Trebuchet Reflection
or our first project in physics this year we made working trebuchets. We started be learning about gravity acceleration and other background knowledge that was necessary to building and understanding our trebuchets. We were placed in groups and had to come up a design, materials list, and we also had to build a mini working trebuchet prototype. I put a lot of effort into our prototype and really tried to make it work. It broke many times and I had to fix it a lot but in the end we got it to work enough to move on to the actual building of the trebuchet. The purpose of this project was to teach us about several of the foundations of physics with a real-world example: the trebuchet.
a:
In order to throw a projectile as far as possible with a counterweight trebuchet you need to have the ratio of your swing arm perfected so that you can create the perfect arc and release point to fling the projectile as far as possible, basically you need a perfect swing arm in order to perfect projectile motion. You also need the ratio of your projectile and counterweight to be proportional to create the maximum amount of velocity and acceleration as possible. If your projectile is not proportional to the counterweight and is only slightly smaller it won't go as far as it would if the projectile was smaller or the counterweight was bigger. You don't want to have projectile that is too light though because it wouldn't cut through the air as well as a heavier projectile would.
Energy is the greatest component to a trebuchet, they entire thing is either kinetic or potential energy the entire time. For out trebuchet you had to hold down the side of our swing arm that the projectile would be launched from and then you would let it go and the counterweight would swing arm down sending the other end upwards to the release point of the projectile. When the trebuchet was just sitting there it had potential energy or simply it had the potential to do something and in our case it had the potential to launch a potato. When we released the longer end of the swing arm the trebuchet had kinetic energy. The counterweight was pulled down by gravity causing the arm to swing forward and the energy from that caused the potato to fly forwards.
b.
In this project we were put in groups by Tina. I was put in a group with two other people, the smallest of all the groups in the grade. We were struggling to stay on task until we started working on the prototype. I worked so hard on it and really felt that we lacked communication on that part until it was brought up and my groups started working with me and asking what they could do to help. We researched different types of trebuchets as a group and that required a lot of critical thinking because one of the requirements for our trebuchet were that our trebuchet had to be from a certain time period (of our choice) and had to look like the trebuchets from that time. Our group chose the very classic version of a trebuchet from the 12th century but without the classic swinging sling, ours was attached.
Near the end of project just before we started building our final trebuchet our group combined with another group because our group was so small and we weren't able to get as much work down as the other groups. We really had to work on collaborating with each other so that we could get our trebuchet done. We spent a lot of time on our trebuchet and didn't mess around too much which was good, that's what you look for in a group; getting work done but still having some fun. Our group was lacking on the creative/artistic part of the project in fact I think most groups just forgot about it. We ended out adding a few crosses to our trebuchet when we realized that it had to represent culture in some way.
c.
I was really challenged with the prototype because I have only built one thing like that in past but that was in sixth grade. It was a small bridge made of balsa wood sticks and wood glue. It wasn't very well made so I was determined to make this one with more care than the other one, I do understand that bridges and trebuchets are very different. I spent all of my class time working on the prototype and just trying to get it to work. it would keep breaking and then I'd have to re-glue it and try again. I had to persevere through a lot of failure in order to get to a point right as our time ran out that it worked enough for it to pass and allow us to move on to building our final trebuchet.
d.
I feel like I brought perseverance to the group because I kept persevering through the many failed attempts or getting the prototype to work. I tried to be a part of the building of our final trebuchet but I didn't start with the experience to really contribute to building something that big. I instead thought about the design of the trebuchet and placed the pieces of wood where they needed to be and then saying where the other pieces would go when people got lost with the design. I felt like I was a valuable member because I really wanted to have the trebuchet finished and I thought that I was an alright group leader and helper when we were short handed. Before this project I had no idea how to use any of the tools that we used but now I can use them with some confidence and could probably build something similar again if need be.
a:
In order to throw a projectile as far as possible with a counterweight trebuchet you need to have the ratio of your swing arm perfected so that you can create the perfect arc and release point to fling the projectile as far as possible, basically you need a perfect swing arm in order to perfect projectile motion. You also need the ratio of your projectile and counterweight to be proportional to create the maximum amount of velocity and acceleration as possible. If your projectile is not proportional to the counterweight and is only slightly smaller it won't go as far as it would if the projectile was smaller or the counterweight was bigger. You don't want to have projectile that is too light though because it wouldn't cut through the air as well as a heavier projectile would.
Energy is the greatest component to a trebuchet, they entire thing is either kinetic or potential energy the entire time. For out trebuchet you had to hold down the side of our swing arm that the projectile would be launched from and then you would let it go and the counterweight would swing arm down sending the other end upwards to the release point of the projectile. When the trebuchet was just sitting there it had potential energy or simply it had the potential to do something and in our case it had the potential to launch a potato. When we released the longer end of the swing arm the trebuchet had kinetic energy. The counterweight was pulled down by gravity causing the arm to swing forward and the energy from that caused the potato to fly forwards.
b.
In this project we were put in groups by Tina. I was put in a group with two other people, the smallest of all the groups in the grade. We were struggling to stay on task until we started working on the prototype. I worked so hard on it and really felt that we lacked communication on that part until it was brought up and my groups started working with me and asking what they could do to help. We researched different types of trebuchets as a group and that required a lot of critical thinking because one of the requirements for our trebuchet were that our trebuchet had to be from a certain time period (of our choice) and had to look like the trebuchets from that time. Our group chose the very classic version of a trebuchet from the 12th century but without the classic swinging sling, ours was attached.
Near the end of project just before we started building our final trebuchet our group combined with another group because our group was so small and we weren't able to get as much work down as the other groups. We really had to work on collaborating with each other so that we could get our trebuchet done. We spent a lot of time on our trebuchet and didn't mess around too much which was good, that's what you look for in a group; getting work done but still having some fun. Our group was lacking on the creative/artistic part of the project in fact I think most groups just forgot about it. We ended out adding a few crosses to our trebuchet when we realized that it had to represent culture in some way.
c.
I was really challenged with the prototype because I have only built one thing like that in past but that was in sixth grade. It was a small bridge made of balsa wood sticks and wood glue. It wasn't very well made so I was determined to make this one with more care than the other one, I do understand that bridges and trebuchets are very different. I spent all of my class time working on the prototype and just trying to get it to work. it would keep breaking and then I'd have to re-glue it and try again. I had to persevere through a lot of failure in order to get to a point right as our time ran out that it worked enough for it to pass and allow us to move on to building our final trebuchet.
d.
I feel like I brought perseverance to the group because I kept persevering through the many failed attempts or getting the prototype to work. I tried to be a part of the building of our final trebuchet but I didn't start with the experience to really contribute to building something that big. I instead thought about the design of the trebuchet and placed the pieces of wood where they needed to be and then saying where the other pieces would go when people got lost with the design. I felt like I was a valuable member because I really wanted to have the trebuchet finished and I thought that I was an alright group leader and helper when we were short handed. Before this project I had no idea how to use any of the tools that we used but now I can use them with some confidence and could probably build something similar again if need be.