Hey guys,
I'm thinking about starting a night to work on combat robots in the style of the show BattleBots at HeatSync. Would people be interested in that? I know Eric Ose had mentioned in a previous post that he thought Monday would be a good night to do this. Would the first and third monday of the month work?
A while back, I talked with some people on the forum about starting a team at HeatSync for BattleBots but after researching it more, I think starting small would be a good approach. Building heavy weight bots (like the show) is pretty much out of the question at the moment because of cost and how dangerous they are.
According to the builder of Tombstone, the runner up in the 2015 BattleBot competition, the average bot costs about 10k and he won't even test run his bot outside an arena with the weapon mounted. He recommends starting small at 1lb, 3lb, or 15lb. People get pretty creative even in the 1lb class and there is still quite a bit of action. This 1lb bot is pretty cool and the design is impressive: Awesome 1lb bot. I'm thinking we could even start with all the bots just being acrylic to keep cost down, encourage more participants, and increase the amount of destruction.
The biggest hurdle with this night is safety. At the first meeting we can establish the rules. EX: All weapons must be covered and moving weapons must be locked in place when inside the lab.
As for fighting them, I think we will need to see what people want to make first and discuss that later. With the weight classes under 15lbs there isn't as much danger. Goggles and a basic plastic barrier with a top is sufficient. Once you go over that weight, things get pretty serious though. Here is a link of a brief clip showing what happens when shortcuts are taken: TRY_THIS_AT_HOME_KIDS. At this match they were running mid-weight bots in an arena fit for light weights. The part that went flying supposedly weighed about 25lbs and just smashed through their thin shield. The leagues in other states (and countries) have plenty information on what is need for each weight bracket to make sure people go home without being impaled.
There doesn't seem to be an active combat leagues in town at the moment. The closest is an event put on once in a while by Xerocraft in Tuscon. I would be happy to organize and manage a league in the event we get enough people and bots together.
When it comes time to actually build an arena I think a joint venture with other hacker/maker spaces in town is a good idea if we make it big. I have a friend at Chandler Tech Shop who is very interested and I know Local Motors likes projects like this as well. Local Motors also has better means to build, and house an arena. The details of this can be discussed later.
*TL:DR SUMMARY*
- Are people interested in coming to a night to work on robots like the ones on battle bots?
- Can we meet two mondays a month? (first and third)
- Making them lightweight will make them easier to manage (The big bots are about 10k and very dangerous)
- Lets not maim each other in the process of building them (safety)
- The details of fighting will be discussed at a later time
- How the arena will be built will be discussed at a later time