Accessory for an arrow

An accessory for a hunting arrow is disclosed designed to be mounted around the shaft of the arrow at the base of the arrow head. The accessory consists of a coil of ribbon-like resilient material which is tightly wound and held in coiled position by a latch. The latch releases the coil as the result of a finger on the latch catching on the target as the arrow penetrates.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 
While the bow and arrow is one of the oldest of man's hunting tools and has 
been improved to the point where it presently is a weapon of vastly 
increased lethal characteristics than it was a mere 100 years ago, it is 
still far from ideal as a weapon for hunting larger animals. It has long 
been recognized that while bow and arrow hunting requires substantially 
greater skills than the use of fire arms, it has the undesirable 
characteristic of wounding many animals which are still capable of 
escaping from the hunter only to die later as a delayed reaction of the 
arrow. This is undesirable for many reasons. Among the fundamental reasons 
why an arrow is less effective than a fire arm as a lethal weapon is the 
fact that in many cases it does not create sufficient physical damage to 
produce an immediate or substantially immediate lethal effect. 
BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION 
The objective of the invention is to substantially increase the immediate 
lethal effect of an arrow. To this end the invention provides an accessory 
to be mounted on the conventional arrow which will greatly increase the 
physical damage caused by the arrow and will assure a rapid and quick 
bleeding of the animal struck with the arrow to assure a swift and certain 
lethal effect such that death comes quickly before the animal has an 
opportunity to escape from the immediate area of the hunter. The invention 
is designed to be sufficiently light and compact that it does not 
materially affect the trajectory of the arrow and does not adversely 
affect the directional accuracy of the arrow. To this end, it does not, to 
any significant degree, interfere with the balance initially built in to 
the arrow.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENT 
The numeral 10 indicates an arrow having a shaft 11 and a head 12. Both the 
shaft and the head are conventional and, as illustrated in FIG. 3, the 
front end of the shaft has an internally threaded opening 13 to receive 
the threaded shank 14 of the arrow head. In general the various arrow 
heads and shafts are interchangeable, permitting any number of arrow heads 
of various designs, sizes and shapes to be mounted on any one of a number 
of different shafts. So far as this invention is concerned, it is possible 
to reverse the threaded opening and shank in such a way that the female 
threaded opening is in the arrow head and the male portion of the 
attachment is part of the shaft. 
The invention is an attachment 20 designed to be mounted on the arrow 
between the head 12 and the shaft 11. The attachment includes an 
elongated, narrow ribbon 21 of a resilient material, preferably a 
stainless, spring steel. In a preferred embodiment, it has a width of 1/2 
inch and a length of approximately 10 inches. This ribbon 21 is tightly 
coiled about a shell 22 which has an inner opening of a size to slidably 
but closely fit about the arrow shaft 11. Thus, it forms the sleeve 23 
which seats about the shaft and holds the attachment against any wobble or 
vibration with respect to the shaft. This is important to eliminate any 
adverse affect upon the arrow's accuracy. 
At the forward end of the sleeve, the attachment has an inwardly extending 
flange 24 which seats over the end of the shaft and has a central opening 
25 of a size to just closely fit around the threaded stem or extension 14 
of the arrow. By this arrangement the invention can be mounted on an arrow 
simply by sliding it over the end of the shaft and then mounting the arrow 
with the rear end of the arrow tightly clamping the flange 24 between it 
and the front end of the shaft. 
Adjacent its outer end, the ribbon 21 is provided with a pair of spaced 
slits 30 extending from the rear edge of the next to the outermost coil to 
a position approximately half way across the width of the ribbon. Also, 
the outer end of the ribbon is notched at 31 so that it has an extending 
tail 32 of a length and size to be received through the slits 30 and 
behind the finger 33 created between the slits. The end of the tail 32 is 
bent outwardly to form a radially extending catch 34. 
The inner end of the ribbon 21 is secured to the shell 22 by any suitable 
means such as spot welding. The ribbon is then tightly wound around the 
shell and is releasably locked in the wound position by placing the end 
tail 32 beneath the finger 33 with the catch 34 holding the ribbon against 
withdrawal from behind the finger 33. 
Because it is important that the entire attachment be as light and as 
compact as possible, all parts of it are designed to be thin. For example, 
the flange 24 can be of 0.015 to 0.020 while the walls of the shell can be 
0.015 stainless steel. A preferable material for the ribbon is 0.005 
stainless spring steel. In a preferred construction the catch 34 extends 
approximately a 1/4 inch outwardly from the surface of the coil 21. 
When an arrow equipped with this invention strikes a target, as the arrow 
head initially penetrates the target, the catch 34 engages the target and 
pulls the end of the ribbon 21 free of the finger 33, this permits the 
tightly wound spring coil to release. As the arrow continues to penetrate 
the target, the uncoiling of the ribbon multiplies the amount of physical 
damage done to the target. Furthermore, since the catch remains basically 
at the exterior of the target, the ribbon extends as a coil in as far as 
the head of the arrow penetrates. This assures a large and open wound 
which will result in positive and rapid bleeding and thus greatly 
increases the chances that the wound will be not only lethal but quickly 
lethal rather than requiring a period of slow bleeding and infection to 
cause death. Thus, it not only greatly increases the chance that the 
hunter will recover his quarry but it also materially reduces the 
possibility of the animal suffering a lingering and painful death. 
To further increase the effectiveness of the invention, the forward edge of 
the ribbon 21a may be scalloped at 40 to provide a large number of small, 
sharp forwardly extending teeth to further increase the power of the 
invention to produce immediate or substantially immediate death to the 
hunter's quarry. 
Having described my invention and the manner of its use, it will be 
recognized that various modifications of the invention can be made. Such 
of these modifications as do not depart from the principle of the 
invention are to be considered as included in the hereinafter appended 
claims unless these claims by their language expressly state otherwise.