Team Outlaw (formerly Team Velocirippa and Team Mouse) is a team from Nottinghamshire that competed in six main series of Robot Wars, including the Robotic Soccer competition of Series 3 and both series of Robot Wars Extreme. They did so with three robots; Velocirippa, Mighty Mouse and Ironside3, also building Series 9 competitor Meggamouse.
Aside from its Robotic Soccer qualifier win, neither model of Velocirippa ever won a battle on the televised show. Mighty Mouse was slightly more successful, reaching the Heat Final during Series 7, losing to Thermidor 2. Ironside3 was by far the most successful of the team's robots- despite controversially missing out on a Heat Final place following its loss to Pulsar in Series 8, it finished in third place overall in Series 9, avenging this loss along the way.
Versions of the Team
Team Velocirippa
Team Velocirippa at the time of Series 4
The team originally consisted of Father and Son duo Trevor and Matthew Wright in Series 3, before Anthony Hillier joined the team for their first main competition appearance in Series 4.
- "My lad was watching the television show, and he said "Dad, could you build one of these?", and I watched it for a bit and said "I can build a better one than that!", so I had the missus shouting from the kitchen "Well, go on then!", so I did!"
- — Trevor Wright on deciding to enter Robot Wars
The team at the Series 6 qualifiers
Team Mouse's original robot was Velocirippa, a compact, agile, wedge shaped robot, based on a dinosaur's head. Its weapons were originally had 8mm armour-plated spikes, which could be effectively used for ramming other opponents, as the robot had a top speed of 20 mph. It originally failed to qualify for Series 3, but used its agility to reach the final of the Robotic Soccer Competition. The robot qualified for the main competition in Series 4, but was defeated by the seeded Razer in its first battle. In Series 5/Extreme 1, the spikes on the front were replaced by a small disc. The robot Velocirippa still competed in Extreme Series 2 and Series 7, even after the team had become Team Mouse.
Team Mouse
- Jayne Middlemiss: "I'm sure I've seen you two before..."
- Trevor Wright: "Yeah, last week!"
- — Velocirippa's Series 7 Pre-first round interview
Trevor Wright, Matthew Wright and Tony Hillier entered Series 6, now known as Team Mouse, to represent their new robot Mighty Mouse. Trevor's daughter Emily joined the team in Extreme Series 2, and remained a part of the team in Series 7.
Team Mouse in Series 6
The team entered Series 6 with Mighty Mouse, a robot reconstructed from the previous version of Velocirippa, maintaining its original ramming spikes, but was now based on a mouse's head. Mighty Mouse was built from the chassis of the original Velocirippa machine, but proved more successful than Velocirippa in the main competition. For Series 6, the team had also built a new and improved Velocirippa machine, this robot was still based on a dinosaur's head, but was bulkier and larger than the original, and was originally armed with ramming spikes at the front. Both Velocirippa and Mighty Mouse qualified for Series 6 but the team could only enter one robot, so Mighty Mouse was entered and Velocirippa was withdrawn.
For Series 7, Team Mouse entered and qualified with both Velocirippa and Mighty Mouse. Again, Team Mouse could only enter one so picked Velocirippa this time. However, Mighty Mouse managed to compete because a reserve robot was needed and Team Captain Trevor Wright was able to reach the studio for filming at short notice. Due to a new rule requiring all heavyweight robots to have an active weapon, Velocirippa's front spikes were replaced with a lifter, whilst Mighty Mouse was given a pair of rear spinning discs. Although neither escaped the Heats, the tournament line-up would have made it impossible for them to fight each other until the Grand Final.
The pair of robots fought together in the Extreme Series 2 Tag-Team Terror competition; however they performed poorly, being eliminated in the first round by the eventual runners-up: Barbaric Response and Hydra.
Team Outlaw
Team Outlaw with Ironside3
When Robot Wars returned in 2016, Trevor Wright captained a brand new team, known as Team Outlaw, entering Series 8 and 9. He was joined by relative Patricia Wright. Team member Adam Lewis co-built the team's robot alongside Wright, learning from his expertise. Adam Lewis and fourth member of Team Outlaw, Louise Hemstock, are a roboteeering team in their own right, known as "Team No Toy Robotics", and are best known for their Ironside series of featherweights.
