Jibril - EXR Colchester
Another one of those long drives again. Took 5 hours getting here and as near as makes no difference 10 hours getting home. I got diverted from the A14 onto the M25/M1, then an accident on the M1 blocked everyone up and then the M6 between junction 14-15 was shut too. Like Portsmouth and Burgess Hill, this is one of those "all weekend or nothing" events for me.

Got to Colchester and setup on a table. In terms of MWs, we were only having whiteboards this time so in with You Little Ripper, Backlip and Gaston. Anyway, got ready by threadlocking the output gear on the 1st stage and fiddling with the TX controls to limit the end points. The hope was that it would resolve the control issues I have been having with this robot.

The first fight proved the basic idea of the end points worked. It wasn't wheelspinnng as much, a little too much, turning felt too slow but the forwards/backwards motion was OK. What wasn't was the Scythe. I did a test beforehand, Sycthe moves. In the arena, nothing. Got lined with Gaston, nothing. Then I got flipped and you know how this goes by now. Ended up being flipped OOTA by You Little Ripper.

The damage was as follows:
  • The Scythe gear shaft was bent in two places. Ended up having to cut the shaft to get the gear off. The new mount held up though.
  • The grub screw I replaced on the drive fell out so lost drive on one side.
  • My hopes and dreams. :S


After a bit of time to cool off, found a replacement threaded shaft, cut the old one up and rushed to get the new shaft mounted. Managed to get it on just before the show started along with the drive again. I readjusted the end points again but alas, the Scythe still wasn't firing. I spotted that the gears were not meshing and despite repeated efforts, it wouldn't mesh.

The second fight went better. With no weapon, I rammed Gaston several times, taking a few blows from the spinning disc. Backflip then flipped me onto my back and tried to right me. In the end, this worked but then one of the battery leads fell out. Now, if this was a single battery to the weapon or drive, this would be "better" because it wouldn't affect the other circuit. However, these batteries are in series driving both the weapon and drive so when the lead came out, it killed both.

Still, Jibril wasn't as badly hurt as the first fight. The Scythe came out relatively intact and once the lead was reinserted, the drive was fine.

I'll be bringing this robot to BotFest 3 along with the frame for Jibril 2.0. The only change I might make is to increase the bore on the mount to drop the output gear down a little so it meshes properly. After BotFest 3, the internals of this 1.3 version is being moved to 2.0.