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