Siegecraft 101 OR How to go medieval responsibly

Hello Makers,

This is your formal invitation to join the hallowed ranks of the MakeICT Siege Engineers! There is quite a bit of work to do and a semi short window to do it.

This thread will be the semi-official landing post to keep track of siege weapon prep in the run up before the GPRF (Renfare) at the end of September.

I’m going to set up first in-person meeting for Aug. 25th at 7pm in room 3. During that meeting we’ll set up the targets for the projects and delegate out tasks. I expect going forward from that meeting we’ll schedule some times during the weekend to get back together and build/troubleshoot.

The Plans:
Primary Project - “Stormwind”
This will be a brand new siege cannon operated by air pressure. This should be easily achievable, the challenge will be doing prop work afterwards to make it look like a proper heavy duty field cannon you would see in front of a castle. Main goal of this project is to make a fully functioning air cannon in a medieval style presentation that can be operated safely by two people or less with minimal training.

Secondary Project - Repair/Refit the Ballista
Ideally the cannon will be the primary weapon for MakeICT during combat this year, but we want to do some maintenance and repairs on our standard bearer of The Ballista. She’s needing new strings made up, her torsion ropes replaced, and a redo of the mounting point that attaches her to her cart. Also, since she’s going to be more of a demo peice this year I’d like to make up some non-combat rounds to be fired out. Think along the lines of those screaming nerf footballs. (CAD/3D Printer gurus wanted).

Overachiever Project - “Hedgehog”
If we complete the cannon and get The Ballista in good condition we’ll see where we are and make a THIRD siege weapon, an air powered Watcha. Those that are unfamiliar it is a one-use anti-infantry weapon that it the “To whom it may concern” of weapons. It wouldn’t need to look as fancy as the above two, it’d just need to be able to lauch one volley of multiple wet floof balls in the general direction of the “enemy” once.

“Are You MAD!?” Project - (insert cool name here)
We make all siege engineers “staves” that have one charge of air and floof ball. We wait. We strike.

If any of this interests you please join me at the space on Monday.

I remember last fair that you wanted to make an Flemish String Jig and a Tillering Stick.

Imagining the porcupine looks like a giant popsicle stick and rubber band catapult :slight_smile:

Yeah the string jig will definitely be on the todo list.

Gave the tour group something to watch last night and took pot shots at the garden lead.

Our next meeting to start building is Monday Sept. 1st at 1pm.

Here’s the Photo of the board from last night.

Long Barrel Cannon Test Shot

Sorry for delayed update.
Prototype air cannon worked like a charm. We tested it under pressures from 60 to 120psi, short and long barrel, and ammo that included large and small floof balls and small rubber chickens. Ideal firing for distance, so far, is 120psi firing three small balls from a long barrel. Next step is to take the prototype and start making it look less like plumbing and more like a cannon.

Next meeting will be Sunday Sep. 7 at 10am. We’ll try to get as much done as possible and gauge from there if we need to meet more often before fare.

EDIT: I’ve come down with a bug so i won’t be there today. My apologies. There is a pine board in the lounge for the flemish twist jig if somebody wants to do some precision wood drilling. Link to plan here

Untitled Document.

Hope you get better.

I was down there earlier, but didn’t see anyone in the area, and having missed meetings before didn’t want to mess it up, so didn’t work on it.

I got here at 11:45ish and started airing out the lounge and thought I got the time wrong.