I guess I will start this one off.
Mini sumo is a great contest for people to get started in, but the 3 kg sumo event is the most exciting.
My wife’s Viper kit has placed in the top 3 positions at the Seattle Robotics Society Robothon and the Portland Area Robotics Society PDXBot event for the last 2 years. This robot is underweight by over 600 grams, and still kicks bot. It is a great design, and very effective.
My champion sumo is an all aluminum body, but uses the wheels and gear motors from Lynxmotion, and has failed to finish in 1st place for the first time in 3 years (7 different large scale sumo events). Lost to my wife’s Viper at the Robothon this year. This robot is also about 600 grams under weight.
This robot even scored the only victory against the Japanese when they came to the U.S. 2 years ago.
I even have a 3 kg sumo made out of Sintra that weighs 1800 grams that wins many of its contests.
People think that 3 kg sumo robots need to have expensive motors and high powered motor controllers.
The reality of this is that this is totally false. These robots are using the cheap gear motors, and doing a great job. Motor controller? relays. Just simple 5 VDC relays. Sensors? the regular Sharp reflective sensors.
I would have to say the key to winning is a robot that works. Weight, speed, and power is all highly overrated. Robots that stay in the ring, doesn’t have microcontroller reset problems, stays together, and on occation sees it opponents, usually wins the tournament.
These guys are relatively ease to build, and a lot of fun to compete with. The crowds that watch them prefer them over all of the other contests.
I hope to see you at some tournament soon.
Pete