Battlebots IQ 2006! *picture intensive*

[slade]

Good luck slade - wish i could see things go down. This will be the first time i havent had some sort of robotics competition since i was seven

The nightmare demonstration was very cool. It is amazing how huge the disk is.

Er, well... Kick some ***. Pound falcon to a nasty mess on the floor. If not in the box, than out of it on your own time when nobody is looking.

i thought if a bot wins two years in a row it cant be registered again? oh well, im sure team whyach... err, falcon will come up with a new bot. and sure, ill knock it into the floor for you

[WenULiVeUdiE]

thatd be cool if you did get into battlebots itd be nice to see you at a tournament sometime. next year, maybe? would you be doing battlebots or battlebots IQ (highschool and college)?

yeah, there is a monetary limit. the limit is the ammount of cash that you can round up from sponsors. technically you could go over that but i wouldnt really recommend it

my school did first a while ago, but we dont have the cash for it. its $6000 to enter, and this year we had $7000 total. if we factor in team shirts, shipping costs, repairs, etc. we'd go over budget. I have about *looks at spreadsheet* $2,148.97 invested in this one bot out of the team budget (many parts were reused from last year and raytheon/remmele paid for the titanium) the other bot only cost us a few hundred dollars in steel since almost everything was reused from last year, and the rest went to our other team expenses.

does it count that the previous night i was at school until 11 PM, went to sleep when i got home, woke up at 3 AM to write a philosophy essay, went to school, took a nap in a shipping crate, and then worked until midnight? i would have slept at school a few times but i wasnt really allowed to, and we arent cool enough to have a warehouse ..

Yeah, I'd say that's close enough.

That's cheaper than I thought. Hell, J&J spent close to $100,000 this season when every possible aspect is included. For the actual robot, without labor, $15,000?

I am definately going to speak with a few of the engineers and machinists and see what they think. This would be an awesome summer project. We're a high school team, so just Battlebots I guess? I really have no idea about the league.

FIRST isnt as much about being cool as it is about teaching students. Sure, if there were little to no limitations I could have a pneumatic shooting robot. But that's not much a challenge. Instead, with all of these limitations we are forced to be engineers and come up with valid designs in an insanely short period of time.

Slade, did you attend the Boston FIRST Regional? I remember you said you may take a trip to it with your team.

[sniper1rfa]

I disagree - i don't think you learn as much in FIRST, which is why i don't like it as much. I was looking at it from that standpoint, not how much i enjoyed competing. I like building any robot. :P


See, the thing about first (or was, anyway, don't know about now) was that you were GIVEN a lot of the stuff (you have to buy a kit, right?), and so got no choice in parts selection or anything. In BBIQ, you buy everything yourself. You get more interaction with suppliers, you get more control over what parts fit your application and budget, and just generally have to do more to do. It has more real-world design elements, IMO. Thats why we swiched away from FIRST. Hell, thats why we got the ball rolling to form BBIQ. The only limitations in BBIQ are the controllers (for safety reasons). And you still gotta program the thing. The only thing i like more about FIRST is the time limit - it does teach you about deadlines.

Making a battlebot is by no means easy. At all. Don't even think it. Making a robot that does something is easy (like our spoof robot code-named Full on Robot Chubby), however making something that is at all competitive is very very hard.

[slade]

I am definately going to speak with a few of the engineers and machinists and see what they think. This would be an awesome summer project. We're a high school team, so just Battlebots I guess? I really have no idea about the league.

youd probably want to be in battlebots IQ, which for me is next week. battlebots isnt a school thing, its the version thats been aired on TV.

our bot didnt cost all that much because the electronics and pneumatics were reused and we got so much from methods, raytheon and remmele. we just had to pay for the steel stock and a bunch of other small things.

[WenULiVeUdiE]

I disagree - i don't think you learn as much in FIRST, which is why i don't like it as much. I was looking at it from that standpoint, not how much i enjoyed competing. I like building any robot. :P


See, the thing about first (or was, anyway, don't know about now) was that you were GIVEN a lot of the stuff (you have to buy a kit, right?), and so got no choice in parts selection or anything. In BBIQ, you buy everything yourself. You get more interaction with suppliers, you get more control over what parts fit your application and budget, and just generally have to do more to do. It has more real-world design elements, IMO. Thats why we swiched away from FIRST. Hell, thats why we got the ball rolling to form BBIQ. The only limitations in BBIQ are the controllers (for safety reasons). And you still gotta program the thing. The only thing i like more about FIRST is the time limit - it does teach you about time limits.

Making a battlebot is by no means easy. At all. Don't even think it. Making a robot that does something is easy (like our spoof robot code-named Full on Robot Chubby), however making something that is at all competitive is very very hard.

