Juan's thoughts on his first Robogames!

"Robo-games was a great experience. The event was larger than I imagined. The attendance was great, from competitors and spectators. We had a large amount of foot traffic at the Mech-warfare event. We were right next to the entrance. The spectators were very intrigued and entertained by all of the events and bots. Robo-games continues to grow each year.

I was impressed with the quality and performance of the ax-12s and overall happy with my decision to use them. They held up great to all the abuse I put them through. I had a fairly large mech that weighed 5.5 pounds. The ax-12s performed well under the stress of all that weight. Their speed was decent. The only problem I had was the servos getting really hot, but for the weight they carried they did great. Especially for running them full speed for 12mins at a time. I’m sure a more powerful servo like the ax-18s or other servos wouldn’t have issues with overheating. One feature that I really liked was the location feedback the Robotis (Dynamixel) line of servos has. It made setting limits extremely easy and gave me a lot of flexibility.

I’m glad I chose the Robotis (Dynamixel) servo over other servos, such as the Kondo servos or other hobby grade servos. The other servos just didn’t have the torque or power to compete against the Robotis (Dynamixel) servos. This was very apparent in the biped competitions. In mech-warfare there were a couple of non-competition bots that used regular servos. They just didn’t have the power or response time to handle the heavy airsoft guns like the Robotis (Dynamixel) servos had. A big part of what makes the Robotis (Dynamixel) servos so great is the servo controller board. They work so well that a few competitors used them to drive their gun motors. Overall I was happy with the Robotis (Dynamixel) servos.

This year was just the beginning for me. I have a lot of ideas for next year. For Mech-Warfare I would like to add a fourth degree of freedom to the legs of my bot to help with stability and maneuverability. I would also like to move away from the traditional tank style turrets and try out a humanoid torso on four legs. I also hope to increase the speed of my mech; I will have to push the ax-12s to their limits to squeeze out more speed. I would also like to try using the Robotis (Dynamixel) servos in the sumo bot competition. A lot of the sumo bots use regular servos that can’t compare to the torque the Robotis (Dynamixel) servos have. Robo-games has me hooked for life."

This is me now. On a side note I think Juan fried two of my AX-12s that I let him use! It is looking like the weigh of the Mech-Warrior bots and all the equipment it needs is getting to much for AX-12s!

Also Juan was able to Macgyver is mech together to win silver in his first Mech-warfare competition at Robogames!