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- [00:00]
A
From Cincinnati, Ohio and Bowie, Maryland, this is behind the Bots, the podcast that brings you the stories and the people behind the bots. I'm Jake.
- [00:12]
B
And I'm Brandon.
- [00:14]
A
And today we have in game co captain Jack Barker. He's tuning in from New Zealand all the way. It's a different day over there. That's how far away it is. It's tomorrow even. He's tuning in from the future to have us on the podcast. We'll wrap up the show with this week's installment of Robots around the World. If you like our show, please rate and review us on Apple, Google Play. By the way, tune in Castbox Player FM and Podbean. Follow us on Facebook BehindTheBots and tell a friend we appreciate you coming to the live stream. We appreciate your support. Brandon, what's going on in Combat Robotics this week?
- [00:55]
B
Oh, so this week in Combat Robots, it's a very central USA kind of week. We have seven events occurring sort of in the more central usa. One event in the UK and then one really big event over Netherlands. So first of all, in Oklahoma City, Discover Fest Flights of the Museum will be hosting 31 ants and beetles. In Provo, Utah, there'll be 24 ants, beetle ants, plants and beetles competing at the bot spot in their very first tournament. In Lincoln, Nebraska, the Big Red Brawl will occur with 24 ants and beetles as part of the ongoing Merka season. And going to Michigan and Ottawa Lake. First, the Smirk Southeast Michigan Robot Kerfuffle will be hosting 39 ants and beetles. And then over in Fitchburg, there'll be 62 ants and beetles as part of the September smackdown in Auburn, Alabama, where Eagle Comet Robotics will be hosting 16 ants, plants and beetles. And then, excuse me. And then in Portland, Oregon, Control PDX will be hosting Chaos at Cathedral park with 32 ants, plants and fairies heading over across the pond to the UK. In Newcastle, infosec battlebots will be continuing their season. A38 robot fighting. And then finally in Eindhoven, I hope I'm saying that right. Netherlands, the Dutch Robo Games be going on all weekend featuring beetle weights, six kilogram and feather weights, including Team Monsoon's own hurricane. Get details on this event and more@robot combatevents.com builders db.com and bristlebotbuilders.com now we're heading to our interview with Jack Parker. Jack, how you doing?
- [02:33]
C
How's everyone else doing today?
- [02:36]
B
Jack, I guess doing pretty good yesterday.
- [02:41]
A
Yeah, you're in the future.
- [02:45]
B
How's it like in the future? Is it brighter?
- [02:47]
C
It's very, very rainy and windy today. It's quite miserable.
- [02:55]
A
That means it's going to rain here tomorrow. Okay. So for some of us, we're Norwalk Zoomers. Okay. We came up not. BattleBots is ancient history. I mean, it happened forever ago. Who are you? What do you do? What's your background? What's your story?
- [03:17]
C
Yeah, so I guess I'm one of those old guys that's been around for a while now, but my team was in game on the TV show BattleBots when that was a thing. There's sort of a team of seven us that would go. Nick and I would captain it. I drive the robot, and in game, done quite well. We've won the World Championship in 2020 on BattleBots, and then we won the Golden Bolt tournaments the two years after that. So, yeah, got a couple of pieces of hardware on the shelf.
- [03:54]
A
Does the bolt thread into the nut?
- [03:57]
C
Yes, both bolts thread into the nut. We had to try them, but because they're anodized, we only did it once, and we're like, that's. That's enough. We don't want to stretch.
- [04:10]
B
Okay. I like how you can say both bolts because it did the golden bolt, and then was it most destructive?
- [04:17]
C
Two golden bolts.
- [04:18]
B
Yeah, two golden. Oh, that's right. You're just. That's right. You're just that cool. Nice.
- [04:28]
A
This story of success, it wasn't always like this, though. It's a storied history. So what was. You also hold a record that we talked about earlier.
- [04:42]
C
It's not a current record, but at the time, we had the longest losing streak in BattleBots history. So we went from winning, like, two fights when we first started in our very first season to, like, winning to, like, losing, like, seven in a row, which. Which at the time was the longest losing streak because the robots that were losing even harder weren't sticking around. So it was quite hard to lose seven fights. I think a couple people might have beaten us out for that now, but then, yeah, we went from that straight into basically winning the giant nut, which is kind of fun.
- [05:25]
B
Man, that's. That's an insane run. You guaranteed that you learned a lot, and then you're like, okay, lean forward in the chair and kill your body in one in, like, a straight run. That's nice. That's pretty good.
- [05:39]
C
Well, I'd rather do it all together, too. You know, let's do all our learning.
- [05:43]
B
Exactly.
- [05:44]
C
Finals and lose, or make it to the semi finals and lose. Let's just lose all the fights to start With.
- [05:49]
B
Yeah, exactly. Expectations are on the ground. No one has to be like, oh, I can't believe they only got this far this time. They're like, man, they're still around. And you're like, yeah, surprise. And then you just, just show all that learning in a very beautiful way.
- [06:06]
C
Yeah.
- [06:09]
A
What was, what was it like? So how do you even get a robot into the country? What does that process look like?
- [06:20]
C
So, I don't know. Not many people know this, but before we went to BattleBots, we went to this competition in China, and we had to fly the heavyweight in bags. So we, we flew like, 17 checked bags. It was like one and a half heavyweights. It was just enough stuff to get by. And then we went to BattleBots. This last time, things have changed. We send, like, 6,000 pounds of gears and a real big crate. All of our tools go. They come pick it up on a big truck, and they fly it over there. So basically, everything we need goes. The only restriction is we need to build a box that's strong enough to hold all the weight. So. Yeah.
- [07:07]
A
How much? So when you're, when you're planning your cost out, like you. Shipping cost, I mean, what are we talking about here? For £6,000 international to and from, I
- [07:21]
C
think it's about $30,000 each way, so. But thankfully, we don't, we don't cover that, which is why we're very grateful that BattleBots has enough budget to bring us to the competition, because we realize we're probably more expensive than most other teams just on that alone.
- [07:39]
A
Yeah.
- [07:39]
C
Yeah.
- [07:40]
A
Wow. Yeah, because that's. That is a whole. That is a whole robot. $30,000.
- [07:48]
C
Yeah.
- [07:50]
B
Heavyweight scale is terrifying.
- [07:51]
A
Jake, again, I'm a Norwalk Zoomer. This is all. This is all new.
- [07:59]
C
Confident in your carry.
- [08:01]
A
No, I, I. Listen, listen. This is, this is, this is what I know. Look at. I just pick it up and we throw it in the suitcase. We're done. Yeah, it's no big deal. Don't ask how, how the 30s get there, though. On that topic, one of the questions in the discord was, wait, when are you coming to nhrl?
- [08:21]
C
Dude, with. I've thought about it. I've been up to the States a couple times the last couple years, but unfortunately, the dates just haven't quite lined up. And honestly, I'm very much out of practice when it comes to fighting robots, so I'm kind of scared I'm going to go up there and get my ass whooped. So, you know, I, I feel like I've got to Build one in New Zealand and. And iterate it a bit before I can justify bringing a robot over. Yeah.
- [08:52]
A
If only you had a featherweight arena where you could test stuff.
- [08:56]
C
If only.
- [09:00]
A
Why don't you take us on a tour? So where are you right now?
- [09:03]
C
So I'm actually at Robot Rampage. So for those who don't know, Nick and I started this company doing all sorts of robot stuff, but we have the space where we run featherweights and beetles and we build robots and stuff. So I'm currently there. Yeah.
- [09:25]
A
Do you want to show us around?
- [09:28]
C
I'd love to.
- [09:28]
A
Yes, that's what I was inviting you to. Yeah, go ahead and show us around. Okay, cool.
- [09:34]
B
Live tour.
- [09:35]
A
Live tour.
- [09:36]
C
Live tour. Where we are right now. This is like our production booth. It's a bit of a state, so if you tune into any of our live streams, we have like five people in here doing things from graphics to switching cameras to mixing audio. So this is their little room.
- [09:55]
B
Nice.
- [09:57]
C
There's probably nothing compared to the NHL one, which, you know, the NHL Zoomers are used to. Out here.
- [10:08]
B
That arena is very nice, though.
- [10:10]
C
Yeah, it's quite big for a featherweight arena. It's six by six meters, which is what, 18 foot? 18ft? Yeah. So that's. That's that we originally built it as a test arena for. In game 19. Yeah. How big are the NHRL arenas? They look a lot smaller, but. Yeah. So.
