Essay On Trebuchet

I, Kylie Innes, have chosen to do the trebuchet as my science demo. The trebuchet is a medieval siege engine that was used to throw projectiles at the enemy. I have an interest in weapons, so the trebuchet was a perfect fit because I was interested and excited about doing the project, rather than it be boring for me to do. I chose to work alone for this project. One reason for working alone is because I work better by myself than in a group for projects. Also, I am a very busy person, so it would have been a challenge to meet with my partner to work on the project.

The specific inventor of the trebuchet is unknown, but it is believed to have been invented in 300 BC in China. During the Middle Ages, around 500 AD, the trebuchet reached Europe where the design was adjusted. The trebuchet was the first war machine that used leverage and gravity instead of tension and torsion to throw an object. The purpose of the trebuchet was to create a more accurate and powerful version of the catapult. One main use of the trebuchet during battle was to knock down and damage walls.

All three of Newton’s laws apply to the trebuchet.

Newton’s First Law states that unless acted upon by an unbalanced force, an object in motion will stay in motion and an object at rest will stay at rest. The projectile, after being released, would fly through the air forever if gravity, air resistance and friction, the unbalanced forces, were not present. Newton’s Second Law states that force equals mass times acceleration (F=ma). The acceleration of the projectile is created by the mass of the weight when released. Newton’s Third Law states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. The action of the trebuchet is the weight dropping and the equal and opposite reaction is the projectile

accelerating.
The first step in making the trebuchet was to research how it works and all the specific details that have to be just right, such as the angle of the nail on the arm and the length of the arm itself. Doing the research for building the trebuchet took me about a month to complete and make sure the information that I got was correct. Next, my dad and I built the structure of the trebuchet in just under a day, but we still had to do all of the precise things. The next week, my dad and I had completed building the trebuchet in about a day. The materials we used to build the trebuchet were wood, nails, an old T-shirt, fishing line, about two pounds of big screws, a bag to hold the screws, a stress ball, a saw, and a drill. Some problems we encountered were that the weight was not heavy enough, the nail was not bent at the correct angle, and our original projectile, a Nerf Rival ball, was not heavy enough, so we replaced it with the stress ball.
The world has advanced so much since the Middle Ages that there is not a rational reason for any country to be fighting battles with trebuchets when we have guns, bombs, and missiles, so some teachers will use it to teach physics to their students. For this reason, the trebuchet has not gone through any recent developments, but when it was a popular weapon of choice, it went through some changes. The very first trebuchets invented in China did not have a weight, but instead relied on human labor to launch the projectile. The trebuchet then got a fixed counterweight, which tuned into a hinged counterweight, which then turned into a propped counterweight. My trebuchet project deserves an A because the actual trebuchet works extremely well, my essay follows the guidelines for an A, and I have worked very hard on this project.