Servo - May 2008

Itsa and MeltyB(eetle).

12’ allowing plenty of room for the robots to maneuver and for fans to watch the action. Teams from California, Oregon, Washington, and British Colombia attended the event. The core of the competition was in the 3 lb (beetle weight) and 12 lb (hobby weight) classes with a few 1 lb and 30 lb robots rounding out the show.

Heavy hitters in the 3 lb class included WAR’s returning champ, “Hurty Gurty” by Team Death by Monkeys, the always dangerous “Altitude” by Team Velocity, and “Itsa,” a home-plate shaped robot with a giant titanium blade created by Mike Daniels of Team Bad Bot and driven by Greg Schwartz of team LNW. In its first competition,

Rich Olson’s one-wheeled robot MeltyB(eetle) was sporting its unique drive system that allows it to use 100% of its mass in its spinning body, giving it the potential of hitting harder than any of the other bots at the event.

Early in the competition, Melty B(eetle) fought Hurty Gurty. As the robots came together, Hurty Gurty was thrown to the ceiling as Melty B(eetle) bounced off the walls. MeltyB(eetle) appeared to be getting the best of Hurty Gurty but started to smoke and was knocked out. Hurty Gurty won the fight but was effectively knocked out of the competition with its 1/4” thick aluminum sides being badly bent, disabling the weapon.

After moving up the losers bracket, MeltyB(eetle) went up against the under-cutter Itsa. Bright white sparks shot from the front

Mission Control lifts an opponent.

end of Itsa as its titanium blade skidded across the steel floor. Like a boxer with a long reach, Itsa kept MeltyB(eetle) from getting close enough to deliver a knockout blow. Itsa chipped away at MeltyB(eetle)’s one wheel for the knock-out win.

In the beetle weight final, Itsa was matched up against Altitude. The two bots fought earlier with Altitude getting the win. Altitude has a large vertical spinning disk with its sides made of heavy aluminum and titanium. Again, Itsa used its long reach to an advantage. Itsa took out the support skids holding Altitude’s weapon off the ground. With no way to keep the weapon off the floor, Altitude threw itself around the arena until time expired in the match. With a unanimous judge’s decision, Itsa took home 1st place.

The returning champs from the Canadian team DMZ brought two robots in the 12 lb class. Their powerful wedge Death Dealer driven by Amir Marvasti went up against the always destructive horizontal spinner Fiasco driven by Kevin Barker. Death Dealer used an effective anti-spinner attachment on the front of its wedge. The composite spring steel and rubber material damped Fiascos blows enough to give the wedge the victory.

Shag, a plow-bot driven by Rob Purdy of Team Guasswave pushed its previous opponents around like toys with the aid of a powerful magnet to increase its pushing power. Shag’s opponent Raven has a wide wedge with a powerful vertical spinning disk. In Raven’s previous fight against the titanium wedge Bubba, driven by Joe Murawski of Team X-Bots, it had some spectacular hits as its spinning disk tore up Bubba’s armor. Shag dominated Raven early on but a strong hit by Raven’s weapon knocked