# Hand slap.



## whacko

Does anyone have an explanation for..and hopefully a cure... for hand slap?


----------



## e~shot




----------



## AZ Stinger

heavier ammo...


----------



## All Buns Glazing

I don't think a dynamic shot helps with handslap. It doesn't seem logical to me that more power reduces handslap. I agree, and Bill Hays has proven, than an active shot delivers more power, and Darrell has shown how much power you can get out of a set of tubes when you stretch them to 100% with an active shot, but it reducing handslap? I can't see how it can.

There are two ways to reduce the problem of handslap, in my experience. I have super sensitive little girly hands, and the slightest hint of handslap makes me toss the singshot away and grab another one. I absolutely hate handslap!

The two ways it can be eliminated
1) Match the ammo with the bands. This means that if you're shooting really fast bands (there's a lot of energy in the bands when drawn out) and the ammo is too light, the bands barely feel the ammo, and the bands still have a lot of power at the end, which means that they extend forward quickly, load up, and fly back at your hand. Ouch. Do that 300 times in an hour and your hand is a hamburger.

2) Shoot TTF or OTF (Through the Fork or Outside the fork). This means that no matter how goofy your band/ammo combination is, you won't get handslap, unless there's something really weird with your grip.

p.s. There seems to be a correlation between having a heavy pouch and getting handslaps from them. I suspect it's because you notice the handslap more with a heavy pouch because it hits you with more energy than a light pouch.

I hope this helps!


----------



## DaveSteve

I agree with Buns.

Another attachment option would be ATT (against the ties) like Rufus shot.


----------



## Bajaja

O shoot same weight of pretty light clay ammo for about 3 years. And same slingshots with same bands. After 1 year of shooting, bands and pouch just stop slapping my hands. Not just slapping less or with less pain. It stopped completely. 
Only thing I change is pouch - I use thinner leather. May the thinner leather is not a key, may be it's a shooting technique. That's my opinion. Just shoot and someday you find your wrist twist and your art of shooting.


----------



## All Buns Glazing

There's something in that, actually.

I've found that handslap has disappeared recently and I've gone back to OTT shooting. But, of course, that could be down to having more experience, matching tube/bandsets with ammo.


----------



## Charles

Buns has the problem nailed ... too much energy remaining in the bands. That means they fly back at your hands with a lot of force. Use either lighter bands or heavier ammo. And as Buns correctly points out, because of the band configuration, Over The Top is much more prone to hand slap than either Outside The Fork or Through The Fork. or Against The Ties, as was suggested by DS. And as someone pointed out, a heavy pouch will absorb and retain a lot of energy at the end of the band travel, so a lighter pouch may also help. In my experience, strongly flipping the fork does not really help and is just injurious to accuracy.

Cheers ...... Charles


----------



## All Buns Glazing

Charles said:


> In my experience, strongly flipping the fork does not really help and is just injurious to accuracy.


Thank you for mentioning this! I've been thinking this for a while but I didn't want to bring it up as I thought I just needed to work on my "flipping skills". I've found it completely and utterly pointless in avoiding handslap.


----------



## Henry the Hermit

This is one of the most-discussed subjects on the forum, and the solutions are simple and well documented. The cause, as Buns pointed out, is too much retained energy in the bands/tubes and pouch after the bands/tubes pouch and ammo have reached maximum speed. The solution is to match the power of the bands to the weight of the ammo. If you are restricted to one type of ammo only (3/8 steel balls, for example) and getting hand slap, first try a lighter pouch. If you still get hand slap, try less powerful bands/tubes. All other solutions only hide the symptoms. Most newcomers tend to shoot a lot more rubber than needed. Look at what some of the older guys are shooting.

While I have the floor, if you have no way to measure the speed of your ammo, OTT can be a good way to optimize your bands/tubes for longer life and better efficiency. Start with light ammo and work your way up. When you reach a bandset/ammo combination that produces very light, or no, hand slap, you will enjoy more power and longer band/tube life. In my experience, with 107 bands, that point is usually about 200 fps. With thin tubes and TBG, it's closer to 250 fps.


----------



## mr. green

Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge.

For hand slaps, I wear my golf gloves.


----------



## treefork

One other point in addition to all the other excellent tips. When attaching bands to forks for OTT style. make sure you attach the band as close to the top of the fork as possible. A 1/4 inch can mean the difference of slap to no slap. Keep the top of fork in a flatter configuration. Eliminate the band grove if need be. That's why the tooless band slots eliminate hand slap.


----------



## whacko

Thank you for the valuable information. I generally shoot rocks, and in an effort to accommadte the larger sizes among an uneven lot, I use a fairly big pouch. This is the fork that gives me the hand slap, so clearly the advice here is good. With the shanghais that I use for pellets I have little or no problem. I suppose I should have made the connection, but I did not, I'm grateful to all who were kind enough to respond. I, too, had decided that flipping was bad for accuracy and did not help with the slap.


----------



## All Buns Glazing

A good thread! Clear, short, conclusive!


----------



## Berkshire bred

I find that a flip at the end of the shot helps to remove the painful handslap.


----------



## Spectre

I just had this problem last night 

Had to dig 9 pages to find this thread but it was worth it!

Thanks All Buns Glazing, very thorough explanation there! :thumbsup:

And Henry in Panama, you're most probably right, I might shoot more rubber than needed 

Thanks for sharing the knowledge guys!


----------



## Soske

Only thing that worked for me was to drill holes in the forks from back to front and run the tubes through the holes in the forks. Tried literally everything else....

I like to shoot 5gram marbles or 5gram lead with 2040 single tubes full butterfly.

Lighter tubes did not have sufficient speed. Heavier ammo gave a worse tragectory. TTF did nothing. Different frames made no difference at all.


----------



## Harry Knuckles

Thank you for this post. Going to a lighter pouch completely fixed the hand slap problem I was having.

I typically only shoot frameless but decided to grab a few frames and give full-butterfly a try. I was shooting OTT with a PFS twist so I wouldn't smack my face. I figured there would be some hand slap with all that going on but I didn't expect it to be as bad as it was. I found this post and tried out a lighter pouch and now the little slap I get is much more manageable. The original pouch I was using was a Warrior pouch that weighed 1.6g and the pouch I changed to is only .7g

Edit: I used the same bands and ammo for both pouches so I could see a direct comparison.


----------

