hydraulics for the heavier classes. Some events
ban pneumatic weapons due to safety concerns,
which makes flipper robots even harder to
successfully compete with. Flipper robots work
best in an arena with an “arena out” feature but
can be powerful enough to damage robots and
achieve knockout victories in a standard arena.
OVERHEAD SAW ROBOTS
These robots have a spinning weapon at the end
of an arm that can be independently articulated.
Most have an actual saw blade (Figure
L
) that
they use to cut through other robots, taking
advantage of the lack of top armor. (Others have
a weapon called a hammer saw that’s no different
from a regular spinning weapon as it imparts
kinetic energy through an impact.) Overhead
saw bots usually have a very open front end with
prongs protruding, as they need to control other
robots and hold them still for the saw blade to be
effective. These robots require a robust design
and also a talented driver, as the articulated
weapon is more demanding to operate and they
usually need to pin their opponent in place to do
meaningful damage.
HAMMER ROBOTS
Hammer robots and their cousins, axe robots,
have a weapon that swings a mass over the top
of the robot in a limited arc to impart kinetic
energy into their opponent (Figure
M
). At the
insect weight classes, these robots can be
powered with either a high-speed servo or
a motor. Like overhead saws, these robots
take advantage of the light top armor on their
opponents. There are two main problems with
insect-weight hammer bots. First, their weapon
must be triggered slightly before the opponent
is in front of them because the hammer takes
time to complete its swing. Insect bots move
fast relative to their larger counterparts, which
exacerbates this problem. Second, they struggle
to store comparable energy to spinners as their
weapon only has up to 180 degrees of motion to
accelerate before impact.
CRUSHER ROBOTS
Crusher robots have an overhead arm that
pierces through the top of their opponents,
M
O
damaging the internals (Figure
N
). At insect
weight classes, crushers are designed to convert
fast rotational movement from a motor into slow,
powerful linear movement at the tip of their claw.
The fatal flaw of crushers is that their actuators
either are too slow to easily grab their opponents,
or lack the force needed to pierce armor. Crusher
robots are mechanically complex and require
extremely precise driving.
WEDGE ROBOTS
Passive wedge bots (Figure
O
) don’t have an
active weapon but they’re very durable, as they
rely on pushing their opponent around until they
break. These robots are the simplest of all — and
very competitive!
Caleb Kraft
N
33
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