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How can the above statement be true when bots like Bob, Tread and Speedbump can compete?

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Its a valid point, I dont find that the more money other people spend the less fun I have.

In fact it would actually be more expensive for me to compete in this event!
Right now i basically only buy drill motors and wheels, everyhting else i scrounge for free. If I have to buy mdf its more expensive

And I know that I have a bit of a different style to building than most, and I am sure limiting like this will make it easyier for some builders.

time to start scrounging mdf!

hehe, yeah $200 racing slick!

or, old car tyre from the side of the road

Tread cost me $0 for everything.

bob tread and speed bump dont have active weapons.
Fights between them with no nick or orbit etc are nudging matches. (although bob nudges pretty dern well).

we want active weapons in this class, the point of the MDF is to make lower power (and more interesting) weapons effective. A pancake motor a V belt and a peice of bar driven off a drill pack should just about do it. and when it breaks it'll look spectacular.

We are thinking of putting in a minimum KE level (from active weapons or ramming etc) bascially saying that your bot must be able to cause damage to others. if your flipper is suitibally juiced then it would count too, basically we are saying your bot must be able to break mdf, or cause in some way other bots to be broken. wedges and nudge bots are out.
(if you want to put 4x scooter motors into a wedge such that it flings the other bots through the air well thats fine too)

It'll also make people make their own bots well or they will break themselves.
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Mechanical engineers build weapons, civil engineers build targets

Minimum KE level? Thats not a good idea. I thought the idea was to make more creative robots and then you want to ban flippers/lifters/crushers/ect.... Sound like you are contradicting yourself a bit. And if a newbies rammer isn't fast enough will you say they can't compete till they get better motors? If you limit to 500J then a 13kg rammer needs to move at 31.5km/h. The drill powered Hellbringer X was the fastest robot I've seen and it barely hit 25km/h. Less then 500J is a small spinner that won't do the damage you want.
Also how will you know the KE of a spinner. As far as I can tell no one has measured the speed of their spinners yet. Most people when they first start out always over estimate the speed of everything. Glen's 10000 rpm Aurora springs to mind.

Limit motor size, not KE. Set a limit of around 250W. That'll leave drills and small scooter motors, but ban EV's and mag motors.

What, no Mag motors ??? It would certainly be spectacular seeing a Mag rip out of it's MDF mounting and destroy itself and the bot along the way.

Seriously, the motor power limit is a good idea but will need to be combined with battery voltage or we will have a lot of horribly over-volted fan motors trying to deliver a kilowatt before they melt.

For Marayong, I have an accurate laser tachometer that will tell us the RPM of any spinner.

I also think the designs should be left completely open - natural selection will take care of the rest
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Australian 2015 Featherweight champion
UK 2016 Gladiator champion

I think that is the way to go, limit motor sizes, not energy built up.

If you want to spend 20 seconds spinning up a disk then thats fine

We think the KE limit is the way to go.
limiting motor size will hurt the "creative" designs far more than spinners.
a crusher with 2 big fan motors powering it is all of a sudden scary.
input wattage is a good estimation of KE (for a spinner)
we want flippers and rambots but we dont want nudge bots. Just because the bots are to be made out of MDF dosent mean we want them to be boring. We want bots to win by KO as often as possible.

building a decent rambot is hard, we wont nerf the class to allow boring bots in. We are thinking a baseline rambot is 4x drill motors at 12 volts which is achievablle by most people and should be enough to actually cause damage (to them or you, either way we are happy ;-P). If you up the voltage then you should wind up with a pretty decent bot. If you have an actual "ram" (eg a bolt or spike or something) on the bot then you stand a really good chance of punching holes in MDF.

Rule addition
Armor for speed controllers/electronics isnt counted in the weight (up to 1kg)


we want to do as little as possible to limit this class, at the same time we want as much destruction and creativity as possible. getting a spinning bar is a $10 trip to pick and payless and some dumpster diving. Making your bot such that you dont get owned hitting the wall is the real challenge ;->
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Mechanical engineers build weapons, civil engineers build targets

sounds interesting.

Just a quick thought.... does every competitor turn up with a dis-assembled bot ?
Since batteries aren't part of the weight limit.
AND you can have up to 1kg metal armour for electrics.
AND you have to prove the bot is the same as the planned "agreed" model

MDF armour/frame sounds good to get spectatular damage and fights BUT doesn't that also mean the internal components are easier to get to (and therefore damage)

... and on the $$'s side, people may save money compared to building metal machines, but what of the perpetually ongoing repair bill.

Don't get me wrong... a beginners class (or low $$ class) or low tech class sounds good... just voicing some thoughts..
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There is no such thing as excessive carnage.

us robot builders are a pretty honest lot i dont think theres any need to come disassembled. (even though wayde probbly will hehehehe)

people are going to need to change their batts anyway so weighing up shouldnt be too much of a problem. the ESC weight is a valid point, but i dont think its going to be too much of a problem.
it should only have to be "close enough" to the plan.
I am thinking before events begin for the day (or perhaps before the bot is allowed to compete perhaps?) the compeditors will "front their peers" to show their bot, demonstrate it failsafing (and point out how hardcore it is) show their plans and possibly talk some smack (somewhat akin to the BBC robotwars series but without the cute chick, if anybody wants to bring a cute chick 1.0 along to take the role of cute chick presenter they are more than welcome ;->) and generally show off their bot. After their demo and Q&A the other builders will vote (anonomyously only spelt better) on if that bot is allowed in to the comp. Obviously itd be pretty crushing to arrive and have the group say your bots not going to compete so people are going to be making good use of the forum, posting pics getting feedback etc. this is all the "peer review" section.

of course the event organisers word is god and its probbly wise to have a "prez for da day" who probbly shouldnt have any judging decisions but is responsiblle for making sure voting is done right and should have a "deciding vote" in a worst case tie.
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Mechanical engineers build weapons, civil engineers build targets

lol yeah i like to be under stress (untill im bald and my bot looks more like a punching bag to me than a bot) and you should know i have a plan and typically i was unable to execute it cause it only came to me 20 odd min ago XD so i "might" get it started tomorow if not my next day off (i think fri not sure)[/img]
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as a shadow is seen and not heard i am here
-Waddy the phoenix

dont forget to post your plans ;->
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Mechanical engineers build weapons, civil engineers build targets

Drumbot for me. Slow speed with lots of torque, designed to get under and control the opponent, ala Mini Mower VS Elbravo VS Pinscher @ 04 Annihilator
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https://www.halfdonethings.com/

well its a 2 wheeled undercutter and its bigest feature is its not a box :O
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as a shadow is seen and not heard i am here
-Waddy the phoenix

crusher for me, weeehee and IR control.
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www.demon50s.com - Minimoto parts
http://www.youtube.com/user/HyzerGlen - Videoooozzz