- [10:35]
B
Well, yeah, they have, like, the bumpers internally, so it kind of shrinks it a little bit. So I think at their peak, they're probably around 16.
- [10:42]
C
Okay.
- [10:44]
B
Like 16 foot for the internals. Yeah, Yeah. I mean, it's still really nice. That's. That's a great amount of space for anything. Makes sense. You mentioned endgame test arena as well.
- [10:54]
C
So especially in there right now. Ready to go. So we beat up. We beat up that barrel with it. People pay. I'm gonna drive it.
- [11:08]
B
So. So when we come in and drive it, that, like. I was gonna say, like, people come in and drive it. So that's part of the. Part thing you do. People can come down there and drive Endgame.
- [11:17]
C
Yeah, yeah. They can come down. We don't get the weapon going, but they get three minutes to beat up that barrel with the drive as much as they can, which is scary enough as it is, just without the weapon spinning even.
- [11:29]
B
Yeah, nice.
- [11:33]
A
Yeah.
- [11:34]
C
And then. Yeah, yeah, this. This down here, we sort of set up. We've got a corporate event this evening, so we've been rebuilding robots and stuff, so it's a bit of a state. But normally this, this is all TED seating, so people come in and watch. Same down here for the featherweights. We got our. Our bar and our kitchen with our liquor license. So, you know, you can come have a beer and get a bit drunk while you're watching robot fights.
- [12:04]
A
So important.
- [12:08]
C
And through here is where we actually build robots. So we have our little.
- [12:11]
B
Oh, wow.
- [12:14]
C
But this is where we would build in game if BattleBots were to happen.
- [12:17]
A
Again, please.
- [12:21]
C
All sorts going on. There's featherweight getting built. So this is sort of our little shop space. We have a little bit more space around here, but it's filled up with a kuka, which we need to get rid of.
- [12:37]
A
Do you not use it at all?
- [12:39]
C
No. It was originally going to be the bartender, But the kitchen situation got way too complicated, so we decided to hire people to do that instead. And we're going to get rid of the robot.
- [12:55]
A
That is. That is a shame. That is one thing that would be cool for a robot to see to do.
- [13:04]
C
Yeah, yeah.
- [13:07]
B
I love, I love that idea because you have your workshop there, but you also are using it, so it's. I mean, it's generating some form of income, obviously, having events there and people are to do kind of stuff. But then also, I imagine even you guys are just there. That also makes, like a very nice space to instantly learn. Like if you're, let's say, spinning up endgame to do a test for BattleBots. If it came back, you could do that in that box reasonably. You have to do like the process of others where it's like, go to like a parking lot and stay in a thousand feet away and hope for the best or anything like that. That's really cool.
- [13:38]
C
Yeah, we, we probably still wouldn't hit anything in that arena, but we. We could spin up, especially with that dummy weapon that doesn't have a tooth and drive around, do testing in there. So
- [13:53]
A
what's the Lexan look like as far as layers?
- [13:58]
C
We just have one layer on this one of like half inch.
- [14:02]
A
Okay.
- [14:03]
C
So it's not quite as thick as the NHL one, but we have that steel kick play around the bottom, which takes the brunt of the force. So.
- [14:15]
B
Yeah, yeah, definitely makes sense. And then it has that nice, like for a triangular shape to it as well. So I imagine it's very helpful, people sort of looking into it. Like, it's a nice sort of viewing angle kind of parallel to their space.
- [14:29]
C
Supposed to kind of look like a bit of a spaceship vibe.
- [14:33]
B
Yeah, that's a good way to describe it, yeah, it definitely like, it's one of the more unique shapes I think I've seen most arenas because I think everybody else, you know, pretty economically makes it basically a box and calls it a day. This has got another level of kind of like, kind of pizzazz.
- [14:50]
C
Yeah, it definitely made it harder to build and it makes it hard to shoot cameras through. Oh, so much, so much worse when, when you're on like a 45 degree angle. So we learned that the hard way, but.
- [15:05]
B
Oh.
- [15:06]
A
Huh.
- [15:07]
B
I mean, what. So I guess what inspired that shape? Was it specifically to be cool or did you have like that mentioned viewing angle or recording or whatever in mind when you were doing that in the first place?
- [15:20]
C
I think it was mostly to look cool. And we did it when we did our, our Beetle weight arena. So we're like, we'll make it the same. Yeah.
- [15:30]
B
Ah, nice. Gotcha. Gotcha. So I guess sort of going with that like the robot rampage events. So I know it was a few weeks ago, right? Like I forget the exact date, but it wasn't that, that long ago, was it?
- [15:51]
C
Yeah, it was like, like six weeks ago now, I think. Yeah.
- [15:54]
B
Yeah, okay. It's about six weeks ago. Yes, that was pretty cool. So I, I watched it, I tried, I mean, much as I could. Time difference is always a little tricky in some way, but I really did, I really enjoyed specifically because you had the mix of both New Zealand and Australia. So I saw both of them coming around and doing fights with it. But also some of the robots there just look just very legit, you know, like some of those machines I think go anywhere in the world and still they're absolutely, absolutely be competitive and then really seeing those play out, that's pretty cool. So how was that like hosting that event?
- [16:30]
C
Yeah, it's been really cool to see the like the New Zealand scene get behind the featherweights. So that was our fourth event in a year and the scene is growing every time. I think, you know, the first event we had like 12 robots or something and James came from Australia, so we had like 13 all up. This most recent one, I think we had like 18 or 20 and it's getting bigger and bigger each time, so. And not all the robots came this time. So people are building robots, they're getting better. And you know, the people that our regulars that are coming to watch are saying as well, you know, every time we come, the, the competitors get better and the fights get better. So I think the New Zealand scene's moving pretty quickly and people are learning pretty fast at the moment.
- [17:19]
B
No, that's, that's exciting. It also kind of mirrors what we've been seeing here in the states, the NHL stuff, I think the 30 pounders. Because historically you've only had Motorama as like a main east coast event and then a Robo games over in the west coast. But since probably after the BattleBots reboot when things started picking up again, Manturell obviously when it first showed up doing big bot fights now 30s get to fight like six or seven times on the east coast every year. And then they have the Scar events over in the west coast too. Like they're, they're terrifying. It, it's kind of impressive seeing how much they can spike up in skill over time. And it kind of makes them very close, like much closer to BattleBots I think, and what they were like before at a time period. Like what do you think about the 30s versus the heavyweights, sort of how they're presented since you kind of have both on display there?
- [18:13]
C
Yeah, actually 30 pound is my favorite class. The reason for that is it's small enough to put in a suitcase. You don't need to fly 6,000 pounds of gears to your event. And it's, they're big enough to actually do real engineering, right. Like people CNC machining, that 3D printing, that designing. And they're big enough that things that are just, you just buy off the shelf don't work right. So you actually have to think about it. You have to make design decisions and work out how you're going to build your robot. Where I find like a beat away, for example, you can buy parts, which is great as, as a way to get into the sport that will just work right. You can, you can buy modes, you can buy speed controllers and if you buy the right ones, you'll, you'll have a great robot. Where you get to the 30 pound class, you've got to really start thinking you've got, you know, trade offs to make and things like that. So that's why I really like that class. It's much closer to the sort of heavyweight challenge.
- [19:13]
B
Oh, I love them. I love them for the exact same reason. I think, I think that probably some of them, I think it's actually kind of one of those lessons. I think it's kind of implicit in HRL at least and how we had the different three 12s and 30 classes there you kind of see like, okay, the 30 pound builders. It's almost like a, like a slightly different culture around it because you have to be so knowledgeable. About the 30, because you can't slap stuff together, it kind of forces a certain level of expertise that goes with it. And I think that that creates an interesting relationship because I think that main. I think 30 pound builders have historically, because of that connection, one battlebot stuff especially think like a good portion of battlebots teams have 30s that go with it. But also I see them doing a lot of talking as well, like other people. Like, if generally a three pound builder is trying to learn stuff and they're like, I want to do 30s 30 pound builders kind of like, let me teach you like engineering to go with that. Sort of like encouraging and sort of mentoring with that too. And I found that pretty, pretty helpful and pretty insightful with it as well.
