Trebuhole

Trebuhole is what I named my model trebuchet. It has been fired a few times in the past but I was inspired by the Bangarang to play with it some more. I had an interesting discussion with James. about the horse being used as a payload, and about the length of the sling ropes.

Technical Specifications

As shown in the Rough Trebuchet Diagram, there are some measurements that must be considered for trebuchets. Trebuhole has these measurements (in inches):

L1=19"

L2=15"

L3=4"

L4=4"

L5=Varied during trials in order to see if long or short sling rope length is best.

H1=9"

H2=5"

Preliminary Attempt

I decided to use a relatively large toy horse as my payload to attempt to figure out if doing so is feasible. This is the setup:

Unfortunately, the horse was inserted backwards, and the legs caught on the sling and the launch was unsuccessful.

Subsequent Attempts

I had my kids build a castle out of Legos as a target for the Trebuhole.

I then set up a lego horse facing the correct way (legs toward bottom of swing arm). The sling length (L5) here is 11 inches.

I also set up Trebuhole with a longer sling rope length (L5=19 inches) using some blue string.

Results

At L5=11", the Lego horse was launched 262".

At L5=19", the Lego horse was launched 52".

Conclusion

The shorter sling rope length seems to be better for Trebuhole. I believe that the sling falls off of the track or otherwise gets messed up during the launch, hindering the long string launch distance. However, this may differ for other trebuchets.