Catapult kit revelation

Here at Oakland Ballistics, we have been working on a catapult kit to compliment our trebuchet kit. I spend some time designing it and I was unhappy with the distance. Comparing it to other kits the distance was roughly equal but I still wasn’t happy. Then I saw a design that had a very simple “cup” but it launched much farther. Many other elements were different but I surmised that the cup design might be the key.

In these pictures you can see the more traditional, cup design then the other, simpler, cut-out design. The simpler design, changing nothing else, almost doubled the distance. I found this to be very interesting and I love it.

In my opinion, the difference is in the release. The more complicated cup holds the projectile in longer and thus has a lower trajectory where the simpler design allows for the projectile to leave the arm earlier.

Sure there is the weight issue but I don’t think that accounts for much of the difference in distance.

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