New Trebuchet Design -- Walking Arm Trebuchet

[mrstapleton]

Hi everyone,

I thought people might be interested in a trebuchet design that I invented three years ago. Last year, my 8 year old son used it to set the all time record at the Vermont Pumpkin Chuckin' Festival. I won, too, in the heavyweight division. My son threw a 3 ounce ball 266 feet with his 20 pound, 41" tall trebuchet, and his scaled up score amounted to more than their estimate of mine. They never found my pumpkin. It was so high over the spotter that he never saw it fly into the woods.

My son and I just made an instructable showing how to build the trebuchet. Here's the link if you're interested... https://www.instructables.com/id/Worlds ... ing-Arm-T/

This is a video of one of my first tests of a 500 pound, 10 foot tall design. The counterweight is 450 pounds, and the rest adds up to a little less than 50. The projectile here is a soccer ball with rice and foam inside.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5Dwe3n9TEjE

This is my first post, so I apologize in advance if these links didn't work the way I thought they would.

Cheers,
Jonathan

[madmattd]

I think I've seen your machine before, or at least a machine like that with that name, so likely yours. Somewhat scary comes to mind But effective from the sounds of it.

As I recall the VT event has a machine weight limit including your CW? In which case I can see the sense to having a very-minimal frame.

You're going back to the VT event this year I assume? I used to live in MA, and I never made it up to that event though I've been to Stowe many times. The event always seemed to coincide with a weekend I had other commitments

(PS your links work fine!)