- [20:19]
C
Yeah. And the like, the level of forces you get with a 30 pound is just insane as well. Like a beta weight kind of looks like it might hurt you, you know, like it might chop your finger off or something. But you watch like a fight like, you know, we had obliterated versus bad blood last time at Roman Rampage, which was insane. And you think if I was in there with them, I'd be dead. You know, like it's, it's a different level of like, of course and noise and. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [20:48]
B
Like they're, they're concussive. And I think that it's kind of like in BattleBots where like you almost don't, you don't get to appreciate that quite as much at a distance. Like, I'm sure someone looks at the kind of like, oh, it looks very neat. And then it's like, okay, this has enough energy where your arm gone or like your limbs. Yeah, erased. I think that's always like the. Oh, okay. I think like feel that with the shot. I think I was making really, really fun stuff over.
- [21:16]
A
When you guys are so, you know, you guys are both 30 pound builders. When you guys are thinking about problems, and especially with, with endgame as well, going from the longest losing streak in the sport to a championship level robot, what key things about the approach to your problem solving do you think influence, you know, a positive outcome the most? So, you know, what, what do you put in that has good turnaround in terms of your investment versus what you see in terms of success?
- [21:58]
B
Well, Jack, you're at the gas. You should go first. Yes.
- [22:00]
A
Yeah, I can go first.
- [22:02]
C
The first thing that comes to mind is not necessarily sort of design decision, but it's sort of the attitude that our team takes. And we, we look at it as a very scientific thing. We look at fights, we. We go, why do we lose that fight? We don't believe luck exists in the arena. You control your robot. You control the fight. If you lose, it wasn't because you were lucky unlucky. It was because you weren't good enough. And how can you make sure that doesn't happen again? Every time we lose a fight or we win a fight, we look at everything that went right, everything that went wrong. We try and make steps to making sure the things that went right happen again and the things that went wrong don't happen again. That's the main thing that we do. I think that's really helped us rather than like, oh, you know, oh, that component that was unlucky. Like, that won't happen again, you know, because it will. It'll happen again. And it might happen in the championship fund.
- [23:11]
B
Yeah.
- [23:12]
C
So. But, yeah, there's. There's no such thing as luck is sort of my. One of my sayings. Well, as soon as you enter the ring.
- [23:20]
A
Yeah, that's awesome. Because there's other people with, like, the. I've heard the exact opposite thing. So it's cool. You know what I mean? It's just like, oh, that was just unlucky. And it's like, it's cool to hear the exact opposite thing. Yeah, that's a cool take. What specifically do you think changed between your. Your losing streak and then immediately that. That championship run?
- [23:44]
C
Yeah, I think we were losing for different reasons each time because we. We'd look at why we lost, and then we would fix that problem, and then we'd. We'd have another problem. Right. So I think we just sort of ran out of things to go wrong. So by the. By the time so many things had gone wrong, we'd fix so much stuff that there was enough stuff going right that we could start winning matches.
- [24:07]
A
Right.
- [24:09]
C
And because we were fixing things properly, those grimmers weren't coming back. Like when we lost to Saniwachi, for example, we lost the beck that powers the receiver. So next year we turn up, we've got 14 receivers. We don't have any becs. That's the sort of scale we'd go to to fix things. So by the time that we fixed the problem, we were sure it wasn't going to happen again. And then, yeah, things start to go right.
- [24:37]
A
Yeah, every problem gets some level of address. When I was first kind of starting combat, it was in 2021, so it was right after you guys had won the giant nut. And of course. So when I started it was for a senior design college project. So I had to do background research. So part of my background research was I never heard about Endgame before. So I was learning about that robot because you guys had just won everything. So.
- [25:13]
B
So.
- [25:14]
A
But one thing that I remember reading specifically was that metal never touches metal. So what does that mean for you and what does that mean on your alls robot?
- [25:26]
C
Yeah, I'm not sure if it's probably not metal. Never touches metal, but anything external never touches anything internal is probably the better way to say it. So, like, our frame is all bolted together hard, but anything that we attach to the robot, know any armor, forks, wedges, you know, electronics inside the frame, that's all rubber mounted. So basically, like our wedges, for example, you know, they look really tough, and they are. Is a rubber layer between that and the actual robot. So basically, the biggest amount of force that, you know, tombstone or someone like that can give you is going to be absorbed at least a little bit by the rubber. And then because we find that it's actually the really sort of the. It's the peaks of the forces that kill robots and especially the electronics. So if you can take away that sort of edge, flatten it out a little bit, reliability goes, like, through the roof.
- [26:28]
A
How is this. How is this wedge mounted? Sorry, I just realized there's no bolts on it, so I'm.
- [26:38]
C
Yeah, I. I can go grab one if you like.
- [26:40]
A
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, sure.
- [26:47]
C
Sorry. Bear with me.
- [26:48]
B
That's very cool. We're going on a trip. Trip continues.
- [26:53]
C
Okay, I'll show you on the real robot. It's. It's in the ring.
- [26:56]
A
Wow. Endgame tour.
- [27:01]
C
As long as the Internet works in the arena,
- [27:05]
B
we're gonna hope for the best. And then it gets to the glitchy nature.
- [27:09]
A
Wow. Oh, the cage opens up. Interesting. Yep.
- [27:13]
B
He stepped right in.
- [27:14]
A
Yeah.
- [27:15]
B
Now he's sitting right next to Endgame.
- [27:17]
C
Okay, I'm gonna take my headphones off for one sec. I'll be back in one moment.
- [27:21]
B
All right, this is why you joined the stream, guys.
- [27:27]
A
He's literally just pulling up. This banging noise is a barrel that they've been hitting in game with or vice versa.
- [27:39]
B
All right, you should be coming back to us in a moment here.
- [27:44]
C
I'm back to you. So I've just got the in game over. So we're looking at the bottom of it.
- [27:49]
A
Oh, wow. Okay.
- [27:50]
B
Oh, wow.
- [27:52]
C
So in the bottom of the wedges.
- [27:55]
A
Oh, dear.
- [27:56]
C
There's these, like, there's these tabs. Yeah.
- [27:59]
B
So that's.
- [27:59]
C
That's how that all mounted, right? Yeah. And we, we have these. A big pin. It's like a 20 mil pin that goes all the way through.
- [28:08]
A
That's crazy.
- [28:10]
C
And then we have these rubber discs. There's actually some missing in here, but normally this. This area here is filled with rubble.
- [28:18]
A
Yeah.
- [28:19]
C
And there's a rubber tube that runs all the way through as well. So that means when we get hit in that direction, the tube takes the force. And when we get hit in the lateral direction, these big chunky bits take all of the force. So that's where all the, like, force of someone hitting the wedge actually goes.
- [28:39]
B
It's all compliant?
- [28:41]
C
Yeah, that's compliant, yeah.
- [28:46]
A
Wow, that's awesome.
- [28:47]
B
See, this is it.
- [28:48]
A
This is real engineering advice. Yeah.
- [28:54]
C
Secrets here.
- [28:56]
B
Well, it's fine. It's fine. It's not battlebots to worry.
- [28:58]
A
Robert absorbs impact. Insane secret. Interesting. There's a gusset. So there's a gusset structure behind here and then in between. That's awesome. And so is that mounting the same as the fork mounting?
- [29:14]
C
No, the fork mountain is different. It's the same concept, though. There's rubber on every direction that can be hit. I don't think that one has our fork armor on it, that picture. But when we play a vertical, we have like an orange cover on the front. We call it the sock. And behind that there's a layer of rubber. And it's the same concept. There's rubber that takes shock in every direction. Yeah, like that one. I don't like that picture.
- [29:46]
B
Yeah. So, like in the photo is end game. It's like a still shot of Endgame fighting against Minotaur Robot's shadowing up. So it's all the crazy angles and whatnot going on there, but there's a lot of. A lot of details in the front and end game, which is always noticeable, like all these different mounting springs and forks and shapes.
- [30:08]
C
Yeah, there's like our way to win a fight is obvious. Right. Like if we get underneath them, then we control the match and we beat them up. That's. That's basically what we're trying to do in every single match we do. So it's important for us to have a variety of ways to do that. And basically we, we had like four different types of fork or something last time we went. And there's like 16 spots. You can attach things on the front. So there's a lot of combinations of what we can do, which is why it's often different. And we, we spend a lot of time Discussing it. I. I think like before we fought Copperhead last time we discussed it for like four hours before we came up decision and it was still wrong, you know. Yeah.
- [30:57]
B
All you need is a Luke Quinn hopped up on caffeine saying, why don't we spin down and crack it, crack the shack and call it a day.
- [31:04]
C
But you got to put your best foot forward. Right.
- [31:08]
B
So absolutely.
- [31:09]
C
Yeah.
- [31:10]
B
No, this.
