Shooting a catapult comes naturally to me as I have been doing it for nearly 40 years but I have often watched
newcomers and been baffled by some obvious mistakes.
Firstly you should always try and keep the bands running at 90 degrees to the frame to avoid fork
hits.
Keep the ammo central in the pouch where the hole is punched in the pouch.
A mistake I see time and time again is to move the frame as soon as the shot is fired which causes a frame hit
virtually every time.
YOU MUST FOLLOW THROUGH ON THE SHOT BY KEEPING THE FRAME IN PLACE FOR A COUPLE OF SECONDS AFTER
SHOOTING.
Some frames with small fork gaps can be sort of flicked forward when shot to avoid fork hits as catapults such as
pickle forks are a bit harder to shoot for beginners therefore I would not recommend one of those if starting out.
Generally speaking,the stronger the elastic the bigger ammo should be used.The bands I supply will both shoot 9.5mm
steel balls very well and the double bands will shoot 12mm lead or steel very well for hunting.
I strongly advise you to make some sort of back stop for target shooting as you can then use your ammo time and time
again,the simplest one is to get an old sheet (see photo on bottom of page) and stitch a piece of wood along the bottom and top to weigh it down,then hang it by the top corners to a tree or something
so it is swinging.Then tie a tin can or something to the top wood so it is in the centre of sheet,balls should fall beneath sheet and be easy to pick up.
A cheap and easy backdrop solution!