase in caliber is less that just what the increase in length implies

Caliber = length of barrel/bore diameter
By saying that length of barrel is important to kinetic energy, I am saying caliber is important to kinetic energy.
When you admit that caliber is important to kinetic energy, you admit that barrel length is important to kinetic energy.
Ergo I haven't missed the importance of caliber to kinetic energy. However, you are arguing in favor of a contradiction in which barrel length isn't that important to kinetic energy but caliber somehow is? You can't have it both ways.

If you actually read Williams work closely, you would find that change in caliber, not just length, is what he finds important.

Length increases caliber. If caliber is important, then so is length by definition.

The Loshult gun was 300 mm/30mm bore for a 10 caliber, while the Ming gun was 420/40 mm bore, a 10.5 caliber, virtually the same. The increase in power due to the longer barrel length would provide very little extra power, since was offset by a larger bore.

The larger bore of the Ming gun would allow more gunpowder and a larger mass projectile, which would increase the energy, but the length would not be a significant factor just as I said.

Note, I.am not hiding behind caliber, as you falsh accuse me of. It was Alan Wiliams who made caliber important, that it is not just the length of barrel, but the ration between barrel length and bore diameter that is important.

You say caliber is important, but not length of barrel
Caliber = length of barrel/bore diameter

Caliber depends on length of barrel, if you admit caliber is important, then you should admit length of barrel is important. I don't see how you could admit one while denying the other.
And as you've admitted, if the caliber of two guns are the same, then the one with the larger bore (and hence greater barrel length) would mean it can store more gunpowder and shoot a heavier projectile. The longer barrel length allows the gun to shoot a heavier projectile and use more gunpowder while still maintaining the same caliber.

Please show me where I saisnthat Alan Williams said that. I never said, or unlike you, implied that Williams had.. I merely used that to explain why the results did not fit evenly on the velocity to caliber curve as they should. The results ofnthr chart on 920 were very odd, and counterintuitive. If younassume some of the variation seen was do to experimental error, the results would make more sense, and fit better along a velocity to caliber curve graph he had on the following page.

You did not say that was your opinion only. You said, and I quote: I managed to find Alan Williams original article on kinetic energy vs barrel's length he referenced in his work "Might and the Blast Furnace", and we can pretty much scrap my speculations above. It turns out, if you look the curve of the kinetic energy vs length/bore ratio (which Williams calls "Calibre""), you find that the apparent differences in kinetic energy for the different barrel lengths is because some of the kinetic energies fall above and below the energy vs Calibre curve, probably due to the unevenness of the serpentine gunpowder. The components of the serpentine (uncorned) gunpowder have a tendency to separate, which effects its performance.

You introduce Alan Williams as a source, then say that "it turns out".... ending with the conclusion. But the conclusion is not that of Alan Williams, it is only yours.
You should apply the same standard for yourself that you apply for me. Also in regards to what you THINK I mistakenly implied, you should read above.

Also your conclusion don't make sense. You said:
if you look the curve of the kinetic energy vs length/bore ratio (which Williams calls "Calibre""), you find that the apparent differences in kinetic energy for the different barrel lengths is because some of the kinetic energies fall above and below the energy vs Calibre curve, probably due to the unevenness of the serpentine gunpowder.
However, the graph doesn't show kinetic energy vs calibre as you are implying. It shows velocity vs caliber. Second of all, you attempted to explain why the graph's 'kinetic energy' (more like velocity) isn't perfectly correlated with caliber by claiming that it's due to the usage of serpentine powder. The problem is, the graph also tried to fit velocity with caliber by using corned (non-serpentine) gunpowder, and it's still not a perfect fit. So did you really look at the graph at all here?

As for your other question, there is something I would like to look up first that I recall reading. When I find the article I read, I will get back on that. There is one point I would like to point out. A lot of cultures that have a strong archery tradition, or have access to archers, do not rely on crossbows. The English, who had a strong archery tradition, strongly preferred their bows over crossbows. And the Turks, who also has a strong archery tradition, likewise relied on their bows rather than crossbows. Likewise for the Japanese, you see bows used much more than crossbows.

You could flip that around and say that many cultures with a strong crossbow tradition, or have access to crossbows, do not rely on their bows.
Also, since crossbows have different designs and bows have different designs, I don't see how such statements are relevant.
For example, the Greek gastraphetes is limited in draw weight to roughly 90 lbs for an operator of average weight, draw weight could be heavier if the operator is significantly heavier. This is because the operator uses a portion of his own body weight to draw the crossbow. So far I'm not aware of any other crossbow design with this unique limitation.
The Medieval European crossbow on the other hand could have humongous draw weight, but is limited by its powerstroke, meaning a steel crossbow of 1250 lbs is not much more powerful than a strong warbow.
The ancient Chinese crossbow is very hard to mass produce without the piece mold process.

Since this is not a thread on ballistas, I don't intended to spend more time on discussing these small ballistas until I happen to find the links I am.looking for.

This also isn't a thread about handgonne caliber and barrel lengths either. That didn't stop you from starting it up again in post 223. Does this mean you're going to let the issue drop?

[Lifthrasir]

Thread permanently closed. You have been warned, Gents.