Day 2- Final(?) Construction

Stardate -310348.63 (May 8th, 2013)- Captain's Log- The second day of my journey was a technical one. Mounting the arm and sling took much longer than anticipated. Work was done though and turned out well. Details follow. Step one was attaching a small rectangle to both triangles so they would stay together and support the rod and arm for the trebuchet.

Clamps make a comeback. More this time. Kinda like Pokemon.

Screws will hold them all together

The screw pattern for both sides.

 Next two holes were drilled across from one another in the new rectangles up top. The diameter matches that of the steel rod, 1/2 inches.

I see you

That is out of regulation. Section 2 subsection 1 Sentence 3 "The base of the catapult cannot exceed 3 feet by 3 feet." Time to cut it. With bolt cutters.

I may have guns of steel (ba da chhhhh), but this rod is gonna need some priming done before it meets requirements.

Faced with the mission of cutting the rod down to size, I decided to work smart, not hard. My Dad busted out his Dremel (a tool that can spin at high speeds with different bits) and showed me how to wear the steel down with a sanding tip.

Sweet shot if I say so myself

Then I went to town

After the rod was cut and put in place, the PVC pipe needed to be primed and sealed. On one end, the end that would go through the rod, I placed a basic PVC cap. On the opposite end I placed a screw cap, so I could fill the pipe with the weight needed to launch.

PVC Cement acts fast. It heats the pipe through chemicals and melts the two parts together, creating a watertight seal.

Once the cement dried (roughly 15-20 minutes) then the same drill bit used to drill the 1/2 inch diameter holes in the plywood was used to create the holes in the PVC pipe. Then it was just a matter of placing it on the rod and securing the ends.

A perfect pivot point

Gnarly dude

This baby will go far

 The next part was to attach the rest of the arm. I used another fence post for the length and secured it with heavy-duty zip ties and screws. To account for the difference in height between the PVC pipe and its cap, washers were hot glued until the post was plum.

First make it level and secure with zip ties

Washers make the fence post plum (even) with the rest of the PVC pipe

Funky angles because I am an artist

Screws are the final anchoring point

 Finally the last bit of the plywood was used to make a ramp for the sling and water balloon. It fit perfectly inside the base. Simply just secured it with screws at both ends.

Here is a video of the final product on day two. This was the original concept for launching, but as you can see major adjustments were made. All these were made on the final day, testing day. See the next blog for a record of all the tweaks made to the Trebuchet.