What is the strongest known bendable material?

magic9mushroo

By "bendable" I mean "you can run it through a pulley and it retains tension", and by "strong" I refer to tensile yield strength.

Thanks in advance.

russ_watters

Carbon nano-tubes I suppose - could you provide some context, though?

magic9mushroo

Strongest crossbow string, basically.

M Quack

I would have said a chain, but for a crossbow that might not be the best choice.

There are very strong fibers like Zylon.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zylon

magic9mushroo

So is Zylon usable as rope/flexible string?

M Quack

Don't know. I have only seen it used soaked with epoxy to reinforce high-field magnets. Off the spool the stuff is a bit ... hairy, so for a string you'd have to insert it into some kind of shell, the way climbing ropes are built.

russ_watters

The question seems odd - a crossbow isn't that demanding of an application, so you really don't need anything close to the strongest.

magic9mushroo

That depends on the draw weight. There isn't really a limit on how stiff you can make the prods, after all. I was trying to work out if you could build a 10 ton draw-weight crossbow.

Kawakaze

Ive seen this done, some guys I worked with years ago built a crossbow based on plans for a trigger they found online. They used a leaf spring from an old van and a 10t cable as the string. The arrow was 20mm dia stainless rod, with a ground tungsten carbide tip brazed on the end. Long story short, it needed to be cocked with the overhead crane and fired from a vice, it shot straight through a solid brick wall, then it was declared evil and promptly dismantled.

preeti22

Carbon nanotubes