December 12, 2000

Failure :(

I suppose I'll start by relating our sorry tale from the auditions :(

Yes we failed! ahh ive said it now, we didn't make it onto the show! We rushed and rushed and ran out of time. We turned up at the auditions 12.6 kilos overweight and wearing temporary Armour. Personally I thought we looked Big Pants but that's what you get when you run out of time.

As for the battle well everything worked well including the weapon! In fact it worked so well we bent the main blade like a sine wave on PC Plods tuff Armour. I just never realised the forces involved with 4 tons of hydraulic pressure! So anyway home we went very very disappointed to say the least :(

Now on to the modifications we have had to undertake to achieve a 12.6 kilo weight loss! I also wanted to triple the force on the main blade, which meant going from a 50mm bore ram at 4 tons to an 85mm bore ram at 14 tons. The trouble is this would just add more and more weight especially as we needed to redesign the 2d blade and go for a 3d blade for the much greater extra strength needed!

This is where the Carbon and Kevlar comes in. We basically have replaced the gearboxes, all the motor casings and the body shell with either Carbon, Carbon/Kevlar or just Kevlar. We also, because I felt that we looked to boxy (crap) have chopped 4 inches from the back and also 4 inches out of the roof! this gives us a much sleeker line and a bit more of a classic wedge shape. The Bosch motors have had Ally end plates made and also now sport a carbon central motor tube. The hydraulic pump motor has been to the CNC man for a short back and sides. This now also sports a carbon motor casing. The kart wheels and slicks have been replaced with a machined alloy wheel sporting a Ti tire and then the cut down part of the slicks we had which have been treaded.

The best bit and the hardest to make has been a one piece Carbon/Carbon Kevlar/ Bullet proof Kevlar /Carbon body shell. This is even if I say so a masterpiece of design! It will once in place make the whole chassis very very strong and we are hoping will be impregnable to all but the mightiest of weapons. It also has built into the roof section a row of 20mm led lights in a strip. These are connected to our new pressure transducer. This will be a visible link as to how much pressure in tons we are exerting with the weapon! So we have 10 lights the first one being 0 tons and the last one being 14 tons. Hopefully this will look cool and also enable me to see when we have reached maximum pressure so I can back off and not blow the pump and or motor up.

So that's it for the modifications the good part in all this is that we have plenty of time now to really nail the design. As lets face it this time last year we hadn't even started building the damn thing! So we are well ahead of schedule. As for other news we have become firm friends with our greatest rivals Anthrax so much so that we have each designed and built parts for the others robot. We have built their Carbon sprockets and they are building the electronics link for our LED lights. We also have become Tag team mates so if there is ever a Tag team then it will be Anthrax and Executioner on the same side! quite a formidable team I might add.

OK well that's about it I will start adding pictures to the page over Xmas and now I've got my new laptop I can update the page wherever I might find myself :) Oh yes this Saturday I am hosting a large meet of the top UK teams at Ashton near Peterborough where I live in the UK. This was invite only so if you weren't invited then chat to us more so you can come to the next one :)

Mark...

Posted by Mark at 4:05 PM | Comments (0) | Robot Wars Series 4 2000

July 24, 2000

One week to go!

Well this update has been long in coming!

We have been very very busy indeed. One week to go for us and we are almost done, a few more days off work this week for all of us should just about nail it I think. I am still holding back on some major pictures in the gallery as I want Executioner to be a suprise in its finished form.

Even if I say so myself I wouldnt want to go up against it ha ha it is very tuff and very efficient. We are very much looking forward to the auditions although as of yet we still dont know who will be there on the 31st so we dont know what we are up against.

Mark...

Posted by Mark at 3:59 PM | Comments (0) | Robot Wars Series 4 2000

July 12, 2000

The Auditions!

Well we have our date through for the auditons 31st July, so anyone there on that day maybe up against us :)

The kevlar arrived today thank the lord and also the new 7075 Alloy cutter forks have been made ahead of schedule! So we are still well on track but also cutting it finer than I would have liked. I still cant believe how much work is involved in something that always looks so basic to me.

If you havn`t seen the latest entry in Anthrax's DiaryCheck it out.

Mark...

Posted by Mark at 3:58 PM | Comments (0) | Robot Wars Series 4 2000

July 9, 2000

Re-design :(

Ahh well what a weekend. The stresses of a robot bulilders life huh!

It has been decided due to our weight problem that we are scrapping the cutter forks and ram straps on the front of Executioner :( These will be replaced with high grade 7075 alloy which is being plasma cut for us this week :)

This will give us back the 5 kilos we need for the armour. As it was on friday we were thinking of turning out in nothing at all for armour ha ha ha! It also was bandied around at the same meeting that we should all give up and just go for series 5 :( My god this realy wound me up after 7 months of work to give up at this stage is just not cricket.

