Gemini

"A first for British Robot Wars! Here we have, long awaited I might add, a clusterbot!"

- Julia Reed introduces Gemini

Gemini was the first heavyweight clusterbot in Robot Wars, created by Team Mace. The two robots, each armoured in kevlar and fibreglass, went into the arena attached by a rear 'Hook and Loop' mechanism with metal hooks on each half which latch onto rings on the other half. Upon the battle starting, the robots would pull apart and act as individuals. Each robot had a powerful flipping arm that could hoist 250kg and gyro stabilisers but were still difficult to control.

Gemini competed in Series 4 and Series 5, also competing in the first series of Extreme, but did not enjoy much success in the main series, dropping out in the Heat Final and Second Round respectively. However, it did win the Pinball competition, the Best Design Award and the Most Original Entry in Series 4. The team had previously entered Series 2 and 3 with the more successful Mace.

In Series 4, the team found that the Gemini twins had the tendency to wheely and sometimes fall onto their backs if they accelerated too fast. Though they could easily self-right, they were vulnerable for the few seconds that their fronts were off the ground. For Extreme 1 onwards, the team added a bar to the back of each machine to improve their balance so they wouldn't wheely anymore. However, the wheely bars created a serious design flaw; the twins were still vulnerable to being flipped onto their backs (particularly as they would often flip themselves onto their backs), and if they were to be, it would be impossible for them to self-right. This saw Gemini lose battles in surprising fashion to robots such as Napalm and Reactor 2.

In Series 6, Gemini was unable to enter because of changes to the rules that disallowed soda stream bottles like Gemini used. The team were unable to fit gas bottles without pushing Gemini over the weight limit, so did not enter.

Series 4
The 8th seeds Gemini caused quite a stir when they first appeared in the arena. In the first round of the Fourth Wars, the clusterbot went up against Kater Killer and newcomers Tornado. As battle was commenced, the Gemini twins split apart. Most of the battle consisted of Tornado ramming Kater Killer around, but both of the twins got good flips in on Kater Killer and Tornado, and one of the flips immobilised Kater Killer, as it couldn't self-right. Tornado later drove itself into the pit, but it had already qualified for the next round of the heat along with Gemini.

In the second round, Gemini went up against The Creature. This battle heralded Gemini's strongest performance, where the two of them hurled The Creature around the arena, the enormous flips soon forced the outer shell to slowly break up and off The Creature. Gemini then double teamed The Creature and used their two flipping arms simultaneously to throw The Creature from the arena, making it the second robot (after Chaos 2) to flip another robot out of the arena.

However, in the Heat Final, Gemini went up against Tornado again. This ended the clusterbot's great run in the main competition as Tornado isolated one of the twins, ramming it into submission onto an arena spike. This particular twin then became immobilised, it later turned out that the arena spike knocked a battery terminal, and the rule of clusterbots meant that Tornado had won the battle as both twins have to keep moving for the whole battle, or else they are declared immobilised. This made Gemini the highest seeded robot in Series 4 that made it to the semi-finals the previous year to not make it in Series 4.

Gemini later competed in the Pinball Championship. It cleared up the leaderboard, coming in first place with a score of 255. They hit nearly everything in the arena, as both twins were allowed to attack different targets. The team later recruited the Turner sisters to fight in the Celebrity Special during the Christmas season for the Fourth Wars. In the first round, they went up against Killertron, which was being driven by Chris Eubank. The Gemini twins did well in flipping Killertron up into the air several times. They could both dodge away from the axe blows of the considerably more sluggish Killertron machine. Killertron was flipped around a lot during the battle, and was barely moving by the end of the fight, but survived to a judges' decision. The judges went in favour of Gemini, putting the clusterbot through to the second round.

Here, Gemini went up against Diotoir. Both twins of Gemini flipped Diotoir around a lot throughout the battle, and looked on top for the whole battle. However, the original Gemini team took back the controls of Gemini mid-way through the fight, and despite the calls of the Turner sisters to leave Diotoir on its back, the Gemini twins then righted Diotoir, but then Gemini broke down due to the removable link system in each twin dislodging one by one. This was down to the force of each flipper, leaving Diotoir to progress through and Gemini to be surprisingly eliminated from the competition.

Despite their disappointing performance in the main competition, the clusterbot design won them the Awards for Best Design and Most Original Entry during the Fourth Wars as well, giving Gemini a total of three trophies won across Series 4.