- [31:11]
A
Yeah.
- [31:11]
B
Looking at, Looking at the, the image here of end game where you sort of have. Seeing it on the cart with a lot of the forks displayed out. It's. I remember specifically seeing this and it inspired a lot of the mounting options I made on my little 30 pounder where it's sort of face mounted going into a much larger billet of material. The only fear I had then was like, you know, screws and shear and things like that. I love the modularity and configuration ability because now instead of just having the set one shape, now you have the ability like you already said, tons of different configurations and we've seen that. And Hap has been happening in big and small weight classes across the world. Really. Even besides just in heavyweights or even smaller featherweights. So I guess one question that people have actually been having, which is a very famous line. I figure he would say it. So how do you feel about the. The. The classic line, live by the fork and die by the fork?
- [32:04]
A
Oh, no.
- [32:08]
C
Well, it's basically a whole,
- [32:12]
A
you know,
- [32:13]
C
philos philosophy on how to win a fight. Right. If you get under us, you'll win. If we get another you, you'll win. Oh, other way around.
- [32:22]
A
Yeah.
- [32:23]
C
It's whoever gets you under them.
- [32:25]
B
Them under you. Yeah, yeah. So ground game is king. Kind of accept that. It's like a big reality of it.
- [32:32]
C
Yeah. Like we don't need maneuverability. Right. Like I'm happy to sit in the middle of the ring and wait for you to come to me, so. And yeah, which we did in a couple of fights.
- [32:47]
B
What do you think about other machines that don't try to play the ground game? And they sort of have just go for the maximum death. So you have like Ripperoni here, famously with the big old disc. But even bots like Minotaur or Copperhead or even just anti ground game bots, like huge. How do you sort of see them fitting in the ground game heavy world, the heavy meta that we currently have going?
- [33:08]
C
Yeah. It's obviously troublesome for us when people don't want to play our game.
- [33:14]
B
I mean, I want to play do it right.
- [33:18]
C
It's to not play our game. Right. It's to. To beat us at your game, not our game. So the teams that are drums are always hard. We're sort of at an inherent disadvantage as a vertical spinner when we play a drum just geometrically. So we basically have to do something where we'll try and get underneath their drum or deflect their hits or something like that. So it's always a tricky thing for us. And then the anti ground game robots, like huge, for example, like we wouldn't even run a front end, you know, there's no point. So we basically just your most bog standard vertical spinner when we play someone like that, unless we had something special to play them against. So yeah, it's definitely. If you want to be in game, don't play the black ground game because we're pretty good at that. Do something different.
- [34:16]
B
Yeah, so don't play your game. Play my game. And if I can beat you at my game, then I can win. But if I play you at your game, you're probably going to win.
- [34:26]
C
Yeah, yeah.
- [34:26]
A
So we'll get DMCA for this one because this one is a YouTube short. I don't think we'll get DMCA for it, but if the podcast just went audio free for a little bit because we're playing BattleBots clubs. So was. Was Copperhead, was he spinning upside down intentionally or did he just hit it upside down? No, no.
- [34:50]
B
So I remember talking to Luke about actually. Go ahead, Jack. You were there. Never mind.
- [34:53]
C
Yeah, I was gonna say it. They were spinning the right way up until we flipped them over.
- [34:59]
A
Oh, okay. Okay.
- [35:00]
B
Yeah. I remember talking to Luke and the thought was that if as soon as they get inverted and they're upside down, they're not going to waste time gyroing because then they're going to get sniped. So the thought was, well, if we just go right out of the spinning down, we're going to force the argument of is my bigger bearing, bigger shaft. And in that question, they're pretty confident Copperhead win. And so it also didn't give them an quote unquote, obvious vulnerable position or time period that trying to invert itself would. And so that was sort of the strategy and it kind of, kind of worked. I can't believe how many weight violence is.
- [35:39]
A
Yeah, heavyweight balance is the whole terrifying. How many times Copperhead rolls is ridiculous. Just because the frame so narrow as soon as he takes that shot. But he. I see what you're saying. He was able to eat up those forks on the front and contact. The once you're all's weapon was down. He really, he got into those forks and then it was. Was. They were toast. Oh my gosh.
- [36:05]
C
We were holding our own until our weapons stopped. But yeah, like that double force hit just. It literally shattered the rollers and the bearing. Like that'll do it.
- [36:17]
A
And how big of a shaft?
- [36:19]
C
I'm gonna say the weapon, like a 40 or 30. Oh, it's 40, I think.
- [36:24]
B
Yeah, that's 40 millimeter.
- [36:27]
C
Yeah.
- [36:28]
B
40 mil. That's like one and two thirds inch like that.
- [36:35]
A
It's thick and it's a neat. Is it a needle roller?
- [36:39]
C
It's a tapered roller.
- [36:41]
B
Oh, no.
- [36:42]
A
Oh, really?
- [36:43]
B
Even bigger.
- [36:44]
C
Yeah. So the pins in them are like six mil pins, which is like what, quarter inch?
- [36:49]
B
Yeah, yeah, yeah, quarter inch.
- [36:52]
A
Rated for like £6,000.
- [36:55]
B
Nice, man. So that's an idea of the level of force between two 50 pound rope, two 50 pound robots.
- [37:03]
C
Yikes.
- [37:04]
A
Yeah, that's wild. That's wild.
- [37:08]
C
And going back to what I was saying earlier, it's really. I almost said it. I almost said we were real unlucky that they had us upside down. Right. Like, because that shattered our bearing, but next time we come, that won't break our bearings. Yeah, but I, I just caught myself. I almost said, you know, we were so unlucky that they, they were upside down and you know, it was twice the force.
- [37:31]
A
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [37:33]
B
No, no hypocrisy over here.
- [37:34]
A
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. That's so real.
- [37:40]
B
Yeah. So. So, Jack, as far as the robot fighting stuff goes, there's a heavy strategizing and playing that goes into it. And I think one of the big takeaways we're sort of seeing with endgame and I guess other robot, but definitely Endgame for sure. There's like a patience that goes with it that you really have to kind of like grind at it. And so what would you say is like a very good sort of summary as you progress? Like once you hit that winning streak and you got like the championships and the Golden Bolts and things like that, what would you say? What kept you driving? Like you mentioned before, there were failure modes. You figured them out in the, in the losing streak, when you got the winning streak going, how was that progression still able to keep you going?
- [38:24]
C
Yeah, I, I actually think that's a good question. It can be hard to keep the motivation up, especially, you know, we've won the Giant night, we've won two Golden Bolts. The team probably is looking to build something new and, and to solve new challenges. So I'm, I'm not sure if we would bring in game back if BattleBots happened again or if we, if we'd build something new and start that whole process again. But I think what keeps us going is those. Sorry about the compressor.
- [38:59]
B
You're good, you're good.
- [39:00]
C
Those losses to Minotaur and Copperhead do keep us up at night. Right. So I think there's some unfinished business there. We want to prove that we can beat a top level drum robot. So we've got ideas for that and that's mostly what we'll be working on if we come back.
- [39:20]
A
Okay, we're going to push to a break for a couple minutes here and then we will be back with Jack Barker. I think we've got some videos of your event, Robot Rampage. We got New Zealand versus a us. I'm sure that stands for Australia. We will be right back after the break. It was about two minutes.
- [39:41]
C
Cool, thanks. All right,
- [39:55]
A
Foreign, Welcome back. Behind the bots. We are here with Jack Barker from Robot Rampage. You know him from Endgame. He's got two golden bolts, one giant nut. That's right. We're taking a look at a video here. So this is Robot Rampage, NZL vs Aus. So, so what event is this?
- [40:23]
C
So, so this is how we had in August. So basically. So basically we ran a normal featherweight event and at the end we had this what we call a teams match. So basically, five robots come from Australia, five robots come from New Zealand. And you know, the way the match works, the simplest way to explain it is it's sort of like a Pokemon battle where the winning robot has to stay in. And then once the team has all of the robots knocked out, they lose the match. So this is one of the, one of the fights. One of the rules we have is that you have to have four different styles of robot. So you can only have, you know, you might have one vertical spinner, a horizontal spinner, a hammer saw, a lifter. So your team has to be made up of four different styles. So like New Zealand chose to have four robots and then like an extrovert. So they had two verts on the team.
- [41:13]
B
Oh, the fifth ones, like the variable one. Yo. Oh, so
- [41:20]
A
pretty.
- [41:20]
C
A pretty sick overhead hammer saw. Hit that one. Yeah.