When we are given the kit of parts, we are limited to using the included motors as well as limitations on pneumatics. By doing so, we are able to design a machine under restrictions that real engineers may face. It also makes it easier for FIRST to regulate robots, safety, etc. However, I do understand your point. And I guess I can not form a proper opinion on this until I try out BBIQ.

As far as it being competitive- I somewhat disagree. The way my team works is in a way that captures competitiveness and allows it to thrive. Sure, we love to build the robot. But we also love the competition: its positives and negatives. Also, on my team building the robot is, with the aforementioned limitations, quite a difficult task. Now I do not mean to debate which league is better or anything of that sort, as that would just be silly. So I will stop where I am so I do not take it too far...or something.

As far as the part kits go- We are limited on what motors we may use as well as limitations in pneumatics. Other than that, it is what ever you please. We are currently designing a custom transmission as well as drive train that includes driveshafts. Quite frankly, we hate the parts kits, as well. It also really helps with the 6 week deadline. Without the kit, most teams would be dead i nthe water.

Again, I am not trying to get into a debate. That's not fun, just silly.

[slade]

When we are given the kit of parts, we are limited to using the included motors as well as limitations on pneumatics. By doing so, we are able to design a machine under restrictions that real engineers may face. It also makes it easier for FIRST to regulate robots, safety, etc. However, I do understand your point. And I guess I can not form a proper opinion on this until I try out BBIQ.

As far as it being competitive- I somewhat disagree. The way my team works is in a way that captures competitiveness and allows it to thrive. Sure, we love to build the robot. But we also love the competition: its positives and negatives. Also, on my team building the robot is, with the aforementioned limitations, quite a difficult task. Now I do not mean to debate which league is better or anything of that sort, as that would just be silly. So I will stop where I am so I do not take it too far...or something.

As far as the part kits go- We are limited on what motors we may use as well as limitations in pneumatics. Other than that, it is what ever you please. We are currently designing a custom transmission as well as drive train that includes driveshafts. Quite frankly, we hate the parts kits, as well. It also really helps with the 6 week deadline. Without the kit, most teams would be dead i nthe water.

Again, I am not trying to get into a debate. That's not fun, just silly.

well, im at least glad that youre civil and rational about everything, and open minded. a girl im friends with was interested in starting a robotics club at her school so she talked to a girl about both FIRST and BBIQ, and the girl essentially said everyone in FIRST hates battlebots, and she said FIRST is "the real thing". i just laughed. neither FIRST nor BBIQ is "the real thing", its a robotics competition, thats all. as both of you have shown there are positive and negative aspects of both, and neither is necessarily better. battlebots is more open ended and less time restricted, whereas FIRST has parts kits but varying goals and more restricted time. you really need what both teaches, and if you want to argue which prepares you better for engineering, then you should just quit both and (gasp) go straight to a job in engineering. just do whichever you like and whichever you can. i sort of have to do battlebots, first because of the money issue but also because, well, i dont exactly have much of a team. battlebots has the same challenge every year (albeit, with many ways to approach it) so i have plenty of time to think and plan things out so ill be able to make the bot myself in time for the competition. if i was in first, well, id be pretty much screwed when my team abandons me, the time limit is a bit too much for one person, a few engineers and occasional help.

theres no point in criticizing either FIRST or BBIQ (although FIRST vex is fair game, and ridicule of it should even be encouraged)

[WenULiVeUdiE]

well, im at least glad that youre civil and rational about everything, and open minded. a girl im friends with was interested in starting a robotics club at her school so she talked to a girl about both FIRST and BBIQ, and the girl essentially said everyone in FIRST hates battlebots, and she said FIRST is "the real thing". i just laughed.

Thank you.

I'm laughing with you. We all love Battlebots! We are so damn jealous of you guys. In order to get out fair share of violence we need ro rag on the lower, more annoying members.

Both programs are awesome in their own aspects. Both encourage engineering, albeit they go about in some what different ways. I say just build a robot and get on with life!

[sniper1rfa]

You should have played FIRST with us way back in the day.

why?

Flipping was legal.

Its not first vex that is lame... its LEGO FIRST robotics. LEGOs are really fun to play with. Lego mindstorms are super lame. :P

[slade]

You should have played FIRST with us way back in the day.

why?

Flipping was legal.

Its not first vex that is lame... its LEGO FIRST robotics. LEGOs are really fun to play with. Lego mindstorms are super lame. :P

hah, yeah, thats another thing, whats up with not being able to sabotage other teams? wheres the fun in that?

agreed on mindstorms i had a class in "robotics programming" which was based entirely on mindstorms. waaaaay too easy and rather mind numbing. fortunately, once it ended last semester i dropped the course that was going to replace it and instead took an independent study in CNC machining

[slade]

okay, time for my update.

i got back from the competition monday morning at 2 am, got a few hours of sleep, and then had to go to school >.< now i finally have time to post this, as all my makeup work isnt important. who cares about grades, college and the SAT?

when i got to the competition, the first thing i noticed was... damn, there are girls here! not too common for a robotics competition. there were two all girls teams last year, but this year about half the teams were all girls. there were 13 teams just from an all girls catholic school in miami.



the competition didnt go nearly as well as it should have. there were far too many electronics issues (the IFI isaac 16 motherboard sucked) and the organization wasnt great. first of all, i have a pneumatic bot, and they had this rule where i have to get an orange sticker put on the tank specifying the max fill pressure with an authorized signature. so i had to run around finding the person to do that, and guess what? he just checked to make sure the label said "3000 PSI", which all paintball tanks can hold. he didnt even check the hydro date on the tank.

after we passed the safety inspection and the functional testing, we asked if we could get some time to test the bot and then charge the batteries before the competition started. they said sure, no problem, put your bot name and pit number down on the list, and we'll come to your staging area to get you. so we waited the rest of the day, which was all testing, they didnt get us, they said we could test the next day. our team's other bot used the chargers overnight. the next day they finished testing. we looked at the schedules they posted up and they said we were the 11th match of the day. they still didnt get us. then we hear theyre starting the competition, and then we hear them call our bot to go up to the arena... what?? i run over and ask someone whats going on, they say we're now listed as the second match. i ask them what the heck happened to giving us time to test and charge batteries, and she just said "well, you have 2 postponements for the tournament... you can use one if you want". okay, screw it, i ask to use one. they say we still dont have time to test the bot so we can only charge the batteries. we hook everything up and go back, they say they didnt postpone our match, they just switched us with another bot thats going round 3. so we got postponed only one match, and they switched the bot we're going against? it says in the rules that if you postpone you just postpone the match, not switch the bots around. whatever, forget it. so we get a wonderful 10 minutes of charging time, put the bot back together, and go back to the arena, to find out that dark angel, the bot we are now going against, wants to postpone. a little while ago they shorted out their batteries and their whole bot went up in smoke. so we finished charging the batteries, then sat around for a day again with nothing to do, and we had to have our match the following morning. on the plus side, i had plenty of time to go around taking pictures. the link is at the bottom of this post.

when we finally went, we won the match without too much of an issue. they had to solder 4 battery packs together and charge them. only two of the battery packs were working and they had half a charge. their spinner wasnt working so they could only drive. we flipped them 3 times (since they could drive upside down) and eventually the connection to their batteries came loose so we won. our IFI had a few issues and occasionally the bot wouldnt respond well, but besides that it was fine.

a little while after the match two of the girls came over to me and gave me two boxes of brownies. they said thanks for delaying the match for them. ?... oh well, score. dark angel = awesome.



since we went the second day instead of the first, our next match came up quickly. we really only had time to charge our batteries. we went up against a hydrolic claw bot, called nipper. we ended up flipping them and they couldnt do anything upside down, so we won. however our bot had HORRIBLE control. the IFI had issues, it kept resetting during the match so we really couldnt do much. one time it turned off when we were under one of our own hammer, and we had to hit our bot with our own hammer to turn it back on... and it actually worked. score.

after the match we found out that, well, the IFI was messed up. if we hit the bot, even tapped the skirt, the IFI would reset. which means we would loose control for about 3 seconds. also, there was about a 2 second delay between pressing the button and the arm firing... not good. we moved the IFI to make sure it wasnt recieving interference from the motors, servos or wires, and then went through all the connections, soldering, crimping, and loctiting everything possible to make sure there wasnt anything loose.

next day, next match. spinal tap. great. theyre a good bot with a great (experienced) driver, and essentially 120 pounds all in 4 motors and wheels, with a steel frame. they just push the other bot around. we figured we'd be okay with the skirt, and, well, we were right. i was driving and the bot actually responded fine. i flipped them once, then used the arm to clamp their bot down. they got us to the hammer once which broke a bolt on the skirt, dented our arm, and dented the lexan, but besides that we appeared to be fine. i then drove them to a hammer which knocked out their electronics, so we won.

i had to saw and re-weld the arm since it was damaged from the hammer, and switch out the bolt on the skirt. between that and filling the tank and charging the batteries, we didnt have too much time. we still had a bit of time to spare, and we were going up against a mediocre wedge so we didnt have much to worry about. when we got to the arena they asked for a postponement since they messed something or other up, and we granted it. we took the top off, refilled the tank, etc (you have to purge it every time you leave the arena, the rules are far too strict) and waited around for a bit until they were ready. we were the last match of the day. when we got to the arena, we found out that we couldnt drive well. great. i went in and checked everything, and aparently our skirt was slightly bent from the match with spinal tap, and now the bolts were touching it. i couldnt ask for a postponement because we had just postponed the match for the other team. i got a wrench and loosened the bolts to allow the skirt some more movement, and it responded a bit better... the match started. the bot didnt really move. it moved a bit, but kept getting stuck. eventually it got completely stuck without the other bot even doing anything, and they won through default. i wasnt too happy.

