Smashing Pumpkins

Happy day-after-Halloween, everyone!

Halloween: The one day where giving candy to other people’s kids is
not only acceptable, but the preferred method of communication.

I guess I don't have to tell you that, as a physicist, I love shooting things into the air. For this reason, Halloween is one of my favorite holidays; it gives me a chance to watch pumpkin chucking. For any of you who are unfamiliar with the process, this is the breakdown:

1. Get a pumpkin.

2. Make a device that throws the pumpkin.

3. Throw the pumpkin using the device.

To be clear, when I say ‘throw’, I mean ‘fling as far into the air as physically possible to watch it explode into the ground’. A good time is had by all, I can assure you. And if you’re wondering how many ways one can throw a pumpkin… well, wonder no more.

CATAPULTS! - This is just like a slingshot; put the pumpkin in a sling, pull back the sling, and let go. The elastic energy from the sling transfers to the pumpkin, sending it into the air at the force dictated by the elasticity. It's probably the most basic form of pumpkin chunking, and easily done at home, provided you have a bungee cord. 

TREBUCHETS! - These are best described as more advanced catapults. Instead of elastic energy, it uses the momentum of the weight on the bottom half of the trebuchet, and uses that to fling the pumpkin on the top half. In physical terms, a trebuchet utilizes the fact that the velocity of an object is faster on the outside of a circular path than the inside of that same path. This difference in velocity means that even if you have a relatively slow-moving weight, you can have a fast pumpkin. Check out the video for what I mean. 

FLAMING TREBUCHETS! - Like a trebuchet, just everything's on fire. 

AIR CANNONS! - This is basically a gun. The amount of engineering that goes into these things is, surprisingly, quite a bit. You want to make the pressure in the gun strong enough to shoot the pumpkin as far as possible, but light enough that the pumpkin just doesn't explode in the barrel. They're intense, I assure you.

Have fun! And remember, these are professional chunkers. If attempting to chunk yourself: safety glasses.

And just for kicks, and to experience how awesome trebuchets are: