I read about atlatl compared to other weapons. But how can you do that without hard facts.
I would like to collect facts about atlatl. Only then would a discussion about its merits make sense.

Dit anyone mesure how far he could trow a dart of given weight and at what speed?
Dit anyone mesure penetration on a given target?
How many darts a man can carry around?
What type of point do you put on your dart?
And many more facts please.

I came across a website http://www.thudscave.com/npaa/articles/howhard.htm witch had interesting information about Atlatl.
I hate Imperial Units! :mad:
I have some comments about it.
First of all i am not sure that the diameter is correct.
Witch could leads to errors in sectional density.
Second Effective range seems to be influenced by reactiontime.
The effective range of most weapons is such that a soldier has no or barely time to duck.
Does anyone have a rough way to calculate penetration?

That was an interesting site. The diameters for the arrows and darts looked to be all right, thought the weights may be a little off. That is more of a guess than anything else.

There really is not any easy way to compute penetration. There are too many variables that are difficult to impossible to determine. Target composition is a big one, nose shape (blunt, cutting edges) is another issue. And not everyone agrees that the same variables are important.

One thing I realized the article did not cover at all is type of point used. Penetration is very different for the same arrow with different points. broad head versus field points versus blunts even if they all have the same largest diameter. Arrows with broad heads cut through the target while a bullet tears through a target. That may be another reason why an arrow will cut through a bucket of sand while a bullet is stopped. (other testing has shown that high velocity rifle rounds like the 30-06 are stopped quicker in a bucket of sand than slower moving pistol rounds even though the pistol bullet had lower sectional density)
To sum it up. Terminal ballistics (penetration and related stuff) is an often misunderstood black art that can be a good way to get into a long debate over minutia.

effective range is usally defined as the range were the projectile is both accurate and effective. reaction time doesn't really figure into it mostly because target reaction time changes and depends on the skill of the user to lead or predict the target and its just easier to a say something has an effective range based on a ideal target standing still on a calm day. And yes the effective range may be less than the killing range.

Wow I must get me one of those. Really impressive weapons ... and they say humans were primitive in prehistory. :p