the next day we had the first match of the day, so we had to wake up at 5:30 to get there in time to do repairs before it. we looked the bot over and found out that one of the servos was disabled, a cable loosened a bit from the match with spinal tap, just enough so that it still responded during the match and then lost the connection while we were transporting the bot, so the complete right half of the drive train wasnt working. on top of that, a set screw on the back left motor came off, and the key fell out... again, during transportation. so we had one wheel that was actually functional on the entire bot, the front left wheel. wonderful >.< i spent a while on repairs to get the bot functional for the match.

i took a look at the bot we were going up against... great. not good. they were a full bodied spinner that was low to the ground and fairly compact... and had a 40 pound, 1/2" thick titanium shell with 1" x 1/2" x 3" teeth. damn. they had 4 magmotors powering the spinner. according to them it spun with a linear velocity of 400 MPH and put out 150 horsepower. which, now that i think about it, seems a bit excessive considering each of the 4 motors puts out 3 horsepower, but whatever. its still 4 magmotors on a 40 pound spinner, falcon had only 2. the only way to beat them is to flip them, but hey, thats what our bot is designed to do, right?

after fixing everything, we tested the bot in the testing box. it drove fine. score. we loctited everything, charged the batteries, filled the tank, etc. we got to the arena, tested the bot, it was fine... the match started. the bot didnt really move. it moved forward, then stopped. damn IFI. i tried to turn, it turned, stopped. turned again. i got the bot over near them, tried to fire the arm... it didnt fire. they hit us, scraped up the skirt a bit. i tried to move the bot again, the IFI reset. tried to fire the arm, it didnt fire. they hit us again, broke a weld and bent part of the skirt. since our bot was still (sort of) moving they just kept hitting us over and over... it didnt really go well. if i could just get one flip off we would beat them, but it just wouldnt work. some times the arm wouldnt fire, sometimes there would be a 3 second delay. eventually i just tapped out, at the point where i was afraid of the internals of the bot taking damage. they tore the titanium skirt apart. if the bot was actually working, we could have had a chance at winning...



after the match, my advisor and teammates did a bit of research and found out that the other team wasnt really legitimate. to enter the competition you have to be associated with a school, you have to be a school team. every team member has to go to the same school and school organized club/class. aparently, the team was a guy who built robots professionally in his own machine shop, his son, and his sons friends. the school they entered as didnt have a robotics team and didnt even have a machine shop. also, the rules state that a spinner must spin down to a stop within 30 seconds, theirs took about a minute and a half... but whatever. they had a good bot, its better than losing to that damn wedge.

oh well, the competition was overall okay. last year we had a worse bot, but it had far less stupid issues. dark angel also had issues with the IFI, and a few other bots did too. next year we're switching to spektrum controllers, which will be much better. this year was the first year they got rid of the IFI requirements since IFI discontinued their motherboards (which we had to tell battlebots, after we called IFI and found that out... our motherboard was broken and we had to send it back twice, and it STILL didnt work right). they didnt change the requirements soon enough for us to really put much thought into changing, especially because i was really the only one working. the spektrum controllers are smaller, cheaper, lighter, and supposedly dont recieve any interferance from motors or wires, and are more shock resistant. they are supposed to never lose a signal and not reset... score.

as far as the bots, each year there are very few bots that i think are actually good. there were maybe 50 bots total in the large division.

the bots that impressed me last year:

greenwave. paul is awesome, he designed and built the entire thing himself. it took second place and got the well deserved award for best engineered. everything fit perfectly, it was low to the ground, compact, and effective.

falcon, of course (although it wasnt built by the kids)

alakran (college) - it was a pneumatic clamp and lifter bot, it would clamp the other bot, and then lift it/flip it over on top of itself, and drive around with it. so cool. it was great.

spiderbot - full bodied spinner, it was amazingly effective when it went against carnegie mellon, it threw carnegie 10 feet high and it bounced off two walls before hitting the ground. so awesome.

this year:

brutality (college). paul is still awesome. he made essentially the same bot as greenwave, but smaller and more compact. he used the spektrum motherboard, which was a great choice. he had one huge spinner motor, and the drive motors were just 4 dewalt drill motors. guess what? he took 1st place in the college division, and half the matches he didnt even turn his spinner on. he just used his bot as a wedge to push the other bot around, it was so amazingly effective.

accelerator 3 (the full bodied spinner that beat us) even though i question the involvement of the students. it was still a nice bot.

titanium knights, they had a wedge with two sawblades and a drum bot. they were nice and well made, with good control and good drivers, but nothing special.

there was one very nice drum minibot that was very effective, cant remember what it was.

the 4 mechanical engineers at raytheon were so certain when i was talking to them that 1/8" titanium would be fine and nearly indestructable for the competition. from what i heard, they were sitting slackjawed during our last match... hey, if 1/8" titanium and 1/2" titanium teeth meet at high velocities, the 1/2" wins.

oh, and nightmare was there as a demo bot, the guy who built it was a judge. he also had a mini 1 pound nightmare.

noteworthy matches:

brutality vs. lunatic

brutality is a horizontal blade spinner, lunatic is a nightmare knockoff. brutality is so low, and it just sideswiped lunatic and knocked it clear into the air and on its back. they had a second match eventually, and the same thing happened.

pneumagic vs. spinal tap

hey, our bot actually worked!

