My combat robot

[cybermike]

Every year there is a robot wars competition at the local university. decided to design and build a combat robot for the event.

It consisted of a heavy duty chassis with a pickaxe as the weapon.

The Chassis

It was a simple armored cylinder with a flywheel that spins up to about 2000 rpm. One drives up to a competitor and then the flywheel is spun up, building up a massive amount of kinetic energy. Then the arms with the spikes are magnetically engaged, instantly transferring the flywheel energy to the swingarm with the spikes

The picks then strike the target vehicle with a massive blow

The competition takes place inside a circle on the ground. The first robot to get knocked out of the circle or to be reduced to a state of inactivity loses. The winner continues to the next round.

Good fun. Pick came third. Got rammed out of the circle once by a a rather unsophisticated heavy square brick once, and got the wheels lifted off the ground once by a wedge. Came in third out of fourteen participants.

My next one is gong to have a magnet and a hammer. I'm just going to lift the opponent of the ground, hammer it a few times and drop it outside the circle.

It's a huge load of fun.

 

[alchemist]

Many years ago, there was a programme called Robot Wars on the BBC (maybe it's on a more obscure channel now). I loved it and always wanted to partake, although my lack of technical knowledge or expertise got in the way. It looks like fun, Mike, and those spinning robots were always the most dangerous.

 

[cybermike]

Yep, you can build up a lot of energy n a spinning weapon. It is serving out it's days as a home security bot. I take great delight in showing 'im off to strangers that drop by. Nothing like being chased by a pair of sharpened pickaxe spikes spinning at 2000 rpm. It will take your legs right out from under you and when you are down, it will go to work on the rest of you. They soon get the message. I haven't had any intruders since. Now I am busy planning a dinosaur ... Like a T Rex. I have an animation here somewhere ...I will see if I can find it.