- [41:26]
B
Wow. Instantaneous fire.
- [41:27]
A
That's creed crazy. It looks like a bonfire. Wow.
- [41:32]
B
Yeah, that's a lot going now.
- [41:35]
C
So this robot here, coordinator was one of two Hammersaurs on the Australian team. So they opted to have two Hammersaurs rather than Two verts or two horizontals, which was a cool decision. And James sort of explained why they did that in their, in their interview. Just to be different and because they thought the New Zealand teams wouldn't be armored overhead. And it worked out in this fight at least.
- [42:00]
A
Yes, yes, it did.
- [42:02]
B
Very tactical. There's the tube, the air. Air exhaust taking the smoke out of it. Good to see that still coming into play. Very nice. Good equipment there.
- [42:11]
A
Nice. So, okay, I'm a little confused about the format. The.
- [42:16]
B
Yeah, you put.
- [42:17]
A
Okay, so you put. You got a team of four robots. I didn't play Pokemon.
- [42:22]
C
Five robots.
- [42:22]
A
How long was this thing on fire, dude? Oh, my God. Okay, we're five minutes through this video and it's still. Yeah, okay, so, so you put two robots in against each other and then.
- [42:36]
C
So yeah, I'll try and explain it. So like New Zealand chooses a robot to put in of their five of the team of five, which has four different styles of robot in the team. So they might play vertical spinner, they might play their horizontal spinner. They had a lifter, they had a multi bot. So they're going to play one of those robots, right? Australia doesn't know what robot they're going to play. New Zealand doesn't know what robot Australia is going to play. So this first match is completely blind. So New Zealand, they chose to put their lifter in in the first match, right? And then Australia chose to put Perian, which is a vertical spinner, but neither team knew which one the other team was going to put in to start with. So that's always like an interesting sort of tension, right. Like you're looking at the other robots team who they've got available and you're thinking if they play that one, we could play this one. And you're trying to put your best foot forward for the first match, right? And then the way this played out was New Zealand won that first match with their lifter, so their lifter had to stay in the ring pretty much. We give them eight minutes to repair it. So we put a. And a table in the arena. We make a big spectacle of it. Everyone's watching them, oh, do their battery change and things like that.
- [43:49]
A
Whoa, nice.
- [43:51]
B
Like a live servicing as well.
- [43:55]
A
That would stress me the hell out.
- [43:58]
C
Yeah. While they're doing that, Australia is deciding what robot they can put in next. So Australia knows what robot New Zealand is going to play. They know it's going to be the lifter. So they get to choose from their selection what's going to go on next. Right, that's. That's basically the gist of it. So. And then. And then that New Zealand lifter robot ended up playing three fights in a row because it won the second fight, which was against Obliterator, a huge horizontal spinner. And then they had to repair it again in eight minutes. And. And they played a third match, which they lost on judges.
- [44:30]
A
Oh. So this is the live repair happening. So it was very stressed. Bases in the pits.
- [44:36]
C
Yeah.
- [44:37]
A
A beautiful hammer.
- [44:38]
B
And it also matters.
- [44:40]
C
It's such a nice robot, that one.
- [44:42]
A
It really is. It's got that custom hub motor on it. AR blade. That's awesome. That thing's sweet.
- [44:50]
C
Cool.
- [44:51]
B
You also sort of describe. So I'm assuming it also.
- [44:54]
C
And then once our team loses all five robots, they lose the match. So it's takes anywhere between five and nine fights, I think depending on who wins. If someone wins all five in a row, it'll happen a lot quicker. But yeah, the idea is that. That people.
- [45:11]
A
Oh, my gosh. I haven't had my camera showing. Oh, my gosh. I clicked the wrong button. I love the video that I'm watching right now on stream. I'm sorry. Okay, let's go back. All right, Chad. So I'm sorry, I clicked the wrong button. The three camera view and the four camera view are right next to each other. Click the wrong button on my stream deck. I also love. Well, I hope you enjoyed our description that you got a small taste of what it's like to tune into the audio version of this podcast. Yeah. You got a live look at what it's like to be Justin Hunter. So. So he refuses to tune into his stream.
- [45:55]
B
Okay.
- [45:58]
C
So, yeah, it's a very different format.
- [46:00]
A
Yeah.
- [46:02]
C
And the idea is that you'll back a team rather than a robot.
- [46:06]
A
Right.
- [46:06]
C
So, like, if you watch a cricket match or, I don't know, American football match, you're sitting down, you're backing a team for two hours. So you have like two hours to. To hope your team wins. If you watch a Combat Robotics competition, you might get three minutes of action of the team you're backing. Right. So engagement can be pretty hard. So we're trying to solve that problem by creating these teams, having countries face each other and sort of have a different format because it's kind of. I feel like, and this is just my opinion, but I feel like the sport of Combat Robotics has kind of been stagnant for 10 years. It came in hard. It's been around for 25 years now, but we haven't had much development. Right. It's not. It's growing. It's not growing at lightning speeds. So we're hopefully trying to mix things up and do it a little bit differently and create something that's more interesting for people to watch and also to compete in, while also keeping the same sort of carnage is sort of our goal.
- [47:04]
B
Yeah, I like it. I think it's a great idea. I personally want to come fight because that. Yeah, that's kind of a big thought because I remember because like for. For the. Any trail zoomers, the teams.
- [47:18]
C
February, we've got some Americans coming, so America's going to field a team. The Australians will come back, they'll field a team. A couple of other countries are thinking about coming as well. Another big name messaged me this morning, just this morning and said they'll come, but not ready to share that yet. So we're going to have a pretty cool event in February. It's going to be a full teams event, so we'll do like a round robin between the countries.
- [47:44]
B
That'd be pretty cool.
- [47:45]
C
Yeah, they actually. They spent like five minutes of the eight minute repair time just sticking stickers on in this match.
- [47:51]
B
Wait, what? Oh, it's Perry the Platypus.
- [47:55]
A
And this is this gorgeous hub motor that I alluded to the idea, the hub concept of. Yeah, that's a really cool robot.
- [48:04]
C
The hammer saw turrets as well. I don't know if you caught that hammer. So they can. They can swing down on different angles.
- [48:12]
A
Really full 180 or.
- [48:16]
C
I think you can see they've got little slots that can come down in. I'm not sure if it goes for 180, but it can go forward and then out the side. Yeah, it's very cool.
- [48:24]
A
Look at that. Yeah, that's something else. Who's coming from United States?
- [48:31]
C
We're still confirming the full team, but the Vasquez brothers are coming along. They're booked in, so they're gonna captain the American team. And then there's some other people coming as well. Justin Marple from Bloodsport and then a few other people we're trying to convince that it's really. It's time to book their flights. But I think we have enough to. To make sure we have an American team at the moment to face the Aussies and the Kiwis. Yeah.
- [49:03]
B
Oh, sweet.
- [49:04]
A
I'm about to go. I'm about to hear that eagle screech. I'm not very patriotic, but hell, yeah. It's like the Olympics. I'll ride. Dude, Feel that whole Nationalist fervor that I never feel ever current these days. Yeah. I will feel it for robot combat.
- [49:30]
C
Yeah.
- [49:32]
B
Yeah.
- [49:32]
A
That's so cool that you can. You can turn tune into an event for. Oh, that's how the. Whoa. The turrets of bevel gear. Or is that.
- [49:43]
C
It's this. I think the swinging is a bevel.
- [49:45]
A
Oh yeah, it is. Yeah.
- [49:47]
C
Straight out of a grinder, which is crazy.
- [49:50]
B
That's nice.
- [49:51]
A
Awesome. My. My weapon motors bevel. Bevel driven. So I love. Okay, I love a good. I love a good bevel.
- [50:00]
C
Nice. Nice.
- [50:01]
A
Okay, so they've got it. So they've got it Hub motored at the. But the joint itself is an in runner that's strapped to the arm and bevel. That's crazy. Crazy. Yeah.
- [50:17]
C
And this is Karan. He's our Farooq. He does the ring announcing.
- [50:25]
B
That's pretty slick. Yeah.
- [50:27]
C
It's been a long process but every event we're trying to get a little bit better production wise and organization wise. So hopefully every time you tune in something will be improved.
- [50:38]
B
I love it. Do you guys have like a lot of big backing or.
- [50:42]
C
Yeah.
- [50:42]
A
So this is.
- [50:43]
B
Sponsors that support it.
- [50:45]
C
Second fight, I think.
