Post and lintel construction is nothing new. It has been around for forever and a day, but that still doesn't mean it's not fun to learn about and to play with... especially if you add in a few physics challenges and a little Stonehenge!
Inspired by this great video, we decided to try some of the techniques out ourselves while we attempted to make a post and lintel arch out of mini stone monoliths (garden pavers) without actually picking them up with our hands.
Instead we played around with stone fulcrums and levers...
... wooden wedge sticks and counterweights...
... to raise the stone off the ground little by little...
... and lever arms to see how much easier it would be to move and turn the stone on the ground. First we tried with just the stone, and then we added the lever arms and some sand underneath to reduce friction.
All in all we learned quite a bit about physics and history with this project, and even though we only moved the posts into place completely "hands-free" (we were close with the lintel but in the end we all agreed that some "hand work" was involved in the process...) it was still a lot of fun and a great way to spend a morning!
Happy building!