# Auto inner tube



## bubbas55

I can't imagine that some one hasn't discussed this to death but here goes. Does/has anyone used auto inner tubes for their rubber???
Thanks


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## Henry the Hermit

Yes, it has been discussed to death. Auto tubes in the last 50+ years have been made of butyl rubber and are worthless for slingshots. The old natural rubber red inner tubes disappeared in the 50s.


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## oldmiser

the last I checked was a couple weeks ago India still make the natural latex red rubber inner tubes for motor cycles..there expensive to buy

if you do a google search you will find some...I was going to use some for setting up a 50's era slingshot...too much money for the small usage I would use it for

Hope that helps..~AKAOldmiser


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## wll

I truly think that if you used paracord instead of newly manufactured Butyl tube material you could get more speed 

We use Butyl in our manufacturing, and what makes it soooooo great for our use, makes it sooooooo bad for slingshot use.... I honestly don't think you could choose a worse material for your purpose.... Unless you want the worlds slowest slingshot with the highest pull !

wll


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## Imperial

car tires still use inner tubes ?


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## Bob E

I'm sure there is some mudder out there driving around with tubes in his radials :rofl:


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## jazz

I used inner car and bicycle tubes for slingshot bands in early 60s of the 20th century..

Now I heard that sports bicycle inner tubes are made of pure rubber but had no chance to check it.

Anyway, cutting tubes which are bacicaly curved into flat bands was something that was ok some half a century ago, but there are rubbers today, like theraband and other that are completely flat and make cutting into stright bands easier.

However, if I get hold of some good inner tube I am surely going to use it for the bands - why not?!

cheers,

jazz


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## bubbas55

Imperial said:


> car tires still use inner tubes ?


you can still buy them. had to put a tube in my mover wheels. dont know of any car sold today that has tubes. the one i have has been hanging in my shop for 190 or 15 years, dont know where it came from.


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## bubbas55

jazz said:


> I used inner car and bicycle tubes for slingshot bands in early 60s of the 20th century..
> 
> Now I heard that sports bicycle inner tubes are made of pure rubber but had no chance to check it.
> 
> Anyway, cutting tubes which are bacicaly curved into flat bands was something that was ok some half a century ago, but there are rubbers today, like theraband and other that are completely flat and make cutting into stright bands easier.
> 
> However, if I get hold of some good inner tube I am surely going to use it for the bands - why not?!
> 
> cheers,
> 
> jazz


right now im relatively new to slingshots so gonna experiment with slingshot design and use the inner tube simply because they were free. later will get therabands when i want to get more serious.


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## Sst der Kleine Steinschlag

Well, i can´t speak for all, but i found a sensational black innertube in an Irish garage near Lake Corrib in the early nineties.

i´m still sorry i haven´t made more bandsets out of it.

i used to cut the set entirely (including the pouch) from the thick tube and it was capable to penetrate a guinness can at 10+ metres with gravel from my then feeble teenage hands and an irrationally high foked slingshot!

i still have the fork now but all the bandsets are spent and mere memory.


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## Flatband

oldmiser said:


> the last I checked was a couple weeks ago India still make the natural latex red rubber inner tubes for motor cycles..there expensive to buy
> 
> if you do a google search you will find some...I was going to use some for setting up a 50's era slingshot...too much money for the small usage I would use it for
> 
> Hope that helps..~AKAOldmiser


 Very true. India,Malaysia and a few others sell the old original stuff but you have to buy a few metric tons of the rubber!!! Little too much for all of us on here!!!!! I did ask for a sample but never got an answer.We'll stick with latex and are own gum rubber which performs better then the old stuff anyway.


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## pgandy

When a kid we used black inner tubes and a tree fork. No one knew of anything else. It wasn't until the '50s after moving to the "big city" that I had ever seen a red tube or knew they existed. According to Henry they didn't come out until the '50s so I must not have been too far out of touch. Wham-O was the first commercial slingshot I saw and laughed at someone paying for that funny looking thing with a odd looking tube band when we use to make them for free. Now there are dozens of band material as well as forks on the market.


