Have you ever sat down and thought “I wonder if a trebuchet could launch a projectile at supersonic speeds?” Neither have we. That’s what separates [David Eade] from the rest of u… ...

Watch a team of carpenters, framers, engineers, and historians recreate a medieval throwing machine called a trebuchet.

A trebuchet has a lever arm with a large, heavy counterweight on one end and a smaller projectile on the other end. When the counterweight is raised up, it has lots of gravitational potential energy.

Lastly, for a given weight of stone, the trebuchet has a longer range. The big ones there, of course, are the maximum projectile weight and range.