Engineers and Pumpkins

[carpenma]

So, the time of year for carving pumpkins is upon us. Today my family took part in this yearly event. When my Dad took out his reciprocating saw (we used a power drill last year and next year we're gonna use a CNC mill ) to form his pumpkin I got to thinking what other interesting things can happen when you mix pumpkins with engineers? Anyone have any interesting stories or comments concerning this?

[Trying to Help]

Here, they fling pumpkins with a large trebuchet. www.yankeesiege.com

Trying to Help

At my work we're planning a pumpkin carving machine that takes a .jpg in black and white and carves it out with a dremel on an arm. I'll throw a picture up here once we finish it.

[Greg Needel]

I saw this blog last year do a cnc picture carve thought it would aways be fun to do it. http://lumenlab.com/2008/10/pumpkin/

[Adama]

Dremel carving. Its a bit messy but very precise and easy. Just use the drywall plunge cutter.

[Andrew Schreiber]

Originally Posted by Adama

Dremel carving. Its a bit messy but very precise and easy. Just use the drywall plunge cutter.

Yeah, be prepared to clean your ceilings, your walls, and your cat.

[DUCKIE]

The World Championship Punkin' Chunkin' (based right here in Delaware) is still my favorite.

For those not in the know.... the competition has a few different types of Chunkers.
-Air Cannons
-Centrifugal
-Catapults
-Trebuchets
-Human Powered
-Torsion

Teams are going for distance.
Pumpkins that disintegrate before leaving the barrel do not count.

[EricH]

A few weeks ago, some engineering students at my school were given standard trebuchets (with certain allowed modifications) and the challenge:

Hit a tractor tire at a certain distance. The "victims" were about the size of two fists.

Some pumpkins survived... the ones that weren't shot.

[dlavery]

This is still my very favorite.






.

[Cory]

That is unreal, Dave.

Someone must have spent days making that.

[Carol]

Originally Posted by DUCKY

The World Championship Punkin' Chunkin' (based right here in Delaware) is still my favorite.

For those not in the know.... the competition has a few different types of Chunkers.
-Air Cannons
-Centrifugal
-Catapults
-Trebuchets
-Human Powered
-Torsion

Teams are going for distance.
Pumpkins that disintegrate before leaving the barrel do not count.

Andrea's right - this event is amazing. The winner last year shot their pumpkin 4483.51 feet. (Probably with an air cannon)

Last year a couple of MOE students took 2nd place wiith their school machine in the youth trebuchet division, flinging their pumpkin 694.06 feet.

http://www.punkinchunkin.com/