Fight 4 VS. Saw Loser:

The second day of filming started with significantly less stress than the first. My heat final matchup put me against Saw Loser (Alex Mordue), a rather poetic final opponent for the heat given that Alex was the one who gave me the brushless ESC’s last time that gave Léim Thart its new effective drive. The press-on wheels that I had been using had started to loosen quite a bit (foreshadowing), so I switched to a spare set, and was able to print a new wagglestick holder to replace the one that broke last fight thanks to Chris Danby actually having a 3D printer with him at filming. All I could hope for was to last until the pit was available, and hope to get Saw Loser in, but it was always gonna be a gamble.


Fight starts at 48:24

The fight began, and things looked good; I was able to outdrive Saw Loser due to his gyro, and even managed to get it turned over. It recovered fast however, and one hit from that weapon left me stranded on my back, unable to move. Alex was a good sport and tried to right me again, but the fight was basically over from there, and so the win for Saw Loser was achieved. Aside from some nicks in the armour though, the bot basically suffered no damage, and due to the format I still had a chance to bring it back through the Rumble Bee!

Fight 5 VS. Rust In Pieces, Phoenix, Claws 2, Jay, Daedalus:

I was feeling pretty confident in having a good tussle with the other control bots in the match, but having the most destructive vert in Phoenix (Ralf Schneider) and the most destructive horizontal in Daedalus (Cosmin Gorgovan) really offered a challenge in deciding who to go for much like the redemption fight earlier (bonus fact: the Shark Setrakian joke you see in the episode was the second take, the first got a bigger laugh, but required a retake so couldn’t be used).


Fight starts at 18:56.

I started immediately trying to stop Daedalus from getting up to speed, though unfortunately one of the hits it managed to get on me managed to get underneath the side armour and clip the left side of the drive, crippling the bot for the rest of the fight. From here I was able to crab-walk, hoping I could outlast the other competitors and stay aggressive enough to win a judges decision if it came to that. All the crab-walking put a lot of pressure on the 3D printed wheels though, and after a while, the hub rounded out, giving me no way to generate motion, and Léim Thart was finally eliminated from the competition after surviving a surprising amount of time in the rumble.


Léim Thart post-Daedalus.

Though it doesn’t look like too much happened, quite an amount of damage was done by Daedalus in that last match. Outside of the bite marks in the HDPE, the drive motor mounts on the left side had cracked, the weapon motor mount had bent from the shocks, and the drive bulkhead mounting bolt was actually pulled through the HDPE base. This was all repairable, but it showed that Daedalus was no joke, and that I’d need better armour in the future to stand a chance against machines like it. I actually managed to get the bot back working for a potential fight in the international special, but that opportunity never came to be, which was understandable given the time constraints (AnnieRUOK definitely should have gotten one though imo).


The cracked custom motor mount.


the front of the bot where one of the bolts had been pulled through.

Conclusion:

Bugglebots 2019 went a lot better for me than last year, and I had an absolute blast over there both in and out of fights. Bristol is a lovely place with lovely people, and the improvements made to the competition and the show were plain to see. While the springs didn’t work quite as well as I’d hoped, I at least had a bot with an active weapon in the four-bar, and the drive system outperformed all expectations I had for it. I intend to give springs one more chance one day, but I’m going to try out some different designs for the near future that will hopefully be more effective in future live events. This iteration of Léim doesn’t actually stop with this event though, as there’s one more part of the story left over…


One last beer I picked up before leaving Bristol. Tasted good, and 10/10 presentation.