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## Henry the Hermit

No, I didn't say the red tubes came out in the 50s. I said that the natural rubber tubes disappeared in the 50s. As I remember it, there were black and red tubes of natural rubber. I'm pretty sure that butyl rubber was developed in WW2 and replaced natural rubber for most tubes after the war ended. I may be wrong and if so, please correct my memories.


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## Chuck Daehler

Panama, you are as far as I know correct. WWII inspired many synthetics because of the unavailability of natural compounds. Pastics made a surge during and right after the WWII era..nylon, polyethylene, butyl rubber and other pliable compounds, etc.. for natural latex producers were basically blocked with mined or dangerous shipping lanes or in the hands of Axis power allies. The French had Michelin rubber plantations, we went through one in Vietnam clearing it of communist insurgents...and the French ceded to Nazi Germany, and all their assets with it. Vietnam was occupied by the Japanese. So natural rubber wasn't as common as before the war. Butyl rubber was developed to use petroleum as a raw material since USA had lots of petroleum. It didn't have to be elastic, just resistant and it won't oxidize as quickly as natural rubber.

I never used inner tubes when I was a kid, talking about 1950s here when I was between 4 and 14, for dad said modern inner tubes wouldn't stretch whereas the old red ones did. We looked in a lot of gasoline ststions for old red tubes, the ones that changed tires, and found none. We went down to the office supply and found dandy wide big rubber bands and dang if I don't use them today! Shot some this afternoon. Aliance Sterling...see my wife's gallery links...

http://slingshotforum.com/gallery/image/23416-sterling-band-box/
http://slingshotforum.com/gallery/image/23414-sterling-bands/

These are not quite as snappy as Theraband Gold (known on the forum as TBG and the most popular of flat bands) but they'll do, I'd say they are about 85% as "good". They are thicker than TBG and a single band, about 15 or 16 mm wide, is pretty good and offers about 80% the velocity and knock down power as two 15mm TBG on each side. Actually these Alliance Sterling bands are good enough for most shooters and that's what I shot exclusively when I was a kid. They are pretty cheap....72 of them cost me $10. You just cut them so the whole band lays flat and trim to your draw length if you don't use butterfly or half butterfly. I trim off about 4mm for a 30 inch draw and the bands don't stretch really tight meaning I get more band life than stretching the band the maximum stretch for the length. That compromises velocity some but I'm not out to kill elephants or puncture bunkers either...lol. If you don't want to fuss with cutting a sheet of Theraband into strips (you need a disk cutter and self healing cutting board..Walmart) then order some Alliance Sterling bands like what is pictured in the images linked to above.

I would TRY the inner tube material just to see what we're talking about. It will propel ammo. You could probably do better with a throwing stick as far as game hunting whereas with a set of good rubber elastics you can down small game as if it was a .22 at short range with head/neck/vital organ shots. A squirrel or rabbit hit in the head or neck with a good slingshot is just as dead as if he'd been hit with a .22 in the head as well. Then after you try innertube material, try Sterling bands...a whale of a lot of difference. It pays to educate yourself even if people say don't try it...try it and see why. That's free education you can pass on to others. Trial and error often is the best way to learn because you then know WHY something does or doesn't work.


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## rockslinger

I believe you're right Henry. When in high school one summer I worked at a wrecking yard ( auto dismantler ) it was always a treat to find a

red tube while breaking down tires. Sometimes the whole tube wasn't but always salvaged enough for several slingshots.

This was about 1956 or 57.


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## Charles

Several manufacturers currently produce latex bicycle tubes ... they are available on Amazon. I have never tried them myself.

Cheers ..... Charles


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## bubbas55

pgandy said:


> When a kid we used black inner tubes and a tree fork. No one knew of anything else. It wasn't until the '50s after moving to the "big city" that I had ever seen a red tube or knew they existed. According to Henry they didn't come out until the '50s so I must not have been too far out of touch. Wham-O was the first commercial slingshot I saw and laughed at someone paying for that funny looking thing with a odd looking tube band when we use to make them for free. Now there are dozens of band material as well as forks on the market.


cut some strips from the black inner tubes yesterday. they dont seem to have mush life. i bought a grey theraband and well be useing that on any future slingshots .... for now... still a lot to learn


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## bubbas55

i have a commercial kabota lawn mower. 60"er. i just discovered it has inner tubes on the big rear tires but tubeless on the front... i was flabbergasted...


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