Team Outlaw in Series 8
After Team Mouse and Team No Toy Robotics merged to form Team Outlaw, they entered a new heavyweight robot, Ironside3, a scaled up version of Lewis and Hemstock's Ironside 2. Its horizontal spinning bar caused huge damage, weighing 18kg, and it dominated its Series 8 heat until it lost a controversial Judges' decision to Pulsar, falling from the head-to-head stages on five points. It achieved vengeance for this loss in Series 9, and finished third place within the Grand Final. The team worked on an all-new robot, equipped with a bar spinner like Ironside3, to compete in Series 10, but Team Outlaw were not selected to compete[1] despite their great success from the previous series.
Adam Lewis, driver of Ironside 3 in Series 8-9, first gained an interest in the team after watching Mighty Mouse in Series 7. As it turned out, he and Trevor Wright were neighbours, and the two built robots together ever since.
Team Mouse (Team Tilly)
Meggamouse with its team
While Robot Wars was off-air, Trevor Wright built a successor to Mighty Mouse, known as Meggamouse. This was armed with a rear-hinged flipper, giving it much more offense, as well as stronger armour. Wright found much success on the live circuit with this robot, and still owns the robot, but as he was already entering Series 9 with Ironside3, he loaned Meggamouse to Team Tilly, who used the Team Mouse name for television. Meggamouse was eliminated in the first round by Carbide. The team also attempted to enter Series 10 with Meggamouse, but were not selected to compete[2].
Team Mouse enter the arena
This version of Team Mouse consists of captain Shane Lale, Peter and Jackie Lale, as well as Sophie Clarkson. Team Tilly are experienced roboteers in their own right, having competed on the live circuit for over ten years, originally with their rim spinner Tilly 101, and later their highly upgraded version of Ewe 2. The team have also built robots of lower weight classes, such as Tilly XP.
When entering with Meggamouse, the team also brought a 10kg minibot known as Charles, and the two robots entered together as a clusterbot.
Robots
| Name | Weight Class | Series |
|---|---|---|
| Velocirippa | Heavyweight | Series 3-5, 7, Extreme 1-2 |
| Mighty Mouse | Heavyweight | Series 6-7, Extreme 2 |
| Ironside3 | Heavyweight | Series 8-9 |
| Meggamouse | Heavyweight | Series 9 |
NOTE: Meggamouse was entered by an unrelated team, loaning the robot from Trevor Wright
Wins/Losses
- Wins: 13
- Losses: 12
- Draws: 1
NOTE: Meggamouse's loss is not included
Series Record
| Main Series | Team Mouse Series Record |
|---|---|
| The First Wars | Did not enter |
| The Second Wars | Did not enter |
| The Third Wars | Robotic Soccer Final with Velocirippa |
| The Fourth Wars | Heat, Round 1 with Velocirippa |
| The Fifth Wars | Heat, Round 1 with Velocirippa |
| The Sixth Wars | Heat, Round 2 with Mighty Mouse Withdrew Velocirippa |
| The Seventh Wars | Heat Final with Mighty Mouse Heat, Round 1 with Velocirippa |
| Series 8 | Heat Round 2, Third Place with Ironside3 |
| Series 9 | Third Place with Ironside3 Heat, Round 1 with Meggamouse (Tilly family) |
| Series 10 | Not selected with unspecified robot Not selected with Meggamouse (Tilly family) |
| Robot Wars Extreme | Appearances |
| Series 1 | Entered with Velocirippa |
| Series 2 | Entered with Velocirippa and Mighty Mouse |
Outside Robot Wars
Team Mouse/Team Outlaw
Like many Robot Wars competitors, the team entered Techno Games with modified versions of their robots. Team Mouse entered a slightly-modified Mighty Mouse (with two small spikes replacing the usual front spikes) in the football tournament and the assault course. Having broken the world record along the way, it got to the final of the assault course but lost both the record and final to Typhoon Rover. In the football, it was teamed with Bugs Buggy rather than Velocirippa (who entered alongside Sugar Plum Fairy to form The Nut Gnashers). Together, the two were the Mousekerteers. The team also built a Battery Sprint competitor called In A Rush, for the 2001 series, but it lost in the first round to Junior from the International Wreck Crew.