(insert bot name here) vs. icewave

icewave is last years college champion. they are a horizontal spinner like brutality, but they have a gas engine that sits above the blade, so theyre sorta top heavy. their blade got bent, they spun out of control, the blade hit the ground, and they did two full flips in the air, a few twists, and landed upside down. watching the slow motion replay was awesome.

press coverage:

dark angel was on the front page of the miami herald, and our team's other bot (the brick) was mentioned in the article. it was sort of funny, the writer didnt know anything about battlebots, and really felt the need to draw attention to the catholic schoolgirls. and in the airport on the way home i caught 30 seconds of a mini bot match on the news, although there may have been more.

oh yeah, a few notable random pictures:


smoke!


/porch!


team "pretty in pink" (yes, it was an all girls team) made these stickers to give out to the teams they beat. they never got a chance to give one out. i laughed. two years ago they couldnt get their bot working, and someone from my team had to help them fix it. the same happened this year. except for my team helping to fix it. they didnt pass inspection, and didnt have a single match.

http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g197/sla...61/IMG_0258.jpg

http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g197/sla...61/IMG_0237.jpg

titanium knights. they had 2 bots (in case you cant count)


that full bodied spinner did exceptionally well, even though its nothing special. hey, if you have 13 girls teams from one school, one has to do well, right?


internet phenomenon, anyone?


brutality

http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g197/sla...61/IMG_0271.jpg

icewave

http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g197/sla...61/IMG_0253.jpg

second place minibot... i dont have pics of the drum.

http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g197/sla...61/IMG_0247.jpg

nightmare

http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g197/sla...61/IMG_0205.jpg

the only other decent flipper ive ever seen at battlebots. it was a 4 bar flipper like ours, except more compact, and it didnt have skirts (which probably would have helped it a lot)

http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g1...1/IMG_0217.jpg
my bot

http://i56.photobucket.com/albums/g1...1/IMG_0199.jpg
our other bot

all my photos and a few videos:
http://s56.photobucket.com/albums/g197/slade6061/

a few of the pictures are blurry, i had my camera on the wrong settings.

[billybob_81067]

Damn... some of those robo-babes look pretty hawt!

[Checkmate]

I stumbled upon this post recently and I noticed a few inconsistencies in your post.. I guess I'll just quote them and then correct them and or comment.

the competition didnt go nearly as well as it should have. there were far too many electronics issues (the IFI isaac 16 motherboard sucked) and the organization wasnt great. ....

There isn't much wrong with IFI. Either you use it right or you don't use it right. I've been using IFI for over 5 years now including F.I.R.S.T and BBIQ. This is actually the first year we used anything different. (IE: The Spektrum DX6 w/ BR6000 bot receiver). We used it though due to size issues. If you've ever seen the inside of my robot (Checkmate) then you would probably plainly see why we switched. I'm not saying that IFI is perfect. I personally witnessed a lot of people having trouble over at the test box having intermitent signal w/ the competition port. The real problem this year with IFI was not having Tom there (The IFI guy). On top of that the IFI has a few things it needs in order to run flawlessly. Good mounting (don't have it bang into things), it's own dedicated power supply, and you can't have it near any of your high current wires. As far as event organization goes - it might not have been perfect, but it isn't exactly easy to run an event of that size. Something I've learned over the last five years at IQ is you need to know who to go to for specific things. As far as testing your robot goes - you should have just lined up with it and waited your turn. It's what everyone does. You can't expect them to come over to your pit table and grab you. They probably saw you on the list and just went on to the next person seeing that you weren't there. That list is for people to pass inspection not to use the test box.

i took a look at the bot we were going up against... great. not good. they were a full bodied spinner that was low to the ground and fairly compact... and had a 40 pound, 1/2" thick titanium shell with 1" x 1/2" x 3" teeth. damn. they had 4 magmotors powering the spinner. according to them it spun with a linear velocity of 400 MPH and put out 150 horsepower. which, now that i think about it, seems a bit excessive considering each of the 4 motors puts out 3 horsepower, but whatever. its still 4 magmotors on a 40 pound spinner, falcon had only 2. the only way to beat them is to flip them, but hey, thats what our bot is designed to do, right?

