This year felt a little bit medieval at times, but everyone who was able to make it had a blast! Our fixed pivot trebuchet ended up earning the 3rd place spot among 20 collegiate teams, battling wind and increasingly worse mishaps to lob off six pumpkins the day of competition. Everyone was pleased by the result, to say the least. Thank you to Rowan University ASME for hosting, and for all of the hard work the punkin chunkin build team put into designing a trebuchet from scratch this year!
Still, Murphy’s law was in full effect. An outrigger leg fell off during a test fire, so we lashed them on with rope. The center pivot rod kept bending during operation, so we swapped it out with precut spares and latter a solid cross section rod — it still bent. In the end, it was the lever arm 200 lb weight attachment that gave way under the snap of dynamic loads. Nevertheless, everyone left happy and had a great time.
