Monday, February 7, 2011

Birth of Artemis Technology





Last year I began to think about creating a new broadhead for hunting. This pursuit would be a compilation of many of my passions. It started as just doing research for my own self and what I wanted to tip my arrows with for the upcoming seasons. This has become an obsession. I have probably spent in excess of 200 hours researching design, material, and machining processes.

One of the first documents I ran across was a report that Dr. Ashby created a while back for hunting dangerous game. His conclusions from the data sparked my imagination, and fueled my desire to learn more and more. The single beveled designed blade is the .500 nitro for bow hunting.

One more inspiration is the company German Kinetics. They designed and created one of the best heirloom blades possible. They had a double bevel design on the blade, but their machining and steel selection was the best around. They are no longer around.

After trying for six months to find a person that could do the machining work I stumbled upon K & S Precision Blade in Fort Worth. I traveled with my hand drawn and plasticine models to twelve different shops before them. This is where the work began.

After I found the shop, I then had to find a designer. Not just any designer, but an Aerospace Tool Designer. This is by far the hardest quest out there. All of these guys are under contract for their companies not to do any outside work. (Lockheed does not like its secrets being used in other lines of work). Six months later, and so disappointed, K&S called me up and there was a man that does great work that was just laid off from Haliburton. He helped them with modeling prototype ball valves a few years back. Ya (that's his name)is great! I met with him, and I knew he could model my design. He began researching tirelessly also. In just a few weeks I had my models ready.

We now have the designs, and the models ready to go, the only thing left is steel selection. Our idea it to give the hunter the best blade for the application they need, It will not fail them! Our steel selection has been made. X15 TN is a steel that was developed by a french company a few years ago, but has seen little application. It is fantastic! It holds an edge better than 440 C stainless, and it does not corrode. We can also make it extremely hard. Jim at Metal Man was instrumental with my steel education, I cannot thank him enough.

The prototypes should be done by next month!!!!!!!!! I cant wait to show them off. Then the real work begins. I have to go into production. Thank you KAY.

2 comments:

  1. Sweet! When will it be ready to try out on an actual arrow?

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  2. Money was paid yesterday and the machining is underway. I have no idea how long the heat treating will take.

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