Techno Events/FRA Beetleweight Championship 2019

During Bugglebots I really enjoyed controlling Léim Thart as a wedge, and seeing that there was one more event in the form of the BW Championships in Marlow I decided to throw my hat into that for once with a build that needed little effort on my end. Being in such an awkward location, and being a little strapped for cash for the event, I had the brilliant idea of avoiding paying for accommodation by flying to Luton late at night, spending the night at the airport, going to the event, competing, and flying out that same night, all while not sleeping (Warning: this is NOT a good idea, do NOT try this, coffee can only get you so far).

I didn’t want to enter the same bot in however, and so I elected to make a few modifications to the design. First, I ditched the weapon and increased the armour at the front and top of the bot. Secondly, I printed slightly larger rear wheels so that I could actually drive while upside down. Finally, I completely redid the theme of the bot. I had been binging a bass-themed channel on YouTube called Davie504, and his videos often featured funny challenges (eg. playing Red Hot Chili Peppers with a red hot chili pepper, playing Guns N’ Roses with guns and roses). So in keeping with that theme, I put a bluetooth speaker into the robot, and during fights, I would play a bass cover of the RHCP’s song *Go Robot*. One visit to a printing shop later, and the bot had a new identity, Go Robot But Played On An Actual Robot. I arrived, passed tech checks, and was ready to compete with little issue.




SLAP like now.

Fight 1 VS. X-301, Puns N’ Roses:

This first fight was an intimidating one. Puns N’ Roses (Sarah Malyan) was a near-indestructible brick, and X-301 (Cosmin Gorgovan) was the reigning champion, and Cosmin had already been on an incredible streak of event wins, the most recent being the FW champs.


Fight starts at 11:19

This ended up being quite a fun fight! The bot managed to stand up quite well to the hits from X-301, and it was a dream to control, allowing me to orbit the drum spinner and keep it under pressure. Unfortunately around 40 seconds in I started to notice I wasn’t getting much traction, and one more hit from X-301 left me unable to move, triggering the count-out and sending me to the losers melee. It seems that the wheels had rounded themselves out, but this happened far faster than it had last event, where I could get two or three fights out of them. Nonetheless, I replaced the rounded out ones, and got ready for the next fight. Worst of all though, the speaker I was using was far too quiet, and you couldn't hear it during the fight at all. Dammit!

Fight 2 VS. Puns N’ Roses, Suijin, K2:


Fight starts at 9:56

Usually you’d expect to fight some weaker machines in the losers melees, but this fight left me competing with two time Bugglebots champion K2 (Mark Leigh), which had fully recovered after a devastating shock loss to Wajoo. I managed to have a small tussle with him while Puns N’ Roses tussled with Suijin (Morgan Ls), and the bigger wheels allowed me to drive upside down for the first time! I kept the pressure up, but after a while I had ended up underneath K2 when the wheels rounded out again, leaving all three of us stuck. After the unstick Go Robot was officially counted out, ending the competition with an 0-2 record.

It was disappointing to do so badly at this event, but I did learn a lot from it. Most importantly, the increase in wheel diameter put more force on the 3D printed wheels, which resulted in them failing far earlier. This tells me that for future competitions I’d need to think of new and better ways of mounting wheels. Other than that though, that’s it with Léim Thart. I mostly use the chassis now as driving practice for my dad, and while I have CAD’s partway done for a Léim Three, there’s a lot I’d need to source before starting a build. This was a fun build log, and I hope to compete at more beetle events in the future, they’re always a blast! Next time there's a Bristol event or a Battle in the 'Burgh, I'm gonna try to go for sure!


If I ever make a Go Robot 2, this will be the upgrade done to the speaker system.