Didn't sleep much the previous night so the whole event was
a bit of a caffeine induced blur.
My friend Theresa managed to get all my matches on video (and a handful of
others). I'll be posting some of it online once I get it captured.
Passed weigh in without a problem. The safety official OK'd me - but
seemed a bit worried about my weapon's control system / lack thereof (I suspect
there may be some 'clarifications' in the rules before the next tournament).
The bots I fought were generally tougher than I anticipated. Part of this
is because of the "double elimination" system they were using -
winning bots go on to fight other winning bots, while the losers fought other
losers. There were 16 bots total.
Arrogant Bastard turned out to be very popular with the kids - during at least
one of the judgings a number of 9-12 year olds were yelling "Arrogant
Bastard!". I'm sure their parents loved this. The announcer
eventually took to referring to my bot as "Arrogant B"
The battlebox is about 6x6x4ft with lexan shielding. Someone thought it
would be a great idea to put a couple nerf balls in the arena. Arrogant
Bastard inadvertently shredded these on numerous occassions making quite a
mess.
SpamButcher combat robotics is made possible by the SpamButcher spam blocker.
First fight - Micro Maggot. I was worried about this one - a pretty
sturdy flip bot. He managed to get underneath me and took me to the
killsaw - but I got about three good hits on him and took out his drive system
- scoring a knock out. Turns out I'd mangled his servo's pretty bad and
he wasn't able to compete again.
Second fight - Nut Cracker. Thwack/spin bot - put up a pretty tough
fight. The judges gave me the victory.
Third fight - I Lash. Another thwack/spin bot. Very
tough/hyperactive.
Had a number of problems throughout the fight - bits of nerf ball
were getting lodged under the bot causing me to lose steering. More concerning
was that towards the end of the match I seemed to lose about half the power to
the drive wheels - with all the nerf I was worried I might end up stuck .
This one also went to the judges. I was very concerned after the fight
that I'd lost it - but the judges gave it to me.
I only had about 15 minutes until the next fight to attempt to correct the
drive system problem. I had a replacement rear-end - but getting it
installed in time would've been risky. Ended up bypassing some diodes I'd
wired in to cut power using a gator clip. The fix worked and held up
through the rest of the tournament.
Fourth fight - Rat Amock. Very different bot design - has a flipping
mechanism powered by a rat trap (the idea had actually occured to me earlier in
the day). I was doing pretty well in this fight - until I ran over the
kill saw. I got thrown across the ring and landed upside down.
Unfortunately the blade motor isn't nearly torquey enough to flip the bot back
over - I was KO'd.
Fifth fight - I Lash (again). Very similar to the first fight.
About 2/3rds the way through I got stuck on the spike strip - and looked to be
out of commission. In a sporting move I myself would not have committed -
I Lash knocked me free. After reviewing this fight on video - I think I
probably should''ve have won it - but the judges thought otherwise (I can only
speculate if they factored in I Lash's save)
The Final Results:
First Place: Rat Amock
Second Place: I Lash
---Third Place: Arrogant Bastard---
No "giant nut" - but I did get $16. Quite happy with the way
everything turned out (the Bastard is only slightly humbled by not taking 1st as
planned).