Holidays, when devoid of sporting showcases, are apparently not conducive to blogging inspiration. However, I need to write about something, so why not the third most entertaining show on television at the moment: Robot Wars. (fyi, Sherlock and Shooting Stars are first and second respectively.)
The compeitors are frequently cringe inducing (Plunderbird boys - you are not funny, get lost), as is Craig Charles' leery demeanour, but the fun in seeing pathetic lumps of metal getting shredded, crushed and flipped by a core of five or six really decent machines remains undimmed.
Over the five series natural selection has seen four design staples rise to the top of the pack, each with a robot of excellent design as the epitome of that class. These are: Chaos 2, Hypnodisc, Razer and Tornado, armed with a flipper, scorpion claw, fly-wheel and raw pushing-power respectively. These four are in essence unbeatable by the vast majority of the competition, barring mechanical defects.
Chaos 2 was the first to have a really effective flipper, pioneered originally by Cassius. The first time Cassius jack-knifed after being overturned was a watershed moment in the history of Robot Wars; not only could it flip other robots but it was also impervious to being itselt flipped. Any robot with serious ambitions would need to be able to self right, and while the flipper was not the only means of self-righting - interesting scrimechs can been seen on the aforementioned Hypno-Disc and Razer - it remains the original and most effective. The third series was dominated by Chaos 2, which perfected the flipper, which differed from Cassius in that it was forward facing active flip rather than a push.
Tornado was essentially a response to the flipper; scrimechs are great and look good, but why not make the robot invertible? It was by no means the most attractive robot, with the simple yet effective tactic of relentless bulldozing, but it worked, defeating Chaos 2 at least twice through sheer bloody-mindedness. It had very few weaknesses: unflipable, robust and had unmatched pushing-power thanks to two engines and rubber tread. There was one robot that could beat it, and beat it easily, however.
Razer was unquestionably the most aesthetically arresting while being the most destructive. The hydraulic beak immoblilised more robots than any other, and for a long time it only ever lost through electical or mechanical issues. Had it not beached itself in the second round of the heats in the third series vs Aggrobot, Chaos 2 may well have finished as runner-up. As it happened, Razer and Chaos 2 only met several years later, and Razer quickly punctured the CO2 cannister of Chaos, causing it to commit the first ever Robot Wars suicide by diving arse-first into the pit. It wasn't invincible, though. Pussycat defeated it twice, once when Razer got stuck on the wall and a second time when it popped a wheel off. Later, Tornado fixed a protective cage around itself to specifically neutralise the claw of Razer; Razer could do nothing and lost to a judges' decision. It was within the rules, but hardly fair play.
Lastly we come to Hypnodisc. It has a poor record against these other three, but when it comes to fucking shit up, Hypnodisc is unparalleled. The first victim, Robogeddon, faced the most complete destruction of any robot, ever. The bodywork was gone, the insides ripped out, the battery destroyed...there was nothing left. Its design is simple: a disc spins at only a reasonably fast speed, but the sheer size of it means the two lumps are going very quickly indeed. It is in essence a bludgeoning device as opposed to the standard slicing circular saw.
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