Tuesday, September 8, 2009

The Catapult

The Boss said their eyes bugged out when they arrived at our house and were told that I was at the store picking up some wood to make a catapult. They came over on Labor Day. The Boss took April to some thrift stores for a day of shopping. Jimmy and I remained behind with all eight kids: seven boys and Captain Chaos. I knew that we would have fun when I returned with my purchase to hear Jimmy ask, “Do you have an extra garage door spring?” He was already thinking of a catapult upgrade, and the original was not yet built.


It was a good day.

We built a simple Spring Engine Catapult from plans that I found in a book titled The Art if the Catapult by William Gurstelle. The book is available on-line from Vision Forum. I built the catapult with mostly scrap wood from the garage. The Spring Engine Catapult was originally used to launch an arrow or a bunch of arrows towards an enemy. Accurate aim is difficult to achieve with this catapult, but the power it can generate is impressive.

Here is the version that I built:

Here is the catapult in action:

 If you are having trouble viewing the video, try this link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ff7UJ0JRtmM

7 comments:

Teacher Mommy said...

Aww crap! I don't have access to the video!

Way to go on teaching your kids how to create weapons of mass destruction, medieval style. And they say kids never learn anything useful in school! ;P

Beth said...

This is on the list of things my son wants to build (also a cannon and a fire thrower). Not sure about that last one though!

Unfortunately, I was unable to see the video.

Thanks for all your great ideas!

Anonymous said...

Gee, can we borrow that for our middle ages study? Also, I knew that golf was boring, but do you really have to launch golf tees at people to get them moving on the course?

Michelle
www.eagleeyeacademy.blogspot.com

Kathleen said...

How fun (and brave) you are!

CrossView said...

And that's why I love havings Dads involved in skoolin'! Y'all do the fun projects.... 30 feet for some lightweight tee's? Cool!

Oh! That bucket in the yard being used as a planter? Me, too! LOL!

Autumn said...

SWEET! You sound just like the voice I always give you when I read your comments lol

Kellie said...

Is that you in the video? You don't sound a thing like Cary Grant.

And I have no idea how to create a blog button. Can you do that on Commodore 64? = )