- [50:46]
A
Yeah.
- [50:47]
C
Third fight I think they went through.
- [50:49]
A
So. So he just. He just won the first fight. He set that guy on fire.
- [50:53]
B
Yeah.
- [50:53]
C
I think he won one fight before he played. He caught someone on fire. Oh yeah. His third match that he had to play.
- [51:01]
A
Get him. I love that. I love this hammer saw. This thing is so sick. I want to watch it eat stuff all day. Oh no, it's broken.
- [51:13]
C
Yeah.
- [51:14]
A
Oh, it broke its own arm. The bevel gear failed.
- [51:21]
C
I think this fight was a little bit lackluster.
- [51:26]
A
This is the peak of the sport. I don't know what you're.
- [51:28]
C
Yeah.
- [51:30]
A
You robots with half side drives.
- [51:33]
C
Yeah. And we don't knock people out as liberally as they. As you do in other competitions. So like if you can turn and face your opponent, that's good enough in the robot rampage room.
- [51:42]
A
Yeah.
- [51:43]
C
So matches like these often just sort of continue on for a while.
- [51:47]
A
Yeah. NHRL is similar. It's. It's any motion is. Is some. Some motion. And even if you cut contact, your opponent contacts you.
- [51:58]
C
Yeah.
- [51:59]
A
It's easier for a spectator and especially a referee to discern. You know, there was that.
- [52:05]
C
Yeah, yeah.
- [52:06]
A
Controversial minotaur count out
- [52:13]
C
against Witch Doctor. Right?
- [52:15]
A
Yeah, that was a bummer.
- [52:23]
C
But yeah, we the. A lot of people argue that, you know, if you can't move properly you should get knocked out. But just to save the robot. But it's real easy to just not move if you want to be knocked out. Right. So yeah, that's sort of what we go with.
- [52:38]
A
Yeah.
- [52:39]
C
And there's no tapping out. If you want to stop the fight, just stop moving. We'll count you out.
- [52:43]
A
Yeah. Is, is this inside wall, is this angled as well,
- [52:51]
C
the lower section?
- [52:52]
A
Yeah. Or is it.
- [52:54]
C
No, that's, that's, that's straight. Yeah.
- [52:56]
A
Okay. Okay. There's my eyes playing tricks on me. How is the crowd noise with the metal side rails?
- [53:05]
C
It's very loud.
- [53:07]
A
Yeah.
- [53:08]
C
Which, which I like. It adds to the spectacle. So. But we always have like free earplugs for people who are.
- [53:14]
B
Yeah, you're definitely gonna want that.
- [53:16]
C
But yeah, it can be quite, quite loud. But it just makes the robots look scarier.
- [53:28]
B
Yeah, definitely. Really cool seeing the robot rampage development there.
- [53:33]
A
Oh, I'm totally invested now. So that was the last fight for the hammer saw. Yeah. No, I totally see how you could get invested in a team for three hours and watch the whole event like cheering for one group. That's cool.
- [53:49]
C
Yeah. And we actually found people in the room were like locked in on the repair table too. That one we saw before was outside because there was a fire and we needed to evacuate just while we like cleared all the. All the smoke. So we got them to do it out, out there for that one. But we had actually had the table in the ring for most of the repairs. And the people in the room were like locked in. Normally between matches they're like bored and they're like just, you know, they're going to get food or go to the toilet. But everybody had their eyes on what was going on, which was cool.
- [54:20]
B
It's like during. During repair time between matches.
- [54:23]
C
Spanner in the works that we have in our rules is once a match, if your robot is too repaired, it doesn't need to play the next match. You can go repair it. And we call that a sub. So that's what happened here. That vertical spin on the New Zealand team. They decided it was too broken and they gonna now gonna play it last. But you can only do that once.
- [54:42]
A
It's like you get one. Okay, that's a good rule. That's a good rule. Yeah.
- [54:47]
C
So New Zealand's now decided to play their multi bot. So it goes back to blind. Right. So New Zealand didn't know what Australia was going to play. Australia didn't know what New Zealand was going to play.
- [54:55]
A
Yeah.
- [54:56]
C
But from here on out, New Zealand can't sub. Right. So if Their multibot wins this match. It has to play. There's no option.
- [55:03]
A
This would be such a good college event format. You know, you have two colleges.
- [55:15]
C
This was one of the. They about £12 each, I think. Yeah, they're like half and half. Yeah. I love ragamuffin. It like bounces around the ring. So unstable. And this is a. A multibrain spinner built by James Kirby which was very. Oh and his friends. I think a couple of the others did their code. But it's honestly, it could move so well. I was very impressed with, you know, the translation ability of it, which was really cool.
- [55:51]
A
JMO's in chat. He said why is New Zealand so far away? You got to get on JMO to come out there with Megatron.
- [55:58]
C
I'm trying to get him to join the American team. You want to bring the hammer? You know, there's lobbying over there coming in February.
- [56:10]
A
New Zealand is last way. Let's see for.
- [56:13]
C
For you can direct flight from there.
- [56:19]
A
Oh, that's easy. You don't even need to get a connector in Los Angeles.
- [56:24]
C
No.
- [56:25]
A
Or wherever. That's.
- [56:26]
C
Yeah.
- [56:26]
A
Come on.
- [56:27]
C
You can go direct. New York. New York to Auckland. Yeah.
- [56:30]
B
It's got to be a long flight then. Yeah, that is a long time. Probably like 18 hours. I imagine. NYC2 man. But this sounds pretty cool though.
- [56:46]
A
18 hours.
- [56:47]
B
Yeah. 18 hour flight. It's about what I thought.
- [56:50]
C
Find cheap flights I think out of California. It's like 12. It's super doable.
- [56:55]
B
But yeah, casual, casual flights.
- [56:59]
A
Casual 12 hour flight jam. I'll send you this link. $916. Buy your ticket. You are gonna have to stay. Oh, that's one stop.
- [57:15]
C
Oh, that's one stop dot that's two stops.
- [57:19]
A
Two stops is. Yeah. 500 bucks. It's easy.
- [57:24]
C
33 hours is a long time to be traveling.
- [57:26]
A
33 hours long.
- [57:29]
B
That's like mini vacations that we.
- [57:31]
C
We might be able to help you out with the flight a little bit. So yeah, if you do want to come.
- [57:37]
A
So Dr. Jack JMO.
- [57:42]
C
But yes, it's been a lot of fun and honestly the, the builder reception and the sort of people watching this was our regular view of the repair. So you could, you could look straight down on what they're doing, watch them change the batteries, you know, make their repairs, see what the damage is.
- [58:01]
A
This is so cool.
- [58:02]
B
That's pretty cool. That's really cool. Not.
- [58:10]
C
Yeah, that's.
- [58:11]
B
I think this is like a much
- [58:13]
C
better interesting idea for it which is, you know what. What we're going for because like if you watch a lot of live sports, say you watch cricket, like there's heaps of downtime. Right. So we sort of make sure that we're filling the space with something like. Like they're doing those sports.
- [58:29]
A
Does cricket have a lot of. I've never watched cricket ever. I'm funny.
- [58:47]
B
There's a lot of action for sure. I really appreciate, like the. The interesting part of even competitive.
- [58:56]
C
Can you hear.
- [58:57]
A
Sorry?
- [58:57]
C
Can you hear Brandon? Because I can't.
- [59:00]
B
Oh, really?
- [59:01]
C
Yeah,
- [59:06]
A
I'm listening to him in a different way.
- [59:09]
C
Oh, okay.
- [59:09]
B
Interesting.
- [59:11]
C
Yeah. I've only had you for. Since the break, I think. So I've probably been ignoring him completely. It might be. It might be an error on my end. One second. He's not muted or anything in discord.
- [59:26]
B
Oh, so it's been a while. Well, I guess audio listeners, you know my plate, you know my opinion.
- [59:34]
C
No, if I. If I unmute your stream again, I can hear him.
- [59:39]
A
I think the best live broadcast
- [59:44]
B
able to hear me.
- [59:45]
C
Sorry about that.
- [59:49]
B
I've been speaking into the void for so long now.
- [59:53]
C
Just been completely ignoring you.
- [59:55]
A
I can.
- [59:55]
C
I can hear you now.
- [59:56]
B
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay.
- [59:57]
C
Yeah.
- [59:59]
A
Cool.
- [60:00]
C
Yeah.
- [60:01]
B
I hope coming through the.
- [60:03]
C
The podcast stuff.
