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War Robot

Date

2019

Location

Vadodara

Competition

Projection

Teammate

Krutarth

Teammate

Rahil

Teammate

Nikhil

Teammate

Manav

Ex-Teammate

Karan

BattleBots is every engineer's teenage dream. For me and my college friends, the idea of controlling a mechanical beast and smashing it into another was the ultimate adrenaline rush. Every year at Parul University, where I pursued my bachelor's, there’s an event that calls to every tech enthusiast: Projection. Held in February (the perfect month to keep nerds busy and happy), this annual technical festival is a playground of innovation. Among the many events, one stands above the rest: Robo War. The most challenging, thrilling, and fiercely competitive battleground.

Right after my first semester, I got wind of this event and signed up for the 15 kg category. I figured it was a budget-friendly option, and with less weight, maybe there’d be less competition. Little did I know, I'd be up against veteran teams with far more resources. I convinced five friends to join me—Dhruv, Krutarth, Rahil, Nikhil, and Manav—forming our crew. To our surprise, we were the only team from our university to attempt this feat in recent years. Robo War was a national-level event, drawing fierce competition from universities and organizations across the country. But we were determined to give it our all.

Inside of a war robot of the first timer first year engineering student

Journey of the Bot

I’ll be honest, my inspiration was none other than the legendary BattleBot “Tombstone.” But reality quickly set in: we had less than 5% of the budget and close to zero experience. Armed with passion, though, we pressed forward. I sketched out a rough design and then dove headfirst into the scrapyards, hunting for materials. (A former teammate, Karan, once booked a hardened Titanium plate worth over 90,000 INR—but, of course, that was way beyond our budget.) We eventually settled for stainless steel box pipes for the chassis and some 3mm galvanized steel sheets. The weapon? An 8mm thick stainless steel blade.

We didn’t have fancy tools or machinery, so everything was built the old-school way. Every weld you see on that bot is ours—and trust me, it wasn’t pretty. We’d just learned how to weld a few weeks prior, and yes, even the motor was welded to the chassis. The mounts we bought didn’t work at the last minute, so we had no choice. The only parts that used fasteners were the top plate, wheels, and the weapon itself.

For the drive motors, we got our hands on some knockoff Johnson motors with a 300 rpm rating and around 15 kg torque each. Our weapon was powered by an RS775 motor—hardly competition-grade, but it was all we could afford. The wheels? We picked up kids’ bicycle training wheels for about 40 INR each. It was a far cry from the sleek, destructive machines we were up against.

Our power tools were as basic as it gets: a drill, an angle grinder, and a trusty arc welder. We used a lathe to drill holes in the weapon plate and make wheel couplings. The weapon mechanism was a bit of a hack too—essentially, a bicycle hub was used to mount the flywheels, linking it to the motor. The RS775 motor spins at about 6000 rpm, and this setup helped give us some extra speed on the weapon.

When it came to electronics, we kept it simple. Without proper motor drivers, we resorted to using relays connected to an Arduino, which was in turn linked to the receiver of a 6-channel FlySky RC remote (FS-CT6B). It wasn’t perfect, but it worked—most of the time.

If you’re still with me, you might be wondering how the competition went. Well… it didn’t.

We had just about a month to build the robot, and as first-year students, we weren’t even allowed to use the college workshop. After gathering materials, we scrambled to find local shops where we could work, often sneaking into our college’s workshop. There weren’t enough tools to go around, so we had to wait for the go-kart team to finish with their angle grinder before we could borrow it. Every day, it felt like we were crawling toward the finish line.

War Robot, BattleBot made by a first year engineering student

On the final day before the event, we were desperate. We tried to get permission to work after hours, but the principal flatly refused. I even had a letter from the HOD saying we could work with his approval, but it didn’t matter. Determined, I handed the letter (which the technician couldn’t read) to the workshop supervisor along with a little "overtime bonus." That night, we managed to complete the bot just in time for our match.

But when I saw the other teams' robots—precision-machined from CNC-cut aluminum blocks, outfitted with motors that cost more than our entire bot—it hit me. Our machine, which cost us around 18,000 INR, stood no chance. These teams were playing on a different level, there was a team which in recent years represented India in BattleBots.

I decided to back out. At the time, I thought it was the smarter move, thinking we could regroup and build a better robot for the next event. But looking back, I wish I’d taken the risk. I should have embraced the challenge, even if it meant watching our creation get torn apart. That excitement, that drive—it’s hard to recapture. I don’t even have that robot anymore. But the memory of what we built, with all its flaws and all our effort, stays with me.

Trial Video

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Create Your First Project

War Robot

Date

Location

Competition

Teammate

Teammate

Teammate

Teammate

Ex-Teammate

The Robotist Ruchit