Your match: I thought you might like that.
http://img.cba.mit.edu/imagebank/060..._pneumagic.AVI

Awesome robot. Excellerator is a scary fight for anyone.

that full bodied spinner did exceptionally well, even though its nothing special. hey, if you have 13 girls teams from one school, one has to do well, right?

Too bad they beat Excellerator 3 to get Third place and afterwards Black Widow to get 2nd place.

Those girls worked damn hard on their robot and they deserve it. To just lump them with the rest of their school and saying "oh dumb luck" is stupid. Just because for the most part Carrollton had this 'quantity over quality' thing going on does not mean that god forbid some of them are talented or break the mold. It was a lot worse though. In previous years Carrollton has been known for taking a lot more robots. Some of which were slapped together in a month for competition. It gives them a bad name(and by them, I mean the other teams from their school that work and are interested in robotics). I was actually very surprised to see their teacher not allow two robots to compete because they showed up a week before competition asking what to do.

Videos:
http://www.buildersdb.com/marc/iq5/m...l%20raider.mpg
http://img.cba.mit.edu/imagebank/060...cellerator.AVI

spiderbot - full bodied spinner, it was amazingly effective when it went against carnegie mellon, it threw carnegie 10 feet high and it bounced off two walls before hitting the ground. so awesome.

You want to see a video of that match? If you watch very closely you can clearly see that Revenant totally missed the other robot, hit the wall, and then flew. Spiderblade or bot (I can't remember the name of it) did absolutely nothing to win there

We went up against them shortly after and 1-hit K.O'd them by denting in their shell. They were nice people though and it's always nice to see people on low budgets build bots and still do pretty well. Kind of hard to compete with $10000 shells (IE: Excellerator, Blender, Revenant). The only difference between my bot and theirs was that they had absolutely no reinforcement. I was disappointed to see they didn't come this year. I talked to them for a while after our match and offered some advice.

brutality (college). paul is still awesome. he made essentially the same bot as greenwave, but smaller and more compact. he used the spektrum motherboard, which was a great choice. he had one huge spinner motor, and the drive motors were just 4 dewalt drill motors. guess what? he took 1st place in the college division, and half the matches he didnt even turn his spinner on. he just used his bot as a wedge to push the other bot around, it was so amazingly effective.

Actually he was using a Futaba 5cap for most of the competition up until we had our match with him and lost. He was having RF issues with his receiver and couldn't spin up the bot. Afterwards we took the Spektrum out of our bot and gave it to Paul so he could use the rest of the competition.

PS: Same Greenwave, different name. Nothing changed Well.. except for the fact that he was using a solenoid instead of that speed controller from robot solutions.

(insert bot name here) vs. icewave

icewave is last years college champion. they are a horizontal spinner like brutality, but they have a gas engine that sits above the blade, so theyre sorta top heavy. their blade got bent, they spun out of control, the blade hit the ground, and they did two full flips in the air, a few twists, and landed upside down. watching the slow motion replay was awesome.

First of all.. Marc's blade never bent. His robot is top heavy. I'll give you that. It's an amazing (And unique) robot. Wedges and other spinners have the potential of beating him.

examples:

http://img.cba.mit.edu/imagebank/060...e_revenant.AVI
http://www.buildersdb.com/marc/iq5/I...0Guazabara.wmv
http://www.buildersdb.com/marc/iq5/I...%20Katrina.mpg
http://img.cba.mit.edu/imagebank/060...ve_lunatic.AVI

In that last one his starter chain locked up the blade and the moment created from hitting that spot in the arena and the blade suddenly stopping just flipped him over. Again no blade bending.

team "pretty in pink" (yes, it was an all girls team) made these stickers to give out to the teams they beat. they never got a chance to give one out. i laughed. two years ago they couldn't get their bot working, and someone from my team had to help them fix it. the same happened this year. except for my team helping to fix it. they didn't pass inspection, and didn't have a single match.

Two freshmen who built a fifteen pounder have the robot given to them two weeks before competition. They passed inspection. They also had two matches. By the way, whoever "wired" their robot from your team did it wrong. The Thor SC's were re-wired wrong and I had to go back and change it. Not to mention that the wiring was all there and intact prior to your team touching it and helping the "poor defenseless girls". So I'm not really sure what it is that they did. It was messy but all there. I checked it myself before they even got to the venue and i know that it was right (there simply was no time to re-wire it.) The only reason they had any problems at all passing inspection was due to a broken IFI motherboard/receiver which kept giving them issues w/ the competition port.

PS: I know it's hard to believe.. but girls(women) can be engineers. They can also build some damn good robots.

