Physics: Mechanical Energy and Rolling Objects

A war-wolf, or trebuchet, is a device used during the Middle Ages to throw rocks at castles and now sometimes used to fling pumpkins and pianos. A simple trebuchet is shown in the figure below. Model it as a stiff rod of negligible mass 3.00 m long and joining particles of mass m1 = 0.120 kg  and m2 = 51.5 kg at its ends. It can turn on a frictionless horizontal axle perpendicular to the rod and 15.0 cm from the particle of larger mass. The rod is released from rest in a horizontal orientation. Find the maximum speed that the object of smaller mass attains when it leaves the trebuchet horizontally. image.jpg