Trebuchet Project

[JStinson]

I saw a program on TV years ago about "punkin chuckin" competitions. Ever since, I've always wanted to build my own punkin chucker.

After seeing a display of pumpkins at a relatives' house the other day, I decided to go for it.

So, here are some pictures of the project.

[JStinson]

[JStinson]

More to come.

[Desoto61]

LOL, it is adictive! I managed to get to the national competition last year and other than being cold and muddy it was a lot of fun, but for people like us making one is more entertaining that just watching one.

You could wind it up with the PW winch! Be a cool way to show off your truck!

Just be careful, you get too hooked and you're going to be buying old busses and lots of steel pipe!

[Bob Thompson]

That's a great project, I hope it goes well. My brothers and I built one when we were kids. The trick was getting the release hook for the sling to the right shape. We were working from plans in a very old and expensive (as it turned out ) book on medievel weapons that had a few missing details. One of my brothers was an expert in ancient weaponry and we had a working trebuchet, built without modern hardware in two months.And though it was approximately one third scale, it had suprising range. It was great fun until the cops made us dismantel it. We had assembled it in our field and had it pointed away from the road,but one night some punks turned it around and peppered the road with squash and other stuff. We went on to build a Roman "Ballista" a few years later. It worked well for a while but we didn't know as much about rope and tensile strength as the Romans.
We were nerds, but we were dangerous nerds.

I've always wanted to build one of the pneumatic pumpkin launchers. But I was thinking a linear accelerator type launcher would be cool too.

[JStinson]

Progress

I've made good progress on the trebuchet. It's about 90% complete.

All I need is a sling and a well adjusted release and I'll be lobbing broken Dodge parts at neighboring fiefdoms.





Anyone want to suggest a name for it?

[Gordon Maney]

Pinosaurus Rex

[Kevin in Ohio]

Anyone want to suggest a name for it?

Orange tossin' special

[Desoto61]

FFPW - Forward Firing Pumpkin Whip
HEMI - High Energy Missle Initiator
The Mopar Throwar

[JStinson]

FFPW wins the motion! Thanks!

I got it assembled earlier today. Here are a few pictures:





Size comparison:

[JStinson]

Defending the castle:

[JStinson]

Video

Here's a video of the trebuchet. The pumpkin slipped out of the pouch about halfway through. I'm gonna redesign the pouch so it will hold stuff better.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yESZ_...ature=youtu.be

[Bob Thompson]

Great Machine, Once you get the sling squared away you'll be ready to take on the Normans.

[MoparNorm]

Great Machine, Once you get the sling squared away you'll be ready to take on the Normans.

Hey!
Just maybe he will take on the Bobarians...

[Frank Irons]

Good one Norm!!!!!!!!!!!!!!