A New Trebuchet! Hurling Pumpkins! And Knights! On Horsies!

Bit of late notice, here, but we’re going to be enjoying the pumpkin hurling and jousting this weekend at the Snohomish Pumpkin Hurl & Medieval Faire. Our own Trebuchet will be there, with a hawt new trebuchet!

Image shows a trebuchet with a jack o lantern in its sling.
Trebuchet’s new trebuchet, locked and loaded! Shamelessly filched from Trebuchet, with permission.

B and I are planning on coming on Saturday, and Starspider and I may do a second day on Sunday. Let me know if you’re local and can be there – we’ll meet up! And yes, I will bring you lots and lots of pictures and video, if you can’t make it. Live vicariously!

{advertisement}
A New Trebuchet! Hurling Pumpkins! And Knights! On Horsies!
{advertisement}

13 thoughts on “A New Trebuchet! Hurling Pumpkins! And Knights! On Horsies!

  1. rq
    1

    You better bring the pictures and the vids back. Else I will not read your next post on MSH. Oh wait, that hurts me more than you… Heck, just bring the pictures and vids back, and good luck to Trebuchet!! The new equipment looks pretty awesome.

  2. 2

    So….. beautiful…..

    Pumpkins (A) and trebuchets (B) are two of my favourite things. I have an enormous one of A growing in my garden, and a teeny tiny one of B on my windowsill. I feel they are incompatible in terms of hurling, however.

  3. 4

    Thanks for the plug, Dana! Looking forward to seeing you Saturday. And Sunday! I’ve actually got some helpers and other visitors coming this year. The more the merrier!

    A bit about the machine:
    It’s actually not a trebuchet, which would be powered by gravity, but an onager, powered by a twisted up bundle of rope. It’s actually quite small — the frame rails are just six feet long, which is also the effective length of the throwing arm. Speaking of the arm, you might be able to make out that it’s wrapped in fiberglass filament tape. That’s to control the spread of the pieces when it breaks. Note that I did not say “if it breaks.”

    Every time I look at it now I think “Dang, that’s too small”. It was originally sized to fit in the bed of my little truck but then I went and got a trailer. Still, the size is probably about as large as I could manage to build by myself. It should be JUST large enough to hurl a competition-weight (8-10 pounds) pumpkin.

  4. 5

    Oh, and I’m seriously considering bringing last year’s machine to the event as well, due to a lack of entries. I suspect the hurling won’t amount to all that much this year, but there’ll still be horsies!

  5. 13

    I’m back! Saw Dana for about 30 seconds, then she went to look at horsies. Priorities!

    Performance of the new machine was awesome! Wait, that’s not quite the right word. “Awful”, that’s the one. It was awful. Apparently the torsion bundle has too much power for the strength of the frame, but not enough to hurl a pumpkin more than 30 feet. I sad. Hurling again in two weeks, work to do.

    Fortunately I took the old reliable trebuchet along as backup. It could hurl 300 feet in its sleep, and did, all day long. It’ll be the only one tomorrow.

Comments are closed.