FIGURE 7. All of the parts are mounted
and Herald is ready for a test drive.
FIGURE 8. The
hammer is added
along with a
wheelie bar and
front spars.
made that could attach to the
hammer arm. All of this progress is
shown in Figure 8.
With the hammer complete and
drive system working reliably, it was
now time to make the top armor
with the small amount of weight
remaining. I decided to use 1/16”
Lexan as the top armor for each
pod. I also added some thin Lexan
armor to help protect the drive
motors at the end of each leg
assembly. With these additions, the
robot was complete.
Top Secret
Herald started out as just a fun
project designed to be cheap and
fun to watch. However, in the
process of building it, I came to
realize the true potential of the
Sportsman class. Not only did it
offer the chance to fight and not be
completely destroyed, it allowed
builders to try things that would
never have been practical previously.
I realized that I could use Herald as
a way to promote the Sportsman
class and its potential. To do this, I
started a build report in the robotic
online discussion forums (http://
forums.delphiforums.com/CJRC/
start). In the build report, I posted
some “hints” about the design
along with a few photos such as
Figure 5, but I didn’t reveal what it
actually was. I thought that if I
created a level of interest and built
up anticipation for finding out what
Herald was, I could increase its
impact when it first competed.
With the mystery of “What is
Herald?” created and a finished
robot, I set off to compete at
NERC’s Motorama 2008.
I decided that I had spent the
last few months hyping up Herald
online, so I didn’t want to give
the design away in an uneventful
fashion. Instead, I kept it a secret
until the very last second. So, at the
event I kept it under a blanket to
keep anyone from seeing it. For my
first match, a friend who was in on
the secret took the initiative to play
the theme music from 2001: A
Space Odyssey as I entered the box
with the covered robot. I lifted the
blanket so it was timed perfectly
with the music, and after three
months of secrecy, Herald was
unveiled. Figure 9 shows Herald
right after the unveiling, ready to
pummel the opponents!
builders were asked to vote on a
number of awards in different
categories: best driver, most
aggressive, best engineered, and
coolest robot. By popular vote,
Herald was lucky enough to win
coolest robot. This was an honor
because this award often went to
rare robots such as walkers and
other types whose builders didn’t
just “think outside the box,” but
didn’t even realize there was a box.
The competition was fierce this
year with over three robots trying
concepts that had never been done
before. In many ways, the other
robots beat Herald in their creative
design concepts. I hope to see a
greater number of “out of the box”
bots at Motorama 2009, because
Herald is only a small step in what I
feel is the right direction for the
Sportsman class.
For more information on myself
or my robots, please visit www.
Benson-Labs.com. SV
Conclusion
Herald started out
as just a fun project
and slowly morphed
into an attempt to
“build out of the box”
and try to excite other
builders to do the same
thing. Herald had four
fights at Motorama
2008, two of which it
won. At the end of the
competition, the
FIGURE 9. Herald sits in
the arena ready to fight
in its first match!
SERVO 06.2008 25