Big Nipper

Hello - me again :proud:.

I decided to start this thread, to say how much I think Big Nipper is wonderful.

The electrics in most robots are reveltively simple. But Big Nipper - http://www.robotslive.co.uk/images/eventpics/exel.jpghttp://www.robotslive.co.uk/images/eventpics/exel.jpg (I cant copy and paste)

I wish to ask three questions to the Big Nipper team.

1: In the 2007 UK Championships, which fights were your most and least favorites?
2: How much of Big Nippers weight is armour and how thick is it?
3: How does it work?

Thanks.

i must admit at telford demo, it was good to see big nipper crushing those beer kegs, you could really here the noise from the barrel under the pressure it was putting on it. i have no idea of thickness on a beer keg, but it was pretty thick and they left some nice holes in them.

Splinter has been taken on a ride on those prongs on several occasions. Big Nipper is still one of my all time favorite robots.

Big Nipper is one of the coolest robots ever to grace an arena. Right up there with Razer and Onslaught.

The very first thing I remember about Big Nipper was it whacking the wing off of Razers sri-mech in its first TV fight in Series 5. Before those first two seconds it was just another box on wheels (sorry guys!!) but now I know its much much more.

Got a question for the Big Nipper guys too:

Weve got Little Flipper, Little Spinner and Little Hitter - any plans for a Little Nipper? That would be sweet :)
(would love to have a go at a Little Nipper myself but dont feel that I would do it justice)

not a fan, all the damage caused to tanto by big nipper came after they called cease,- winter tour final white board is the only i can prove but i knwo they did it in preston that year too,
and any robot that admits to weighing over the limit is cheating, i dont care if there is a 2% allowence, there shouldnt be one

as a piece of engineering its one of the best but i am never going to like a robot that attacks after the bell and is overweight

Cant please everyone :), but Ill to try and answer some questions raised.

In the UK Champs, best fight for me has got to be the Final with THz. We never know what will happen but it always makes for an entertaining fight, mind you THz always seems too no matter who its fighting. Cannot really pick out a least favorite as there are too many :). Guessing at what the weight in armour is but Id have to say its around 30kg, not really weight just the armour bits on there own. The arm itself weights in at around 30kG too. The thinkness depends where, as it varies all over the robot. The top main plates are just under 8mm, bottom are 6mm down to 4mm where in contact with the chasis, sides are 5mm for the most part with 10mm ribbs. Front and back are also 6mm. Cannot remember the thickness on the Arm think its 4mm. As for the chasis, its Aliminium and most is 30mm think, which is milled down in pockets & holes all over to reduce the weight.

As for how it works, thats a long one, Real Robots Magazine did a 3 issue article on it but in a nutshell it only has 3 motors inside, 2 for the drive, 1 for the weapon. The Weapon motor is right at the back and has a electronic clutch attached to either side, on for the lifter and one for the crusher. The Crusher is chain driven to a 20:1 worm gear inside the arm with the worm wheel attached to a ball screw, the nut has 2 levers attached to it which then attach to the jaws, this arrangement gives approx 1:1.5 leaverage (15mm of movement on the ball screw gives 10mm on the tips of the jaws). The lifter is a little more complex but basically has a 400:1 gearbox connected to a 20mm shaft that then has 2 sets of chains (a further 2:1) that lift the arm from both sides.

The electronics to control it now have 2 sperate DX6 2.4GHz receviers (one for the weapon and one for the drive), the drive one connects to an interface/mixer board that can be reprogrammed to how my brother preferrs to drive it, It also controls the acceleration & deceleration of both the stright and steering controls at different rates. The weapon has the same interface/mixer board but with adtional functions enabled for the 4 limit switchs and 2 clutches to overide the controls if it will damage the robot (when it works) and to engage the clutches at the correct times depending on the transmitter stick postions and limit switchs.

Have looked at doing a Little Nipper, with the increase to 13.6kg I think its more realistic to build a competative one, weve talked about it a few times and who knows oneday we might just have a go but no certain plans yet.

Craig, you should know me better that that, I would never knowingly attack another robot after cease, but sometimes its hard to here it so apologise if I did. I would like to know how we managed to damage Tanto as I didnt think it was possible with all that armour you have. As for the weight, well we are always going to use the full weight allowed at events, and as long as it is allowed we will use it, there are far worse fat robots around. Bet you wouldnt have said that if you had a robot with CO2 in it :)

That all sounds very complex :mrgreen:

Personally, my favorite fights you fought in were the Top 8 fight against Beast, and the two fights against Iron Awe 5.
The first one was good because it was very evenly matched and showed the best of both machines and was very exciting.
The two Iron Awe 5 fights are up here because it showed Big Nipper at its best. Iron Awe 5 is a fantastic robot and you just beat it no problem. And then you beat it again to show it wasnt luck, but skill.

As for Craigs sculprious comments (:angry:) Big Nipper isnt overweight for good reasons - they now they would be disqualified, they prepare BEFORE they go to events to check they are under limit and can survive robots like Kronic, Storm 2 and THZ if theyre there. If they werent underweight or on the weight limit, how would they have won the UK Champs this year, as well as RobotsLive! in Leicter (how do you spell it?:blush:) and multiple awards?

Anyway, well done on winning the champs and good luck for next year and have a happy Christmas :proud:

(Message edited by paulc on December 12, 2007)

Iron Awe 5 was a very good machine, but in both fights it snapped the shaft of a drive motor which casued it to loose drive, we used to have the same motors in big nipper and have had the same problem with them as well. If it was not for this it would have certainly been even more interesting fight.

How much does Big Nipper weigh Mark?

