Hey people. I've been busy in other parts of the book, not related to aircraft disassembly. I'm now 90,000 words done, and I need to extract some weapons from the aircraft.
I've decided that crossbows are the simplest thing to pursue for a bunch of untrained PAX. The stock, bow will be made of wood along with the trigger mechanism. I could use other material from the plane if it made sense and wouldn't require excessive effort to extract rework.
I was wondering if the bolts (the arrows used in a crossbow) could be made out of stainless steel? Someone mentioned to me that the seats of an aircraft contain stainless steel rods? I don't know what diameter these are, or how long. My hope was that they were about 18" long and about 1/4" diameter. You'd sharpen the end of them using a stone and have a bolt. If each seat has a couple of these, then I have plenty of bolts.
If not bolts, then how about making steel tips to go on wood bolts? Are there things that might make great sharp tips with minor modification? There is plenty of hard, dense wood on this island. It would make decent shafts.
Tools available include a hand drill, a couple cordless drills, a single Dremel. Hacksaw with a couple spare blades, other basic tools. No lathe, grinding machines, forge (yet), or anything more sophisticated than hand tools.
Any help appreciated.