- [60:04]
B
So I hope the pods been. I hope the pods been having a fun time. I've been listening to my woes in separately or.
- [60:10]
A
You've had great ads. You've had great ads for the last half hour. It's been all good. It's been all good.
- [60:17]
C
Yeah. Did. Did I miss anything important that you said
- [60:23]
B
it don't matter now. That's so brutal.
- [60:27]
A
Oh, my gosh.
- [60:29]
B
It's so mean.
- [60:33]
A
Okay, is this. Is this a rumble? Is this the end of the. Yeah, this is it. At the end.
- [60:39]
C
We like close.
- [60:40]
A
Whoa. Oh, this is that horizontal I've been seeing in.
- [60:44]
B
Oh, you don't know what the obliterator was?
- [60:47]
A
Yeah, that thing is gorgeous. Obliterator.
- [60:51]
B
That's Obliterator.
- [60:52]
C
That's very nice.
- [60:55]
B
Haven't you been following the series on YouTube? Like Comment subscribe Broken Link Robotics.
- [61:00]
A
I have not. What is. What do. Obliterator.
- [61:04]
B
Wow. Wow.
- [61:06]
C
Probably a man drinking for a bottle is the best.
- [61:09]
A
What?
- [61:10]
C
That sounds.
- [61:13]
B
Broken Link Robotics.
- [61:14]
C
The guy who built James. His YouTube channel is called Broken Link Robotics. Yeah.
- [61:20]
A
Oh, okay. Interesting. Yeah, this thing. Yeah, this thing is gorgeous. Yeah, the. Oh, wow. Yeah, the hubs. The hubs are cool. Yeah. And specifically the armor package on it. It's fun. It reminds me of. It reminds me of Robert Cohen's robot three pounder. Yeah, we're doing the arm. Yeah.
- [62:00]
B
Very, very fun. See, this is what you get being an HRL zoomer. You don't know about.
- [62:11]
A
Yeah, yeah. Wow. Yeah, this thing's super cool. So it's AR top, bottom and it's a bevel gear. That's why. Yeah, it's a bevel gear.
- [62:30]
C
The irony of his team name being broken like robotics is he lost the final at the last robot rampage because his link fell out.
- [62:39]
B
Yep. That's brutal.
- [62:42]
A
And he's still running a link. I don't trust like that. That's trust. I don't do that.
- [62:50]
B
Is that a requirement at all? Do you know between New Zealand or in Australia?
- [62:56]
C
I actually don't know. I need to check because we're going to Australia to compete in November and we're very switch heavy, obviously because we, we make the switches.
- [63:06]
B
Yeah, that is true. I've seen those robotics.
- [63:10]
A
Listen, man, I've been on the mountain top all, all summer. I've been, I've been grinding. You'll see, you'll see, you'll see. Yeah, that thing's awesome. It does have my least favorite drive style of all time. But other than that, the gear to the, to the wheel. Yeah, yeah. I strongly detest that style because it has failed.
- [63:45]
C
I sent you a link to in the streaming chat to another fight of his which was incredible. Probably the, the best fight we've had at Robot Rampage.
- [63:58]
B
This is why you want to tune into stream because now you get to watch this.
- [64:01]
A
Yeah.
- [64:02]
B
Not only do you get to see the pretty robots. Exactly.
- [64:06]
C
This is against our little driven by Shane.
- [64:10]
B
Oh, deep bread. So immediately explosion. Very cool.
- [64:15]
C
Yep. Oh.
- [64:19]
B
Bad Blood versus Obliterator for Robot Rampage.
- [64:22]
C
This was very scary to be next to in the, in the, in the room.
- [64:27]
A
Gosh.
- [64:28]
B
I think every interaction has been just a shower of sparks and robots, which is awesome, man.
- [64:35]
A
The handling on that thing is great.
- [64:37]
B
Oh, at the side off of. Oh.
- [64:41]
A
Oh.
- [64:42]
B
I think, I think mini end game. Bad Blood's been defaced.
- [64:46]
C
It's lost his wedge. Oh, yeah, yeah.
- [64:50]
B
Oh, no, little buddy.
- [64:51]
C
So when those two fight, it's the second time they're fought.
- [64:54]
A
Oh, geez.
- [64:55]
C
It's always crazy. The first time they fought was 2018 in Australia. And you can see people in the background running away because it was so scary.
- [65:08]
B
That's what we're talking about. Earlier we were able to. We're talking about like heavyweights and featherweights being related and featherweights being such a great class. There's your example. Mortal Terror tells you need to know about the power Level of featherweights.
- [65:22]
C
Yeah. Yeah.
- [65:25]
A
It looked like the drive was working, but it was stuck on something. Are they running magnets? No.
- [65:31]
C
I'm not sure what happened there because,
- [65:35]
B
like, I'm making little forks. Yeah. I'm making either, you know, scrapping the arena. The forks in the back maybe got bent down. Any number of little things can get you s. High centered, but they're smoothing. They're moving real good. Lots of big shots. Yeah.
- [65:53]
C
When they turned up on like Thursday night and tested that robot in the arena, everyone was like, n New Zealand's screwed. I just. Just pack it up, boys. Let's not even do it, you know?
- [66:07]
A
Yeah.
- [66:08]
B
It's that kind of warning, huh?
- [66:10]
C
Yeah.
- [66:11]
A
Rive. Their drive motors probably fell out. No, the jam of the wheels are spinning. I'm winning.
- [66:19]
B
Wheels are moving. I think it's just high centered or something.
- [66:25]
C
Yeah. I can't remember exactly what happened there, but that happened to him a few times over the competition where they got
- [66:30]
A
stuck on something like that.
- [66:32]
C
Yeah, probably too. I think he was having drive mode issues a lot.
- [66:40]
B
So what I'm hearing is we need James to drop a video giving us a full event report about Obliterator robot rampage.
- [66:47]
C
He's about to drop one, I think. Yeah. Let's go.
- [66:52]
A
Have an issue where their outrunners face mount, dip, drip. What do you mean dripped? Is that a mistype? Yeah, this is. This is my. This is my least favorite, like, drive style.
- [67:08]
B
Oh, it ripped. Oh. So JMO's saying issue with the outrunner face mounts. Ripped. I see.
- [67:14]
A
Yeah.
- [67:14]
B
So the.
- [67:15]
A
That.
- [67:16]
B
That would do it. There's a lot of shock going into this, so don't surprise me that the inertia of the motor itself can do crazy things like that. This is what you're mentioning.
- [67:26]
A
That. That is the exact failure that I had, except the pinion was so heavy that the. The shaft shattered.
- [67:33]
B
Dang.
- [67:35]
A
Well, they're not heavy, but just like the inertial load of the pinion. Man, but that thing is freaking gorgeous. Dang.
- [67:44]
C
Yeah, it's beautiful robot. All of his robots are.
- [67:47]
A
Yeah. Just really well constructed.
- [67:50]
B
Excellent stuff. Really big fan of it.
- [67:55]
A
Yeah. And the heat formed UHMW side rails. Oh, I love me a little heat forming on the UHMW side rails. I want to see more about this bevel setup as well because his is. His is all like, nice. Mine is. Mine is like very open. His is all like nice and enclosed. I'm not. Yeah.
- [68:21]
C
Let's see the comparison.
- [68:23]
A
Oh, okay, fine. No, sorry.
- [68:25]
B
Bar for bar.
- [68:26]
A
Yeah, yeah, sorry. I was.
- [68:31]
B
This is the Jake we're walking into his mind.
- [68:34]
A
Look at this right now. I forgot that I was streaming. Yeah. Was like I need to look at this right now and compare. Does he have any videos on his bubble?
- [68:46]
B
I mean the first one he's part one.
- [68:49]
C
Yeah. Multiple videos.
- [68:50]
B
You're in part two right now. Yeah.
- [68:52]
A
Oh, I'm in part two.
- [68:54]
B
Yes. This is a half of an interview of Jack. Other part of it is.
- [68:59]
A
Yeah.
- [68:59]
B
The other half is watching James broken link react videos. Brooke.
- [69:05]
C
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. You'll get. You'll get James on next week and you have to spend half the pod talking about me.
- [69:11]
B
Honestly, that's what's going to be happening. I wanted. I just. I was waiting for a moment when the stars could align where I would just ask him to do things. But half of it now it's like our answer. I build up too. So even now we're gonna be busy pretty soon.
