Check out this fight in Battlebots Season 3, Episode 1.
HUGE’s first ever fight in the Battlebox was against the veteran team and ‘Battlebots at Sun Java/One’ champion SubZero. Their only fight before this during modern Battlebots was a loss to Icewave in 2016 where they showed a lot of toughness, so we didn’t know what to expect going into this fight.
Before the fight while out in the battery-charging tent, our team heard members of Team SubZero on the phone with McMaster-Carr ordering a bunch of parts in preparation, and we did our best to look casual while writing down as many of the part numbers as we could hear. Included were things like long pieces of aluminum brackets and some steel sheeting, so we had an idea of what kind of attachments that they were putting together. The team told us afterwards that they exchanged many internal frame components for lighter carbon fiber versions to accommodate the weight of these changes.
Our strategy was simply to do our best to hit them with the weapon, and to avoid being pushed and controlled around the arena. We wanted also to stay in the center of the arena as much as possible. These strategies worked well, by first quickly taking off some of SubZero’s attachments and then continuing to attack for the duration of the fight. This fight actually involved two separate unsticks: when both robots were stuck on the screws, and when one of HUGE’s rear stabilizers was pushed down the killsaw slot. Luckily, HUGE maintained most of its functionality throughout the fight.
After the fight, we learned that our drive motor mounts had cracked, loosening the belt tension and leaving us reduced to just slowly crawling around the arena. This explains our slow drive in the later stages of the fight. SubZero also suffered drive issues, burning out their drive controller and causing the intermittent movement in their second half of the fight. Due mostly to the effectiveness of our weapon, HUGE won the judge’s decision!
Photo Gallery
SubZero during the 2018 season.
SubZero, during preparations for HUGE. Note the carbon fiber frame rails.
SubZero’s attachments
HUGE skims sparks off of SubZero’s armor early in the fight
HUGE throwing SubZero and removing an armor panel
Damaging the flipper and front armor
Post-fight damage to SubZero
Photo credit to Dan Longmire, Tony Woodward, and Jon Bennett