So anyway we had lots of chat and realy pulled our design to pieces
(in more ways than one) and after all our brainstorming sessions so far have come up with better and lighter! It was no surprise that this one was the same. So that was good and we are all happy again although my bank balance will be all the lighter.

We have been out and about driving the beast though so that was good. The Vantec is very nice indeed and it appears Ian did get the theory right on the gearboxes as we clocked the little machine doing 13 mph which is just about right. I have just looked at Martins last diary entry and have clocked his fabled jaw :( Gods teeth is all I can say and I am glad we have a good driver as I think between us and them its down to who cuts first wins. Still I do think our blade for them will perchance make them lose a tad of sleep of an evening he he we will have to see. I once again have a stack of piccys to update and will do it this week time permitting.

Mark...

Posted by Mark at 3:55 PM | Comments (0) | Robot Wars Series 4 2000

June 29, 2000

The Van arrives!

Well it appears that we have ruffled some feathers in the robot world :) Some feathers are easily ruffled methinks!!

It has been noticed that some think we have copied Razer! Thinking about it we have copied Chaos11 aswell because lets face it we have got a flipper! Apart from the fact we look nothing like Razer and nor does our weapon. Inspired by them Oh yes very much! copied hmmm perhaps not.

Its also been said that we know everything! nah not quite, We know lots about modeling in Carbon and kevlar and also racing RC things, and absolutley nothing about robots at all, after all this is our first! However it will be ruthlessly efficient in what its been designed to do and as a team we will give the public what they want I.E. lots of damage.

If another team manage to kill our bot I hope they do it well! I will laugh and shake their hands after all its all about fun.

At last the Vantec is on its way hurrah. I was begining to think I might have to beg Will Jeatt to give me back the 4 qd I gave him. What a laugh that would have been :) Anyway if your very sad like me you can track the progress of the final piece of Executioner by going here Fedex and typing in this way-bill number 800055089665 isnt the net exciting these days!

Mark...

Posted by Mark at 3:53 PM | Comments (0) | Robot Wars Series 4 2000

June 23, 2000

Friends and Enemys

Well a good weekend again, got loads done which I must say we needed to as we still have stacks to do :( Our robot is looking very industrial now which is nice.

It appears we have developed lots of friends and some enemys to ha ha! good this is what its all about. To our friends I`ll say thanks for the support and encouragement if you need help in the pits you know where to come :) To our enemys and their supporters what can I say hmmm. How about im going to go on about our requirements and composite armour etc etc and all the good parts of our design until your sick :) and then we are going to rub your noses in it by trashing all the robots you think are any good ha ha ha.

You are going to hate us by the time we are finished and guess what we dont care! No Mercy is our team name and No Mercy is our team motto.

Oh yes we got our holy hand grenade machined down this week to :) much much lighter now. No prizes for guessing what it does. A favorite team of yours and one which is raved about on the boards and who might I add we consider our main opponents! are using one but I cant tell you who or how to use it as I promised I wouldnt! however They did say would we do theirs to so we cant be all bad as I said yes ha ha.

I will update the gallery tonight. And to all our opponents out there Executioner has arrived, prepare to see your favorite bots crushed.

Mark...

Posted by Mark at 3:51 PM | Comments (0) | Robot Wars Series 4 2000

June 21, 2000

I am Fat!

Hiya guys :)

Well lots has happened to us since our last update! We encountered a major overweight problem which left us all scratching our heads I can tell you. I have so many pictures to put on the gallery page I just dont know where to start :( Anyway this is what has happened to us and what has been the result.

We had an impromptu weigh in and realised that we would be 10 kilos over argggggggggggggggggggg this means we either had to do away with our composite armour :( get lighter less powerfull batterys :( go for a smaller ram :( :( have no Srimech which is a big no no!! Or use a combination of all these mentioned! Not a good situation I can tell you as we like our design just how it is thank-you very much.

So anyway I came back to Brussels and having successfully avoided being deported for being an English soccer thug I set about thinking about our problems. Made a few phone calls and realised we could get some smaller batterys and only lose out on amp/hours which is not to bad! My bro can make us a 50mm bore ram but that would be a shame as we like the tonnage of the 70mm. At this point we still had 9 kilos taken up by the Srimech so you can imagine my joy when I came across this little site Highpower and phoned the helpfull chappy Trevor on the other end of the line.

So whats it all about I hear you ask? well what if I told you that they will supply you a ram with a built in solenoid actuator that actuates at 1000 psi!!! yep not a measly 150 psi like most other systems! also this ram only travels 4 inches and complete with the control box and gas cylinder weighs in at less than 1 kilo muhahahahahahahahahahahahahah it also fits in a very very small shoe box to boot!!!!!!!!!!!!