Paul the limit is 100kg anything over that is overweight simple including with Co2

Mark it was 05, you attacked Tanto side on when i parked it the only moving going on was posistioning to be turned off, you got Tanto end on end and bent the front and back plates in, damaging 2 nicad packs the roboteq, and also bent the 5mm plates to the point where we had to remake the aluminium bulkheads over the winter.

Never been in the arena with you since then thats why

luckily the breaks in the nicad packs were across the terminals no cells were penitrated and didnt short, the roboteq was jus flattened out abit but the panels were bent beyond repair we hammered them flat but they jus snapped, so they need to be replaced
Damage in a fight is to be expected but once stu hits the cease button you dont attack anymore, id spent the fight pushing Beast and TAN around then Big Nipper did that,
Was not impressed at all thought better of big nipper

Edgehog was seriously battered at least 6 times by Thor after the cease in the UK champs, but we forgive them becuse were sure they never heard the cease... we barely did and we were stood closer to the shouting.
I know mistakes can happen, but wont comment further as I do not know what happened with Tanto.
In my opinion, Big nipper is right up there with Razer, and everyone Im sure knows how much I love that robot.

think we need a loud noise like when the pit opens. then it would resolve your problems. sure the event organisers can sort something out quite easily.

(Message edited by ady on December 12, 2007)

james i remember that and you are right i didnt hear cease be called. i didnt hear anything as i think most roboteers will agree there is a zone to which you enter and the world around you becomes a complete blank especially in full combat competition. i remember another fight where ripper was about to flip envy oota but i said to him please dont as it would damage the ram because it was broken at the time. so i forfeit the match. jonno then tried to do his party piece and flip over the pit but landed in it. after the fight i was protesting that jonno was in the pit before i was immobile for 30 seconds. completly forgot i forfeit the match. still jonno reminded me all too soon. :) big nipper is my favourite robot on the circuit and beat envy well at the champs :)

Having fights with the Nipper team in nearly all weightclasses I will say they are very good sports and would never deliberatly damage robots after a cease is called. I am 100% sure it was an accident.

the only problem i have with the big nipper guys is their robots are too good :lol:

You got a point there Adrian. :)

Big Nipper is probably the best in the country; it€™s made 3 out of 4 Robots Live! finals this year and is currently ranked as our number 1 seed. I remember seeing Nipper for the first time at one of our events several years ago, I think it was the fist time it had ever been out, and no-one believed it would work or be affective, how wrong we all were!

Ive lost count how many times theyve beat us but I always enjoy fighting them. They are one of the most sporting teams on the circuit, they actually gave us the ram that€™s in Merlin, also Alphas Ti and loads of other stuff, not too mention the advice.

Although I will point out, the reason Nipper is in bits in the photo on the first post, was due to Merlin :) Unfortunately they got their own back by popping our tyre in the following demo :sad:

They have never beaten Turbulence, only fought them 2 or 3 times though, and never since they restarted having two controllers. Nothing against Graeme, because I know how difficult it is driving and operating two weapon channels at the same time.

What did Merlin do to Big Nipper?

For a few years it was 101.9kg(ish) on Jonnos scales, but really depended on the mood the scales were in. These days it is below 100kg, belive it or not we can add or remove panels to alter the weight the extra couple of kilos does give an advantage and if you are allowed to use it then why not. I wonder if I can pass the blame onto Graeme, maybe he was driving it by himself that time :), but seriously I dont remember doing that amount of damage to tanto but I do know we have got hold several times in the past.

Also remember using big nippers jaws to get the tire of the rim to replace the inner tube after we poped it :sad:.

Hi all, My recollections of the UK champs are that we were very lucky to have won. I think the best fight we had was probably the closest fight we had, that being the fight against Beast if not for the arena hammer I am quite sure we would have been thrown out in that fight, until the judges decided I didnt really know who had won.

I also feel that we were very lucky against Iron Awe 5 him being unlucky to break down with the same fault in both our fights although he must have got it fixed to go on and to do have done so well in the winter tour.

I think the luckiest fight in the competition for us must have been the fight against Envy after being lucky enough to have put him on his back with his weapon activated rendering him inactive. Then after Shane capitulated - now theres a word - we righted him and after he chased us round like we were a dog on heat for 2 minutes then threw us out of the arena.

Also remember using big nippers jaws to get the tire of the rim to replace the inner tube after we poped it :-(.
not on tanto, we never had pneumatic wheels

when i come back ill take on nipper with new tanto (i have anti nipper device) and even end no end u wont damage it, put this in the past, wont change how i feel about the damage done but its a start

Has it fought Thz yet? I seem to think it has...yet I cant remember it doing so...

If it has, a vid would be appreciated.

Those claws look like they can hook around the axe and stop it from working, and then just drag Thz wherever it wants. :)

BN beat THz in the final i think?

Did he? Hmm...havent seen any vids of the championship. :sad:

Big Nipper beat THz in the Uk champs, and in Hemel Heampstead the day afer.

Was talking about Merlins Tyre at the London Expo. Anti nipper device sounds interesting, any clues?

a pit :)

For what its worth, Pressure beat THZ (semi) and BN (final) at Hemel Hempstead.
Nice to beat two of my favorite bots in one event!

Indeed Mike, you went home with the title in the heavies and the feathers that day.

Still dont see any vids of Big Nipper vs. Thz...:S

its on the uk champs dvd

havent seen it since tho my dad keeps 4gettin to get the dvd

we will also have a rematch one day :P

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=1NTYIjDPTVQhttp://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=1NTYIjDPTVQ

There you go Kody :)
From the Welsh Championship in April

Thanks Jamie! :)

Man, that sucks that Thz lost the axe in the middle of the fight. :sad: Good job Mark Lumb and Big Nipper though. Actually got under Thz and flipped it, which many, I think, failed to do. :)