Extreme 1
Gemini fought in the All-Stars competition during the first series of Extreme. The clusterbot went up against World Champions Razer in the first round. The twins began well, they managed to flip Razer a few times, but Razer was able to cause considerable damage to both twins using its claw weapon. One twin had a ripped wheel guard and a popped tyre, the other had a huge hole on its top. Razer then gripped onto one of the twins towards the end of the fight, just as the other Gemini twin flipped the two of them. Razer righted them both before the end of the televised battle. After this, Razer, in an untelevised moment, drove over the floor flipper, which fired, throwing the mobile Razer machine. Gemini then managed to disable Razer's drive on one side, allowing it to only turn in circles. Razer also grabbed one of the two Gemini twins' flippers later on in the fight, which when fired caused the hydraulic fluid bag to burst within Razer and disable the weaponry, immobilising it completely. However, as the floor flipper should not have been used on a mobile robot, this footage was never shown and the Judges intervened, judging the battle up to the point of the floor flipper's misfire.. The judges went in favour of Razer based on the first half of the battle, eliminating Gemini from the competition.

Gemini also fought in a Mayhem battle for a right to fight in the second annihilator of the series. They went up against Napalm and The Spider. The two split up with one attacking one robot each, but The Spider became immobilised on the flame pit fairly quickly, so both attacked Napalm for a long while. Napalm was flipped high in the air by the Gemini clusterbot. However, after The Spider had been counted out, one of the twins forced itself over after trying to flip Napalm and got caught on the rear wheelie-bar added to stop it doing wheelies. The other robot attempted to flip it back over but misjudged the flip and got itself stuck on the rear wheelie-bar as well, so the twins were counted out and eliminated. Shunt then came in and pitted one of the twins along with the winners, Napalm.

Series 5
The twins returned from their Fourth Wars disappointment to be seeded 18th for the series, fighting Ruf Ruf Dougal in the first round. Gemini constantly surrounded Ruf Ruf Dougal, giving it no chances to attack, althought the anti-flipper flywheel underneath Ruf Ruf Dougal made it very hard for Gemini to get a KO flip in. The steam vents blew away the dog's kevlar coating, and not too long afterwards, it broke down. Once it was immobilised, a Gemini twin could slip underneath, turn around, and use the flipper as if it were front-hinged to overturn its defeated opponent. Sir Killalot disposed of Ruf Ruf Dougal, placing it outside of the arena.

This put Gemini through to the next round of the heat. In the second round, Gemini went up against Reactor 2. The Gemini clusterbots dominated the first half of the battle, flipping Reactor 2 multiple times. However, Gemini started to lose Co2 power as the match went on, and after being flipped by Reactor 2, one of the robots got stuck on their own innovation brought in for Series 5 - its wheelie bar. The bars were meant to stop Gemini from tipping back as it drove forwards, but instead this prevented the robot's own self-righting, and as a result, the twin had become vulnerable. The other half of Gemini attempted to flip its partner back over, but instead flipped itself over upon missing, and could not self-right either. With both twins stranded, Reactor 2 had won. This would be Team Mace's last appearance in Robot Wars.

Results

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Wins/Losses

 * Wins: 4
 * Losses: 5

Series Record

 * Series 1: Did not enter
 * Series 2: Entered with Mace
 * Series 3: Entered with Mace 2
 * Series 4: Heat Final
 * Series 5: Heat, Round 2
 * Series 6-7, 2016: Did not enter

Appearances in Merchandise

 * Gemini/Minibot

Outside Robot Wars
Although Gemini has retired competitively, and the two halves of the robot reside with two different members of Team Mace across the country, a single Gemini twin was displayed alongside Mini Mace at a charity event organised by Brian Fountain, at a local Tesco supermarket in 2016.

Trivia

 * Gemini is one of only seven robots to break 200 points in a Pinball tournament. The other robots to have achieved this are Roadblock, Killerhurtz, Spawn of Scutter, Panic Attack, King B3 and Razer.
 * Gemini is one of two robots to win two different awards, the other being Plunderbird. Gemini won Best Design and Most Original Entry. Unlike Plunderbird, however, Gemini won both awards in the same series.
 * Gemini, and 3 Stegs to Heaven are the only robots to never win a heat, to come from a team with a previous record of consecutive series semi-finals. Coincidentally, both of these robots were the number 8 seed in their first loss.
 * In Series 4, one half of Gemini was painted red on the top of the flipper, and the other half had blue paint in the same place.