Am I happy or what ha ha Im so happy I could sing oh well enough of that anyway give Trevor a ring he is most helpfull and will make custom systems too, although the standard setup is more than enough for our needs I can tell you.

Chaos 2 eat you heart out we are gunning for you George :) And all the rest of you to! We will show none of you any mercy so prepare to bring your bin liners with you ha ha!!!!!!!! I promise to update the gallery soon ish :)

Mark...

Posted by Mark at 3:48 PM | Comments (0) | Robot Wars Series 4 2000

June 6, 2000

No Vantec :(

Well This update has been a bit to long in the making, I have been very busy mind you as have the rest of the team with your favorite bot and mine Executioner :)

Well the Vantec still hasnt arrived ( getting worried now ) Will can we have the 4qd back ha ha ha!! I am assured it is on its way, he had a rush on for Battle Bots orders thats all.

The body is now all welded up thanks to Dan my friend who just happens to be the best tig welder I know. As a result we now look like a robot and not just a chassis which is nice. The gearboxes are all finished and fitted in place once again thanks to Ian for the work he put into these, nice job. The other Ian is working flat out on each of our composite armour panels :)

These as you know are top secret and indestructable to boot! We have gone for the scorpion tank route here which might give you a clue.

Mark...

Posted by Mark at 3:47 PM | Comments (0) | Robot Wars Series 4 2000

May 18, 2000

Famous at Last!

Woohoo we are famous at last :)

We got a whole section devoted to us on Martins page!! Well in their diary anyways! Tips his hat to Martin as he did say he would link us cheers :) but we still think the modellers will take out the engineers everytime. As for the sizes its not hard to work it out from the piccys :) 12 inches I reckon as the wheels are 9". We know that our weapon mechanism loses tonnage through the stroke but then with 8 tons against ally lexan or fibreglass (most robots) we dont figure on this being a problem.

The 2 seconds out stroke is crucial to our tactics as it means we can out drive, ram and then cut/crush before the opposing robot can get away. Still anyway all this banter aside its fun to develop some grudge matches, after all we are the NO MERCY team! cant have you all thinking we are soft now can we.

After all this we probably wont meet in the rounds ha ha!

Mark...

Posted by Mark at 3:45 PM | Comments (0) | Robot Wars Series 4 2000

May 16, 2000

Life is a V Twin

Well what can I say, Life is an Italian V Twin ha ha mmmmmm

I am very happy and now think I am Carl Fogarty :) Ok back to robots! Still waiting the delivery of the Vantec (Pissed) and the Kevlar :( So nothing much happened this weekend. We have an appointment with my friends engineering firm this Saturday to get some ally welding done on the chassis and to get our blades made from 12mm stainless.

I have decided to make an extra special blade just for Anthrax as we know their dimensions :) I know Martin and his team will be pleased with this as they occupy a place in our hearts and we wanted to show this :) I am making a costing page which will list everything we have bought to make this project work! I now know where all my hard earnt goes :(

Oh yes I ran a small competiton on the robot wars web page to give away roughly £350 of surplus parts. Will Jeatt won and the parts are on there way to him well done mate. All I can say is that I hope after all this hard work we manage to get through the damned auditions!!!

Still I am sure we all feel that one huh?

Mark...

Posted by Mark at 3:41 PM | Comments (0) | Robot Wars Series 4 2000

May 12, 2000

Robot Wars Series 4

I should have started this diary at the beginning I suppose :) However I was so busy with other things in My life that I forgot!

Anyway better late than never as they say so I am starting it roughly half way through our project. I think the gallery will bring you all up to speed on the state of our build progress to this date. I feel that there is a potential light hearted grudge match brewing between us and the Anthrax team ( God bless em ) Martin and I have shared quite a few secrets during build and it will be fun to Cut them to pieces I must say he he!! I am sure that they feel the same about our beloved Bot. still "all's fair in love and robot wars"

At this time we are awaiting the delivery of the VantecRDFR38e speed controller from the States. I cant wait to get my hands on this as we have had it custom made to my specifications ( not cheap ) The net result is a speed controller that can be setup so we can drive Executioner like an Rc car on the tranny :) This will give us a major advantage we feel as our driver has competed at World Championship level racing Multiboats ( IC engined Carbon/Kevlar boats that go so fast its a joke )

The kevlar I have ordered has also not turned up as of yet which is a bit of a bind as we seem to be in limbo waiting for these things before we can carry on with the build, still I pick my Ducati 916 up on Saturday so im not overly bothered about robots at this time ha ha ha!!!

Mark...

Posted by Mark at 3:34 PM | Comments (0) | Robot Wars Series 4 2000