Hello OJCS students. Today  I am going to tell you about my innovation day project. Our teacher told us to build a medieval castle with a working drawbridge with gears and pulleys. Starting my castle was okay but some parts were a bit harder. Like making the drawbridge, Cutting out the archer holes, and making the actual castle.

Background information about the middle ages

So my medieval castle is a stone castle with a working drawbridge that uses pulleys and gears to move up and down. My castle is mostly made out of cardboard and some other materials. But real castles back then were made from wood and stone and iron and metal. Castles back then also had a lot of traps and and holes for archers. They also had holes on the roof of the entrance so they could pour hot tar or lava (not real lava, I’m talking about very hot materials like melted iron). I choose a stone castle because they are one of the coolest castles in my opinion, The stone castles were also heavily fortified.

In this paragraph I will tell you about some more interesting facts I found during my reading, For instance, To be a Knight you would need to pay for all your things like your Horse and and armor and pole. But if you were a foot soldier you wouldn’t of needed to pay for your axe, bow, arrows, and spear. Another interesting fact is that  if you wanted to be a knight you would need to start training at the age of around 10/11. You would need to leave your family and go to a relative or friend who is willing to teach you. Here is some info about the knights in the middle ages .

Drawbridges

Drawbridges are like normal drawbridges but they can go up and down. The point of a drawbridge is for the King/Lord/Queen/Lady to have a quick escape and even if the enemy starts to follow him/her the drawbridge will go up which will therefore block them letting the King/Lord/Queen/Lady escape. The way a drawbridge would work is by some people spinning something that is lifting the drawbridge. It was pretty hard for the people to lift up the drawbridge but the King didn’t care as long as he lived. Here is a little link to how drawbridges work

 

Hypothesis

For my hypothesis I wanted to make my own pulley. I would then put a string on to the pullet and attach the other side onto the drawbridge which would then pull the drawbridge up or down.

Procedure

Miss M told us to build a working drawbridge so the way I imagined it is a piece of cardboard attached to the drawbridge that can go up and down. So I took some gears and attached it to the walls  on both sides and then took a very long stick/skewer/pole that goes through the gears witch will then be stuck to the gear. Then i will add a crank so I can crank instead of slowly and painfully spinning the gear. Then on the stick/skewer/pole i put two strings and those strings attached two the drawbridge therefore I made a working drawbridge.

here is a link to some info for a stone castle. 

My self reflecting conclusion

My castle sort of turned out how I want it. The drawbridge turned out good but not in the way I wanted it. Next time I would change ho the pulley and gear system works and I would also make my castle smaller because my castle is pretty big. In the end I am happy with my castle but it’s not perfect.

here’s a picture of my castle for now. now It’s black and has a pulley and gear system in the middle.

Here is some more information about pulleys if your are interested 

Here is a video of me explaining how my drawbridge works and how my castle turned out.