Vertical crushers

Vertical crushers are one of the most prominent forms of gripping weapons. The pioneer of this type of weapon was double world champion and UK Series 5 champion Razer. Tiberius 3 won the University Challenge with similar weaponry.

However, some of the Robot Wars community insist that all vertical crushers are merely "clones" of the famous Razer. Many called the other vertical crushers "a poor-man's Razer", especially Ming 3. This belief has been fueled by Jonathan Pearce's unhelpful calls of a claw being "Razer-esque". However, most of the Robot Wars community have more respect for the effort put into vertical crushers.

Definition

 * A vertical crusher is meant to attack the top of a robot, usually with a spike or crushing claw. To maximize attacking potential, these were almost always hydraulically powered, often allowing the crushing arm to deliver several tonnes of pressure.

Advantages and Disadvantages
Advantages Disadvantages
 * They are effective at trapping opponents, and are even capable of lifting robots off the ground (without the need for dedicated lifting weapons), which Razer and Tiberius have managed on several occasions. When Razer added a hook to the end of the claw, specially to combat Tornado's anti-crusher frame, it lifted its opponent with ease.
 * They can often immobilise a robot in a single attack, by piercing into the mechanics and damaging vital components.
 * They often have slow, inefficient, or non-existent self-righting mechanisms.
 * This is coupled with the fact that it is difficult to implement a vertical crushing arm on an invertible machine without leaving a high ground clearance after being flipped.
 * As crushers are normally operated by hydraulics, the weapon is necessarily slow, so require a skillful driver or secondary weapon in order to trap the opponent in place long enough to pierce the robot. For example, Razer was unable to attack Onslaught in the fourth round of the Southern Annihilator because it was too quick.
 * The weapon is often exposed to damage, usually from rotating weapons or overhead bladed axes. Ming 3's loss to Terrorhurtz and Razer's scare against 13 Black, demonstrate this fragility.
 * A robot's height may exceed the crusher's reach. Razer was unable to pierce Attila the Drum or Aggrobot (initially) because of this.
 * Smooth, slanted sides of a robot are extremely resistant to a vertical crusher. Razer was unable to pierce Backstabber, and struggled to damage Aggrobot and Cyrax in battles against them.
 * The huge weight of the weapon system meant that many hydraulic crushers had very little armor and/or required holes to be drilled into the robot so it could fit within the weight limit. This was best shown by R.O.C.S., as its electronics had no protection against an attack from fellow crusher Pinser. Razer was protected by a very thin layer of armor prior to the weight limit increase, which was torn to shreds by the blade of Pussycat.

List of Robots with Vertical Crushers
Robots are listed alphabetically. Robots that are not heavyweight are listed with a green background.