- [69:26]
A
The most so. But okay. Just redesigning the most fearsome combat robotic. How many robots are there? And his is Helix. Oh, that makes me feel small. That's sweet. That's so sick. So much cooler than mine. Mine is. Mine is not helical. It's straight cut for serviceability. He's got it to the TP power in there. That. You know what that looks like? That looks like an ots. So mine is.
- [70:05]
B
There it is. There's maximize everybody.
- [70:07]
A
Mine is the. The gear and the pulley are one and this saves a ton of weight because it's all one part. And then you've got kind of like this.
- [70:20]
C
So you get the gear custom made.
- [70:23]
A
Yeah, everything's. Yeah, yeah. This is a titanium gear and then. Yeah, it's, it's, it's. I was being pretty hardcore. And then this is a hardened steel pinion and it. It does wear down the titanium but it takes a while and then that's straight back to 2020 and then that's a three to one reduction and then out to a pulley. But nice. But his is all nice. Isn't. This is nice that his is all like enclosed because it's. He can actually run grease.
- [71:01]
C
I think his gears came out of an angle grinder.
- [71:03]
A
Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. His the definitely all ots.
- [71:11]
B
I'm just excited for Jake to go on the deep diving lore when he has to just sit and just watch these videos through. Because Obliterator is a storied machine. Is fought many years, multiple owners and has been cool all that time. It's cool. It's a solid Machine, I guess. Actually Jack, going off of this, the tangent, do you. So you said you haven't been building robots to fight them per se. Like you've been creating this whole infrastructure with end game about rampage and so on. If you were to make brand new from the top robot, 30 pounder to test it or fight it out, Robot Rampage, maybe bring it stateside for any competitions here, what kind of idea would you want to throw together? Unlimited budget, limited time.
- [71:58]
C
Yeah, I'm actually building a brand new one right now which we're going to take to Australian Nationals in November. So we have our next Robot Rampage event November 7th and then the weekend after we're going to Brisbane to fight. Because I find that running the event here, I can't really fight. I'm too busy. Right. So yeah, we'll go over there and play. But I'm basically building a 30 pound FingerTech robotics kit robot. So I've got, you know, it's, it's, it's designed to look exactly like, you know, a three pounder, just way bigger. So exactly the same looking like beta, it's got M30 bolts on it as the weapon head. I'm going to anodize it orange. So like it's, it's. The idea is it'll look exactly like that. It's got AR500 like wheel guards, which, you know, most people make out of umpi. So, yeah, it's kind of like. I don't know if it's going to do super well, but I'm kind of keen to test it out. Yes. Yeah.
- [73:03]
A
Wow.
- [73:05]
C
Yeah, so I'm building that for November and it's probably not what I would build if I was really, really trying to win, but it's some, it's something fun, you know, so. And it'll probably do well enough.
- [73:17]
B
Yeah, that should be cool. I'm excited for that. See now, see now it's me tricky because now we're going to want to get James in and James be like, well, you see, we, they came over here and we destroyed them. We're like, oh, they destroyed us. Now I got to go back over there and do it back and forth. So it's really just like two sides. The rivalry are just going to keep building up and we're just going to see if it rests over this podcast occasionally.
- [73:37]
C
Yeah.
- [73:38]
B
So how's the business?
- [73:38]
C
And yeah, hopefully they'll keep coming back. We'll go over there. It's not that hard to get to Australia. It's like two and a half hour flight. So, you know, it's probably easier than going east to west coast, right? So, yeah, hopefully they'll want to keep coming back and we'll go fight them and have some fun.
- [73:58]
B
They sound pretty cool. Be a good time. Okay.
- [74:04]
A
All right, I'm ready for Robots around the World. Let's do Robots around the World and then we'll close it out. Is that all right?
- [74:13]
B
Yeah. So Robots around the world. So it's actually just more robots that we kind of already know, but we're going to take it a little interesting direction with it. So at BattleBots back in September 6th, so, you know, about three weeks ago, according to this, this recording, BattleBot showcased more true walker robots. So in this case, there's a robot called Qjaw Cu Jaw, made by Donald Hudson that premiered as sort of a walking robot similar to Spot, with the ability to both saw and grab with different jaws. And this was demonstrating alongside Markian stalker robot, which is famously. Both exhibited both at BattleBots in previous years and other places too. In addition, Proving Grounds unleashed a creature combat event where they had two robots. One, Arachnophobia, which is a true walker, very spider like in shape. Two little like sort of fang like hammers in the front of it. And Armageddon, which is a wheeled base but with robot arms controlled in real time by the drivers. So what do you think of the growing presence of more humanoid slash animal style robots in. In BattleBots.
- [75:24]
A
I want to fight one of these. I want them to let me fight one of these in the NHL cage. Like for real, like, like Greco Roman wrestling. That's what I want.
- [75:39]
B
You want to wrestle the robot dog is what I'm hearing.
- [75:42]
A
Yes, I want to wrestle and fight the robot dog. And you know, I don't. If Sam lets me. Well, I'll. Tomorrow, I'll do it tomorrow. So is this. This is the. This is the what, a Kentapod? Five legs? Yeah.
- [76:01]
B
Nice is how you say it. Yeah, sure.
- [76:02]
A
Kenta pod.
- [76:03]
B
Is that a word I think means five?
- [76:08]
A
Oh, Kenta.
- [76:09]
B
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [76:11]
A
I hate that.
- [76:13]
B
Okay, so you hate that.
- [76:14]
A
Yeah, I hate that. I'd fight the hell out of that.
- [76:19]
B
What about Armageddon? That's like a wheeled base, but it's like the robot arm. So it's kind of like spongebob meme where it's a giant inflatable arms, but like the really small base is that. We just call that different than stalker here. Would you give that a different viewpoint on it or.
- [76:35]
A
No?
- [76:40]
B
I think he's just enamored right now by looking at the videos of it.
- [76:43]
A
Sorry, I was.
- [76:44]
B
That's Q Draw.
- [76:46]
A
Is that. That's the other one?
- [76:48]
B
Yep.
- [76:49]
C
Okay.
- [76:50]
B
That's the other one. Yeah. So in your opinion, you're running, you're growing a Greco Roman style rest.
- [77:00]
A
Yes, yes. And if Sam lets me.
- [77:10]
B
What about you Jack, what do you think?
- [77:12]
C
I think they're pretty cool. I, I think it's going to be real hard to get the same level of carnage out of them though that we see with the robots we have. And like that's why people tune in, right. They want to see bits fly off and you know, things catch fire and stuff like that. So I think it's really cool as a sort of technological thing but it's going to be a real hard sell as a thing to watch and, and be entertaining I think. But yeah, pretty keen to see what, what comes of it. But it's definitely a different challenge. I think
- [77:47]
B
I'm definitely curious about like the, I guess the additional game elements you kind of would have to build into it to make it make sense. I think if you were to do a straight up box like run then they're absolutely going to suck because they're never going to be nearly as fast as a wheeled robot and never load much forces. I think you kind of have to gamify it by creating additional elements or something either more dynamic arena or different goals to accomplish or something like that. Well, you can use damage like I don't know, let's say that the, the dog robot Qjaw, let's say its goal is to try to like, I don't know, grab and move different items to different areas. Sort of like a Vex game or first game, whatever, something like that. But it can use the saw to attack the opponent instead of just having to like push out the way. And that could be another element you could try to add into it. So there's a chance where you could create this like very fancy way even like a very high sparky grinding disc or something to make the pretty lights on it. But you could I think do it if you change the game dramatically. I think that would require a lot more investment to get consider.
- [78:53]
C
Yeah, yeah, no, it's definitely doable with, with changes like you say. But I think with the current format we have for Combat Robotics it will be quite hard.
- [79:02]
B
But I'm.
- [79:03]
C
If people are going to change the game that's really cool and I hope to see it.
- [79:10]
B
Yeah, changing the game. We want to see the innovation like you said, 20 years of probably consistent box smash things but we can make it interesting. You never know, maybe unlock something else that you could add into the more wheeled robots. It'd be cool.
- [79:24]
C
Yeah.
- [79:26]
B
Okay.
- [79:26]
A
That's gonna do it for us. Jack Barker, thank you so much for
- [79:29]
C
being here with us.
- [79:30]
A
Thank you for showing us what tomorrow looks like. You will always be one step ahead of us in terms of time. 10 hours. Thank you. Appreciate it. A good time.
- [79:44]
C
Cool. Thank you for having me on.
- [79:46]
B
Thanks, Jack. We'll catch you later.
- [79:49]
C
Cheers.
- [79:50]
A
Thanks for.