ESPN & BattleBots: Gearing Up For College And Pro Competitions

[Greg Needel]

Originally Posted by Arefin Bari

How much is it to register for one of these competitions?

using past events as a reference ~$200

although if you are worried about that cost I would suggest skipping it. I would bet that most people with a bunch of FIRST stuff lying around would still need to invest $1500-2500 min to have a competitive machine.

[Dan Richardson]

UCF Team built theirs for a few hundred at the college BBIQ comp I went to last year, but granted they didn't do all that great they basically designed a bot to only beat the #1 bot ( a cow catch that avoided being hit by the spinning blades of their opponent ) they just pushed their opponents into the hazards.

Its much harder however if you can't use good materials.

[Ryan Dognaux]

An update for everyone was posted a few days ago: http://www.battlebots.com/news_home.asp#espn2

For the college students, this is some good news:

Originally Posted by battlebots.com

The response to our survey has been tremendous, and the results are in -- Colleges need more time to compete at top level. Therefore, we have set the date for the Back-to-back College / Pro competitions to November 11- 16

We didn't think we'd be able to pull together the people to do this having just come from Atlanta, but now we can work on it over the summer and into the fall semester.

[Sean.Conway]

I remember going to BattleBots when it was in Las Vegas a few years ago, didnt know it was still around.

[=Martin=Taylor=]

Love it or hate it, but BB really looks to have come back....

Official event registration has opened on Builders Database, and teams have begun to register. There are three classes, high school (120 lb.), College (120 lb.), and Pro (220 lb.)

Yes. That’s right. High school 120 lbs.

Think you're good at Defense? Well, now you can prove it…

I'm not entering anything, but I'm definitely going to test the waters.

[Mushrooshi]

Combat robotics actually "inspired" me to become so interested in robotics. When I was about 3 or 4, I watched an episode of Robot Wars.

I used to love combat robotics, but I feel the sport has got stale. Every (effective) robot has a spinner. No originality in the sport anymore. Before, you would have robots of every kind to test their metal, from giant sledge hammers to circular saw blades to pneumatic spikes. Granted, these weapons, especially the pneumatic spikes and saw blades were so terrible all they caused were scratches, but at least there was variety.

I actually enjoy watching rambots (Tornado, storm, sewer snake), since they do more than aim for a robot, rev their spinning disk/drum/body, and go, but instead, they actually maneuver a robot around, and they are more fun to watch. The carnage a spinner causes is nothing like watching a combined 200lb+ mass of robots slam into a wall.

[kapolavery]

at first i liked battle bots and other stuff like that..
but after competing in FRC, i like FRC better bc youre actually building something constructive that is less violent and promotes the whole gracious professionalism ethic that we all strive to emulate.

[JesseK]

I can't wait to see this competition. There should be some great ideas that would apply to an FRC bot as far as high quality fabrication goes. Though personally I'd only go if I can watch other peoples' robots be destroyed ... I just don't have the heart to watch one of my own magnificent real life creations be pulverized to dust. SimCity taught me that.

[MikeJ675]

I was at the event and had a great time. Entered with my 12lber fighting as a 15lber in the botsIQ event that was running at the same time. Got 4th out of 25-30 15lbers and best engineered.

The big bots were pretty good. I really hope the 220lb stuff makes tv. Can't go into detail about the big bots as those were taped for TV and are covered by the NDA for the event.

Here's my bot getting tossed around in its third match against eXecuter-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A9-jk...e=channel_page

Note, the arena roof is at least 8' tall and I hit it twice. Got high centered on a piece of my bot that got ripped off and that's what got me counted out.

Went 5-2, winning 1, 2, 4, 5, and 6. Spent half of match 4 and the rest of the tournament with only one working wheel. I really hope video of matches 5 and 6 turn up.