(I should have made a different user-name so this is a little disclaimer that in no way do I represent the rest of my team)

[slade]

There isn't much wrong with IFI. Either you use it right or you don't use it right. I've been using IFI for over 5 years now including F.I.R.S.T and BBIQ. This is actually the first year we used anything different. (IE: The Spektrum DX6 w/ BR6000 bot receiver). We used it though due to size issues. If you've ever seen the inside of my robot (Checkmate) then you would probably plainly see why we switched. I'm not saying that IFI is perfect. I personally witnessed a lot of people having trouble over at the test box having intermitent signal w/ the competition port. The real problem this year with IFI was not having Tom there (The IFI guy). On top of that the IFI has a few things it needs in order to run flawlessly. Good mounting (don't have it bang into things), it's own dedicated power supply, and you can't have it near any of your high current wires. As far as event organization goes - it might not have been perfect, but it isn't exactly easy to run an event of that size. Something I've learned over the last five years at IQ is you need to know who to go to for specific things. As far as testing your robot goes - you should have just lined up with it and waited your turn. It's what everyone does. You can't expect them to come over to your pit table and grab you. They probably saw you on the list and just went on to the next person seeing that you weren't there. That list is for people to pass inspection not to use the test box.

thanks for responding, heh you actually cared enough to sign up for the forum to post.

we didnt have any problems with the IFI last year, but we just had too many problems this year. our isaac 16 had to be sent back twice, and it was still having issues. it was mounted on springs, out of the way of the wires, and yes it had a dedicated 11.1 volt battery pack. it was just resetting upon taking any ammount of shock (even just hitting the shell with my fist), and i know i certainly wasnt the only one there with the same problem, there were plenty of other bots there that had issues. and yeah, I heard that Tom was there previous years but not this year because IFI stopped supporting battlebots. it probably would have helped if someone from IFI was there.

i know event organization cant be expected to be perfect, but from my experiences it was horrible this year, a lot worse than last year. first of all i do find it somewhat annoying that the person authorized to do pneumatic safety checks doesnt even know what to check for. And trust me, i talked to the people working there enough, they said clearly to just give them our pit number, and they would come get us. that alone isnt too bad, but then switching the matches around on us?

Your match: I thought you might like that.
http://img.cba.mit.edu/imagebank/060..._pneumagic.AVI

ooh... thats just brutal to have to watch again. you can see me trying to get it to drive, and trying to fire the arm... it didnt work out too well. i would have actually had a chance at winning that match if it did work, it took them quite a while to get through the titanium.

i have a video on google video (which i think i posted here) of my bot actually working. i also found a 20 minute video someone posted of a few of the matches.

do you have any other videos of the competition? maybe my match against spinal tap? id like to have the video of the one time my bot actually worked, its the only match my advisor didnt videotape.

now that i think about it, i think excellerator 3 took their second loss against marvinator due to either IFI issues, or an electrical connection coming loose.

Too bad they beat Excellerator 3 to get Third place and afterwards Black Widow to get 2nd place.

im glad they beat black widow, honestly that bot did not deserve the placing it got. its not an entirely bad bot, but that team had a lot of luck.

Those girls worked damn hard on their robot and they deserve it. To just lump them with the rest of their school and saying "oh dumb luck" is stupid. Just because for the most part Carrollton has this 'quantity over quality' thing going on does not mean that god forbid some of them are talented or break the mold. It was a lot worse though. In previous years Carrollton has been known for taking a lot more robots. Most of which (with the exception of two) were slapped together in two weeks for competition. It gives them a bad name. I was actually very surprised to see their teacher not allow like five robots to compete because they showed up a week before competition asking what to do.

I think you missed that my "hey, if you have 13 girls teams from one school one has to do well" comment was a joke. i know it was a good bot, and i know that they are knowledgeable and worked hard. by saying that it was "nothing special" i meant that it didnt have any clear advantage over any other full bodied spinner. it beat excellerator 3 when the spinner is less powerful, and the design overall seems less effective. i didnt mean to discredit the girls working on it by any means. I actually think some of the girls on other teams (like marvinator and dark angel) put in more work than most of the members on my team. then again, if you ask either of my advisors they would say that i did 95% of the work on my bot. however, there are teams like that pneumatic hammer bot who i had to help last year, and pretty in pink, who didnt appear to put any work or effort in.

You want to see a video of that match? If you watch very closely you can clearly see that Revenant totally missed the other robot, hit the wall, and then flew. Spiderblade or bot (I can't remember the name of it) did absolutely nothing to win there

really? i was in the stands for that match and it looked to me like revenant didnt move, and spiderbot hit them. id like to see the video if you have it.

Actually he was using a Futaba 5cap for most of the competition up until we had our match with him and lost. He was having RF issues with his receiver and couldn't spin up the bot. Afterwards we took the Spektrum out of our bot and gave it to Paul so he could use the rest of the competition.

PS: Same Greenwave, different name. Nothing changed Well.. except for the fact that he was using a solenoid instead of that speed controller from robot solutions.

