Some old robot combat photos of my bots.

[RFS]

http://www.trackmill.com/forums/album.php?albumid=211
Photography credits go to myself or Bill Marsden.

These were all taken at the Southwestern Alliance of Robot Combat (SWARC) events in the year 2004, there were 4 of them we went to and 1 of them in 2003 that isn't shown in here. I'm pretty sure it covers most of the robots.

Videos available SOMEWHERE in my YouTube account:
http://www.youtube.com/user/RFSmediaproductions
Videos by Glenn Pipe. (Who needs to fix his damn camera and give me the SWARC 9.0 event footage *cries*.)

Brief history of the team:
2009?: Twilight Foundry Robotics
2005: Newfac Robotics
2004: Team Psygnosis
2003: RFS Labs
2002: Twilight Foundry Robotics
2001: New Island Technologies

And now the robots, from newest to oldest:

Earthquake (Beetle)
Weapon: Steel scoop + 4WD
Record: 3-2 (SWARC 9.0 2nd Place)
Status: Active?


Five-O (UK Ant
Weapon: Titanium wedge
Record: 1-2
Status: Retired


Detonator (Beetle)
Weapon: Thwacking arm
Record: 1-2
Status: Retired


Kill Switch (Beetle)
Weapon: Wedge with tank tracks
Record: 5-8
Status: Active?


Super Turbo Baby Puncher (Ant)
Weapon: Ball and chain fail
Record: 0-4 (one rumble win)
Status: Retired


Keep Back 500 Meters (UK Ant)
Weapon: Clamping arm (left) and Plow (right)
Record: 2-6
Status: Retired


Keep Back 500 Feet (Ant)
Weapon: Lifting arm or Clamping arm (seen pictures with clamp)
Record: 1-4
Status: Retired


The Fatal Contraption (Beetle)
Weapon: Cutting blades on each corner (not pictured)
Record: 0-0
Status: Retired


Mewtwo Bot (Open Class)
Weapon: Spikes and cutting disc
Record: 0-1
Status: Retired


Exodus (Open Class)
Weapon: Spike ram
Record: 0-1
Status: Retired


Terminal Impact (Open Class)
Weapon: Spinning disc with weighted flails
Record: 4-3 (Battle Clash 2.0 Champion)
Status: Active...?


D.C.O.I. ("Decoy" - Don't Count On It) (Open Class)
Weapon: Spike and cutting disc (disc not pictured)
Record: 0-5
Status: Retired


PokeBot (Open Class)
Weapon: Lifting arm (version 1), wedge & cutting disc (version 2, pictured)
Record: 0-2
Status: Retired


Roton aka Metalhead (Open Class)
Weapon: Wedge (left) and Dual cutting discs and spike ram (right)
Record: 3-5 (Battle Clash 1.0 Champion)
Status: Retired

And below is just my favorite picture ever from my history of robot combat. This was taken at the Battle Clash / Raptor Robotics 2.0 event held March 21st, 2002 at Rockport-Fulton Middle School, an event that was co-managed by me wherein I was also a participant. Robots were made from remote controlled cars and there were combat and obstacle course tournaments. Seen below are all of the teams and their robots (and a very young Draco in the orange shirt giving a thumbs up). :3

[HurricaneAndrew]

The Fatal Contraption (Beetle)
Weapon: Cutting blades on each corner (not pictured)
Record: 0-0
Status: Retired
 
That was a waste of a Nintendo, then. lol

[Condor33]

That makes me wonder if I could make a mantisweight out of my GCN.




Nah, too top heavy.

[RFS]

The Fatal Contraption (Beetle)
Weapon: Cutting blades on each corner (not pictured)
Record: 0-0
Status: Retired
 
That was a waste of a Nintendo, then. lol

It was busted to begin with (the contacts were corroded to all , I think it got wet or something). We wanted to enter it somewhere but we decided that the plastic was simply WAY too brittle so it became a showy demo-bot and we retired it soon thereafter.

If the sport is still alive and if there's an event in Texas soon we are thinking about gutting TFC and using it to make a real life version of Thumperizer.

[roboman2444]

ahh some of the bots are crap

[kill343gs]

I want to make some cardboard robots like that with totally lame weapons now. Maybe have a little challenge with some of my friends :)

[RFS]

ahh some of the bots are crap

Considering I built the really old ones when I was like 11 or 12 years old and with only some R/C cars I bought from a secondhand store, yes they are crap. After watching BattleBots on PayPerView in 1999 I set out to learn about radio control stuff, and really the most easily available things were R/C car toys, so I simply taught myself a lot about how stuff worked by taking things apart, putting them back together, and mixing and matching parts and stuff. It was a pretty cool learning experience, I figured out how to make a couple makeshift (and in retrospect incredibly unsafe) spinning weapon robots to battle against my buddies.

When I was old enough to have a job and stuff the opportunity to continue my robot combat hobby arose, and SWARC was the closest event. I couldn't bring myself to accept spending $40 on a single motor was a good idea, so I just went back to what I was used to and started purchasing old and broken remote controlled cars of all kinds, and stripped them down to their bare elements. There were some things I invested money in (a radio system, speed controllers, etc) but for the most part I kept everything low-tech and used my new talents in working with wood and metal to make robots better, instead of out of things like cardboard and foam and whatnot. Because of official regulations on things like spinners and stuff a lot of the ways I used to put stuff together wasn't allowed... and as I mentioned before I wasn't about to start spending excess money on stuff I didn't need, so I just designed other stuff.

edit: S. T. Baby Puncher was a gimmick joke robot, it was absolutely abysmal and never won, as you can see. :P The rumble win was really a total fluke, everyone else had broken down and I just kept swinging the chain around and scored more points. We put it together because we felt like being stupid and upping the numbers entered at SWARC (and also to set a record for largest wheels on an antweight). STBP lost in rather hilarious ways (there's a video of it losing a wheel while fighting a wedge, the wheel just simply rolls off). It lost a little more spectacularly at SWARC 9.0 (hazards) but those videos were never released.

[R1885]

I see the famed French Kiss of Death:P

[RFS]

I see the famed French Kiss of Death:P

Haha, YES! I loved the name of that weapon. :P

[kill343gs]

I would like you to know that I have in fact started development on a CD-blade toting cardboard robot.

[RFS]

I would like you to know that I have in fact started development on a CD-blade toting cardboard robot.

Haha, awesome - keep the spirit alive! :3

[JoeBlo]

I have a little shell spinner, could be an US antweight not entirely sure, there isn't any robot fighting that I know of in Australia  so I didn't care on the weight just build one for the fun of it, show it off to my friends basically smashing soda cans.... just made some pointy metal teath for it :-D the shell was a recycled 25 CD-R container haha still works though

[kill343gs]

JB:You should make a video, I'm making one of mine once its finished.

[JoeBlo]

I will when its done :-D its in the upgrade stage atm, it did have plastic teeth and the shell was painted like the revolutionist but I decided to make it my own so now metal teeth and a new paint scheme shell

looking forward to seeing yours too

[RFS]

I have a little shell spinner, could be an US antweight not entirely sure, there isn't any robot fighting that I know of in Australia  so I didn't care on the weight just build one for the fun of it, show it off to my friends basically smashing soda cans.... just made some pointy metal teath for it :-D the shell was a recycled 25 CD-R container haha still works though

I had a similar idea going on for a shell spinner. :)

[JoeBlo]

well they are light weight and pretty sturdy :-D

[kill343gs]

At one point I was going to use a cookie tin to make one. That never happened.