MouseTrap

Mousetrap (sometimes spelled MouseTrap) was a robot that competed in Series 4 and 5 of Robot Wars, plus entering in the first series of Extreme. It was a wedge-shaped replica of a spring mousetrap, with the trap itself being the weapon. The robot reached the semi-finals of Series 4, losing to the seeded Stinger. In Series 5, it reached the second round of its heat, losing to future Semi-Finalists S3.

The original Mousetrap was made from an old office desk with polycarbonate side armour and was fitted with an 11kg mousetrap weapon made from scrapyard steel. This weapon was powered by CO2 and was said to travel at 100mph. Mousetrap progressed through its heat, but lost a drive chain and was immobilised against Stinger in the semi-finals.

For Extreme 1 and Series 5, the polycarbonate side armour was replaced with much stronger steel and spikes and a guillotine blade was added to the trap weapon. During Series 5, the robot was known as Mousetrap 2. This version was much less successful, progressing to the second round only because Shredder pitted itself, before losing on a judges' decision to S3.

Team Mousetrap had previously entered Robot Wars in Series 3 with their robot Triterobot. The team also failed to qualify for the Sixth Wars with an updated version of Mousetrap 2 called Mutant Mousetrap. Additionally, Team Mousetrap entered Series 7 with a brand new clusterbot called Black and Blue.

Team member Stan Launchbury also worked on the Oxfordshire Fire Service's Oblark machine for the Forces Special in the first series of Extreme.

Series 4
Mousetrap entered the wars as a newcomer, although its team had fought in the previous series with Triterobot, losing in their only battle to Evil Weevil. Incidentally, it faced Evil Weevil 2, now the 12th seed, in their first round melee of the Fourth Wars, along with newcomers Tiberius. Team Mousetrap had their revenge this time around, although it didn't really do anything to the robot, this was because Evil Weevil 2 broke down very early on in the battle due to an uncharged battery. Mousetrap, already through to the next round of the heat, clashed with Tiberius, Tiberius clawed Mousetrap and poked the desk outer-shell, however no major damage was caused. Mousetrap next faced Sumpthing in the second round of the heat. The low-tech robot attempted to destroy Mousetrap's spring, which powered the weapon. It was unsuccessful, but appeared to be on top in the battle, until it was lifted off its wheels by its own forklift in a similar way to Razer in the Third Wars, and immobilised. Mousetrap was through to the next round, although quite luckily. In the heat final, Mousetrap went up against newcomers Little Fly. Mousetrap used its trap weapon, but the attack was unsuccessful, just like one of Little Fly's. Mousetrap then drove at it again, pushing Little Fly into Matilda's CPZ. Little Fly was able to do some more damage to Mousetrap before cease was called and the battle went to a judges' decision. The judges put Mousetrap through to the Series Semi-Finals.

In the Series Semi-Finals, Mousetrap faced the 30th seeds Stinger in the first round. Here Mousetrap wasn't able to accurately hit Stinger, while the future Grand Finalist was able to land blow after blow on Mousetrap. After a time, both of the chains of Mousetrap's weapon broke, and it subsequently stopped working. A few seconds of only being able to use the wedge shape with both chains trailing on the floor saw the whole robot slow to a stop in the centre of the arena. It was then attacked by house robots Shunt and Sir Killalot, who crushed the side armour and dragged it to the pit. Mousetrap's remarkable run ended there.

Thanks to reaching the Series Semi Finals, the robot was nominated for the Most Promising Newcomer award for Series 4, despite not actually being a newcomer, but lost out to Tornado anyway.

Extreme 1
Mousetrap's only appearance in either series of Extreme was in a Mayhem qualifier battle in the first series of Extreme for a right to fight in the second annihilator of the series. Mousetrap was drawn up against Atomic 2 and Fighting Torque. However, a problem with its trap mechanism left it defenseless, as it fired only once, before activate was sounded, from then on it was stuck in the activated position. Mousetrap was continually flipped around the arena by Atomic, with Fighting Torque largely staying out of the way of the action, Atomic finally left Mousetrap upside down to be counted out by Refbot, flipped by the arena floor flipper, and left for Dead Metal to slice and cut into. Fighting Torque later suffered a similar fate to Mousetrap, and Atomic 2 was declared the winner of the Mayhem and was due to proceed to the annihilator.

However, despite winning the Mayhem, Atomic 2 was unable to compete in the upcoming annihilator due to suffering severe damage in its Series 5 battle with Hypno-Disc. Unfortunately for Team Mousetrap, it was decided that Fighting Torque would take Atomic's place in the annihilator rather than Mousetrap.

Series 5
For the Fifth Wars, Mousetrap 2 was seeded 20th, this being a rather lowly seed considering its predecessor reached the semi-finals of Series 4. In its first round battle, Mousetrap 2 was pitted up against Shredder. Throughout the battle, Mousetrap 2 seemed incapable of landing a noticeable blow on Shredder to cause any real damage, but Shredder was using its discs to grind at the side of Mousetrap 2. Luckily for Mousetrap 2, Shredder backed into the pit before it could cause any more damage, this put the seeded machine through to the next round of the heat. Mousetrap 2 needed to then beat the much fancied S3 in the second round to set up a grudge match with the 5th seeds Stinger in the heat final. In this battle, S3 couldn't cause any severe damage to Mousetrap 2's front end, so Mousetrap 2 drove into S3, making it go up its wedge. Mousetrap 2 swung the trap mechanism and sliced into S3's armour, while S3 chewed up the hose wrapped around the bottom of the trap. For at least thirty seconds, the two robots remained locked together, with the spring having become caught in S3's spinning disc, which disarmed both machines. Mousetrap 2 bulldozed S3 back into a CPZ, looking to win the fight. However, S3 broke free and began to use the weapon to wreck Mousetrap 2. As time ran out, S3 tore a huge chunk of armour from it. These attacks put S3 through to the heat final, with Mousetrap 2 bombing out of the competition.

Results

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Wins/Losses

 * Wins: 4
 * Losses: 3

Series Record

 * Series 1-2: Did not enter
 * Series 3: Entered with Triterobot
 * Series 4: Semi-Final, Round 1
 * Series 5: Heat, Round 2
 * Series 6: Failed to qualify with Mutant Mousetrap
 * Series 7: Entered with Black and Blue