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Illinois Tech Robotics, Society of Physics Students take
home top prizes at 11th annual BMES Pumpkin Launch

Kori Bowns
EDITOR-IN-CHIEF

Illinois Tech’s Pumpkin Launch,
hosted for the past 11 years by IIT’s Biomedical
Engineering Society (BMES) student
organization, is a popular event that attracts
hundreds of spectators, including IIT students,
family members, staff, faculty, and alumni, as
well as members of the local community and
media, to Ed Glancy Field each yearl In order
to compete in Pumpkin Launch, teams of
students across a variety of disciplines build
machines that throw pumpkins across our
university’s baseball field This year’s Pumpkin
Launch event took place on Saturday, October
171

Each launcher designed for the
competition had to adhere to a variety of rules
set forth by BMES and others overseeing the
competition The launchers had maximum
total height limits and height limits for any
counterweight used to launch the pumpkin,
as well as limits on the types of propulsion
that could be used Several safety regulations
were also included as rules to the competition;
students had to be able to operate their device
from a safe distance and the launchers were
inspected prior to launching by two faculty
advisors for the event, Professor Carlo Segre
and Professor Derek Kamperl

After weeks of preparing, five

launchers lined up along the first baseline
of Ed Glancy Field on Saturday morning, all
hoping to take home some of the prizes offered
by BMESI Three different types of awards were

up for grabs at this year’s launch The distance
and accuracy competitions have been a part of
IIT’s pumpkin launch for several years Teams
win the distance competition by launching
the pumpkin furthest and win the accuracy
competition by being able to most accurately
guess the distance of their launchesl A third
award, the Crowd Favorite award, returned for
athird year after its debut in the 2013 Pumpkin
Launchl During the event, spectators voted on
their favorite launcher, and the launcher with
the most votes was the winnerl

The competition was also one of
several events that are a part of the Office of
Campus Life’s IIT Family Weekend as well as a
Freshman 15 event, one of a collection of events
that the Office of Campus Life encourages all
firsteyear students to attend

Early on Saturday morning, the
five launchers were in place and teams were
working on some finishing touches and last,
minute testingl Before the competition began,
several activities were underway to entertain
spectatorsl IIT’s Residence Hall Association
hosted pumpkin carving, and many food
trucks had arrived to campus so spectators
could grab lunch prior to the event

The five teams that competed in this
year’s event each designed a different type of
machine aiming to launch pumpkins as far
as possible across the baseball field The first
team stationed on the first baseline was a team
comprised primarily of IIT alumni, calling
their team “Meow" and their launcher the
“Kitty Catapult," a floating axel King Arthur
trebuchetl The next team was a collection of

students from IIT’s Society of Physics Students
organization, their launcher was powered by
a collection of 12 large springs and named
“Celebratory Gourd Relocation Engine,"
shortened CeGRE, alluding to the student
organization’s advisor, Professor Carlo Segrel
Phi Kappa Sigma fraternity was the next
launcher up the first baseline; their trebuchet
Skullcrusher III was an adaptation of their
machine that won second place for distance
last yearl The last two launchers on the field
were built by student organization Illinois
Tech Robotics (ITR) Their first launcher
was an onager, a type of catapult that uses
twisted rope to store energy for launching the
pumpkin Their second launcher, Mach III,
was the third iteration of a powered rotating
arm launcher that won the organization first
place in accuracy at the 2013 competition and
first place in distance at the 2014 competition

At 1 pm, the launches beganl This
year, the pumpkins being launched were spray
painted pink by students from Colleges Against
Cancer to promote awareness for breast cancer
research Each team got three official launches
to try to throw their pumpkins as far and as
close to their estimates as possible

At the conclusion of the launches,
ITR’s Mach III was the distance winner, with
a furthest launch distance of 227 feet The
second and third place winners went to ITR’s
Onager and alumni team Meow with distances
of 65 feet and 43 feet respectively

The first place accuracy award went
to Society of Physics Students’ CeGRE; the
organization estimated that they would launch

seven feet and one of their launches met this
estimate perfectly The second place award
went to ITR’s Onager; the students on the team
estimated they would launch 25 feet, and one
of their launches reached 11 feet, a difference
of 14 feet ITR’s Mach III won the third place
accuracy award The team estimated a launch
distance of 300 feet, and their furthest launch
0f227 feet resulted in a difference 0f73 feetl

Lastly, the Crowd Favorite award
went to alumni team Meow With a smaller
number of launchers than usual, this year’s
pumpkin launch event was still very successful
The small number of launchers resulted in
a better viewing experience for spectators,
who were able to line up along the third
baseline instead of their view being blocked by
additional launchers like in previous years The
launchers involved in this year’s competitions
were also varied and creative, each launcher
had a very different design and only two of the
five launchers were the traditional trebuchet
usually seen at pumpkin launch

The event concluded with University
President Alan Cramb loading a final pumpkin
into Mach III, which slipped through
the machine’s holding mechanism and
spectacularly flew backwards nearly 200 feet
as the launcher gained speed in preparation
for launch After a few additional exhibition
launches, high school students invited to the
event by BMES met with members of ITR to
discuss the physics and engineering behind
building the launching machinesl

 

Photos by Kevin Zheng