First of all.. Marc's blade never bent. His robot is top heavy. I'll give you that. It's an amazing (And unique) robot. Wedges and other spinners have the potential of beating him.

hmm, i just heard that paul used the spektrum the whole competition, but i didnt hear that directly from him. I didnt know that he was having radio issues, i thought that he just didnt want to stress his bot too much. the blade already had quite a bit of damage on it, and last year the gearbox broke on him against falcon. i thought he was preserving it and just using his bot strategically as a wedge.

brutality isnt the same as greenwave. its the same concept, same blade, and i think one or two other parts are the same. besides that, everything was new.

hmm, it looked like the blade bent, but i never saw it afterwards. i guess the bot just was knocked off balance. it is a great bot, and deserved first place last year. that reminds me though, what happened to alakran? i loved that bot, and was disappointed that they didnt come back this year.

Try this on for size. Two freshmen who built a fifteen pounder get that terrible excuse for a robot dumped on them a week before competition. They passed inspection. They also had two matches. By the way, whoever "wired" their robot from your team did it wrong. The Thor SC's were re-wired wrong and I had to go back and change it. Not to mention that the wiring was all there and intact prior to your team touching it and helping the poor defenseless girls. So I'm not really sure what it is that they did. It was messy but all there. I checked it myself before they even got to the venue and i know that it was right (there simply was no time to re-wire it.) The only reason they had any problems at all passing inspection was due to a broken IFI motherboard/receiver which kept giving them issues w/ the competition port.

PS: I know it's hard to believe.. but girls(women) can be engineers. They can also build some damn good robots.

-Checkmate (Checkmate Bot) and Mean and Green Tech Advisor

that would be pringle that helped them two years ago. he graduated last year. i wasnt on the team two years ago, i just heard from my teammates that they asked him to help them with their bot.

i just brought it up because i found it funny that they spent their time setting up this arrogant plan of what they would do when they won, and they never won a match.

also, i talked to a few of the girls on dark angel and they didnt seem to like pretty in pink, they said the team didnt put much work in and came essentially just to skip school.

PS: I know it's hard to believe.. but girls(women) can be engineers. They can also build some damn good robots.

i know, and its not hard to believe. youre acting like im sexist (although admittedly, i guess my posts could have been interpreted that way, which is why i have to try to explain myself). I know girls can be good engineers and im glad when that is proven... although, a lot of the girls there were there just for the trip.

i didnt get a chance to watch most of the videos, actually i still have an essay to write for tomorrow. and now im even worse off for it. oh well. thanks for taking the time to respond.

[SubliminalMessage]Play Paintball![/SubliminalMessage]

how did you find this thread, anyway? just a random search online?

[Undertow10]

first of all i do find it somewhat annoying that the person authorized to do pneumatic safety checks doesnt even know what to check for.

I believe I was your internal inspector, and I really hope this quote isn't directed toward me. Aside from the fact that practically none of your components had pressure ratings stamped on them and you never showed documentation for anything, I took your word on most things because you said the parts came from a kit. The goal of the safety inspector is to make sure robots are safe, which yours was. You had burst discs, you had properly mounted tanks, proper regulators, proper tubing. After running through the standard checklist, there was nothing more to it. Building a safe robot is YOUR responsibility first and foremost. If you saw a problem with the inspection process, it should have been your duty to bring it up to the inspector or request another inspector.

[slade]

I believe I was your internal inspector, and I really hope this quote isn't directed toward me. Aside from the fact that practically none of your components had pressure ratings stamped on them and you never showed documentation for anything, I took your word on most things because you said the parts came from a kit. The goal of the safety inspector is to make sure robots are safe, which yours was. You had burst discs, you had properly mounted tanks, proper regulators, proper tubing. After running through the standard checklist, there was nothing more to it. Building a safe robot is YOUR responsibility first and foremost. If you saw a problem with the inspection process, it should have been your duty to bring it up to the inspector or request another inspector.

it was not directed towards you or the safety inspection (it was actually more thorough than i remembered last year). it was directed towards the fact that before filling the tank, i was required to get it approved and get a sticker put on it, and the person checked that it was marked "3000 PSI" but did not check the hydrotest date, as most paintball fields would. i tried to show him the hydrotest date but he just looked at the pressure rating, saying some tanks could only be filled to 1200 PSI or so.

I know it is my responsibility to build a safe robot, and i did that. the tank was currently in hydro, since it was fairly new. the piston, solenoid and hosing downstream was rated to an operating pressure of 300 PSI, twice what it was running at, and i could have given you documentation on the piston but it was tucked away with all the other documentation. the solenoid I had the model number of and could have looked it up online for you in a moment, and the hosing had been stamped "300 PSI" but I cut the hose to short lengths. it might still have been printed somewhere. I never said anything was from a kit, but everything was properly rated and had been tested multiple times.