Machines behaving Badly

Robots are starting to take shape.

A basic bulldozer type pusher.  Just needs some side armor.

This is a lot of middle schoolers with power tools.  12 kids each doing something potentially problematic!  But they are good about safety glasses, and do seem to heed one of my frequent exhortations:  "Hey, no humans fighting.  Only robots."

No, loosely wrapped duct tape is not an effective way to hold your robot together. Since re-done in more sturdy fashion.

A more ambitious design.  When completed the Barby Jeep gearbox will spin that rusty bicycle chain at about 800 rpm.  In theory.  In practice the complicated robots are often finished at the last minute, and their drivers get little opportunity to practice driving them.

Hmmmm.  This is an odd contraption.  I am suggesting he relocate the wheels towards the center of mass.  Otherwise it will be essentially an immobile Victimbot.

Somebody shot video of the our 2008 tournament, which we refer to as Machines Behaving Badly.  Here are a few spliced together minutes of the action.  Seeing this after a few years I can promise that the mayhem in 2012 will be up a couple of notches, as both the arena hazards and the robotic weapons have escalated, as technology so often will in times of conflict......

 machines behaving badly 2008

Note:  In the first clip there is a rather complicated looking machine with a 360 degree spinning blade.  The body of the robot was made entirely out of popsicle sticks!  I assured the kid that it would explode on first serious impact.  He and I were equally pleased to have me proven wrong.