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Festival Pavilion
Even though some of the contestants look like Dust Buster
hand vacuums or rolling pie plates, members of the Robot Fighting
League (RFL) are ready to wage war in Fort Mason Center’s
Festival Pavilion. Menacing machines composed of bludgeons,
saw blades, diamond plate and other metallic materials roll
into the pavilion November 12 to compete for glory and lots
of cash.
Sparks and robot parts fly at the RFL 2005 National Championship
games as contraptions in many size and weight categories struggle
for dominance in a bulletproof glass arena. Competitors resembling
flame-throwing toasters take on ominous spiked circuit boards
or whirling wheels with razor-sharp teeth. Loud collisions,
occasional small explosions, and quickly extinguished fires
keep the arena atmosphere lively.
 Teams
of dedicated robo-enthusiasts from around the world labor
all year to create battle-worthy devices that they enter in
regional and national robot games, such as the Robotics Society
of America’s RoboNexus 2005. Winners of all these bouts
converge on the Festival Pavilion for the invitational RFL
championship as well as the new ComBots Cup heavyweight contest
and $10,000 prize.
The RFL is a loose alliance of many robot battle groups, including
Mechwars and the Robotics Society of America (RSA). RSA hosts
a variety of popular robot events at Fort Mason Center. RFL’s
national tournament brings together the toughest and most
creative robots and robotics teams in the business. School
teams also build robots for school projects and make it all
the way to the championships from time to time.
 The
merry mayhem at RFL events inspires much news coverage with
crews broadcasting live from the competition floor. The spectators
and support teams are as quirky as the robots. Where else
could you see super heavyweights like Robotic Death Company’s
Megabyte duke it out with DNA Robotics’ Shovelhead?
Enjoy some mechanical sports action with the battling ’bots
of the Robot Fighting League. For details, see November
12 and www.combots.net.
– Claudia Willen
Images:
Sparks fly at previous battles (top) Sewer Snake, Team PlumpCrazy, Heavyweight Class, Rank 1 (middle) &
Super Megabyte, Robotic Death Company, Super Heavyweight Class,
Rank 7 (bottom)
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Clash
Of The Titans: Robot Fights
