Which events happen in England?

[Daniel Vernall]

Hi all,

I'm a newcomer hoping to start work on my robot over the summer. You can see my build diary here:
https://www.fightingrobots.co.uk/thr...er-first-build

But I'm struggling to find information about light/middleweight events. The events section of the forum is pretty out of date and the FRA events page is completely empty. I understand that COVID threw a spanner in the works, but it seems like people have started attending events again now.

How do you all know about the events? It seems like people hear about them at previous events and by word of mouth. Is there no FRA timetable or event calendar? (If not, it would be great to have one. Even open to community editing.)

From the events I can see it looks like Ant, Beetle and Featherweights get lots of events - I imagine that's because they're a bit easier to contain, so event organisation is less work/cost. But also heavies are run by Extreme Robots and another one that I can't find.

Does that mean there's no light/middleweight events being run at the moment?

If possible, does anyone mind listing some events here and their websites/rules/calendars for newcomers, as to a newcomer it seems pretty dead (and I'm sure that's not the case!) so it might put people off from investing themselves into something without a community.

I may be completely off-base and have missed something staring me in the face, so if that's so just point me in the right direction please!

[Mr Manuva27]

Hey Daniel,

https://bristolbotbuilders.com/calendar.html is the most up to date and the one most of the UK use (they also have a lot of other good resources for beginners, including rulesets for the most common events).

Unfortunately though, you are correct on light/middleweights. There are no dedicated events.

Lightweight is a dead class. Middleweights had a brief revival a few years ago due to lack of bots at heavyweight shows, however this has now changed and middleweights don't have anywhere to fight apart from being thrown in with heavyweights at Extreme Robots shows.

As for community, I recommend the BBB Facebook group and the Out of the Arena Discord:

https://discord.gg/oota
https://www.facebook.com/groups/BristolBotBuilders

and because I'm the chairman and therefore biased, Robodojo's discord and other socials are through the Linktree underneath this post.

[Ocracoke]

Middleweights had a brief revival a few years ago due to lack of bots at heavyweight shows, however this has now changed and middleweights don't have anywhere to fight apart from being thrown in with heavyweights at Extreme Robots shows.

For MWs, the issue is that there hasn't been a lot of continued interest in the weight class, same with the LWs. Being one of the few active MW participants, the lack of interest from others has meant that yes, we are now only a preshow event at EXR and in with HWs at RL but the more that do come, the more likely a MW only fight and/or event may occur.

I had been tempted to run a MW only show at BotFest (still am) but that needs investment and interest.

[Daniel Vernall]

Thanks Manuva,

That link to the Bristol Botbuilders calendar is great! Their website is great, I've bookmarked it for later. And thanks for all the other links!

Shame about the light and middleweight categories, it seems people either challenge themselves to squeeze into feather and keep it small, or they go all out and build a heavy and a trailer to tow it to events!

[Daniel Vernall]

Thanks Ocra, it is sad to see not many middleweights around, as light/middleweight seems a bit more forgiving than feathers with weight, but less overwhelming than a full-on heavy.

I'm trying hard to squeeze Creep down to a feather design, maybe with a 33% weight bonus, like shufflers seem to get at BBB events. We'll see how possible it is!

[Ocracoke]

Thanks Ocra, it is sad to see not many middleweights around, as light/middleweight seems a bit more forgiving than feathers with weight, but less overwhelming than a full-on heavy.

I am going to disagree with this. MWs might be half the weight limit but they are an order of magnitude more difficult than FWs to build and maintain and if being honest, MWs can be as big as HWs so have the same sort of space requirements in terms of storage and transport. By the time you factor in the costs of the parts and materials as well to fight in the class, I can see good reason why MWs are often a overlooked class.

That being said, my preference is still fight in the MW class rather than build up my existing MW or new MW to a HW. I often ride solo to these events and lugging a MW around is challenging (a HW damn near impossible) and I prefer the challenge of building within the much tigher limit.

[Daniel Vernall]

That's interesting to hear! Maybe some events could do what Battlebots (And Gemini in the early Robot Wars seasons) does and let two MWs team up and share the 110kg in a HW battle

[Ocracoke]

They already have done in greater or lesser respects I personally don't mind fighting HWs single handedly - it's been done before.

[Mr Manuva27]

I'm trying hard to squeeze Creep down to a feather design, maybe with a 33% weight bonus, like shufflers seem to get at BBB events. We'll see how possible it is!

Most FW UK (Robodojo, Fightfest) events allow 50% bonus for shufflers, 100% for walkers. BBB have a lower class arena that can't handle spinners, etc, so only do 33% bonus to avoid larger bots being thrown in to the walls.

[Ocracoke]

Indeed - it comes down to the EO's judgement. I run a 5% over rule for the Ants at Botfest in terms of size and weight to make it more appealnig to newcomers.