Mini Mighty Mouse
Team Mouse found success on the live circuit, most notably with their featherweight Mini Mighty Mouse, which won the 2007 UK Featherweight Championship. Velocirippa also won the 2006 Tag-Team Terror Competition, paired with Team MAD's Merlin. In 2008, both Mighty Mouse and Velocirippa were retired from robotic combat, with the newer Velocirippa being stripped down and its internals used to build Meggamouse. Both Mini Mighty Mouse and Meggamouse still fight competitively today, with Meggamouse's most recent appearance being at the Robots Live! Stevenage event in October 2016. Team Mouse were working with Team Roaming Robots to turn their robot Orbiter into an axe wielding robot. This fell through and Orbiter was sold to Krissy Knee, who renamed it Rybot.
No Toy, Lewis and Hemstock's featherweight
Meanwhile, Adam Lewis and Louise Hemstock competed on the live event circuit as Team No Toy Robotics. They fought on the circuit with a featherweight named No Toy, a hexagonal robot armed with an electric chain-driven axe. They also bought the second incarnation of Ceros and fought with that in live events until they sold it to Tony Smith in 2016, and also briefly owned the 2011 version of Chimera.
Yoton, Adam and Louise's current live circuit heavyweight
Team Outlaw have competed with a series of featherweight robots called Ironside, the inspiration for the team's heavyweight. The original Ironside was an invertible, octagonal-shaped rambot, and was superseded by Ironside 2, which was initially armed with a front spinning disc. When it fought in the UK featherweight championships, however, Ironside 2 featured an angled spinning bar similar to that of Ironside3, which it still competes with to this day. Due to the specifications of today's arenas used on the live event circuit, Ironside 3 hasn't been able to fight. It has however made appearances at the Extreme Robots events on display at the Truckfest event at Peterborough and also Guildford in 2017. Adam and Louise currently fight with YOTON, a black and blue wedge-shaped robot armed with a flipper which initially made its debut at the Robots Live! Stevenage event in 2016. YOTON earned considerable success in June 2018, where it took third place at the Robots Live! event in Grantham. Later the same year, it entered the 2018 FRA UK Championship, finishing fourth overall.[3]
Robin Hood, Team Outlaw's Clash Bots entry
Team Outlaw also competed in the 2018 Chinese TV show, Clash Bots. They fought with Robin Hood, a robot very similar to Ironside3 with an angled bar spinner and new self-righting mechanism, with the robot painted green in reference to its namesake. In the first round, it fought the Chinese entry Nightmare Strangler, but after delivering two hits to the side of Nightmare Strangler, the recoil of Robin Hood's attack caused the robot to stop working. Robin Hood was counted out, and lost the battle in prompt fashion.
Team Tilly
Team Tilly formed in the live event circuit in 2002 when they attended the first Roaming Robots event at the Newark Kit Car festival. Shane Lale started off with driving featherweights, his first robot was a Remote Controlled Matilda which he named Tilly. Team Tilly's first heavyweight was Tilly's Revenge, which was a large pink coloured (later black and orange) wedge shaped robot armed with an electric lifter which was built in 2005, the team fought with it until 2008 when it was sold to Team Kinforesters who renamed it Hortron. For the UK Championships in 2006, the team fought with Tilly 101, a circular invertible robot armed with a full body rim spinner which lost in the group stages but made it to the final of the International Championship where it lost to Kronic. From September 2006, the team purchased an upgraded version of Ewe 2, renaming it to TillyEwe 2, under Team Tilly's belt it has done very well in live events winning the 2007 Annihilator and also finishing 3rd in the Roaming Robots Winter Tour 2007. In 2008, the team built an upgraded version of TillyEwe 2 called Tilly 2 Evo which has done well in live events reaching the finals of the UK Championships in 2008, 2009, 2010 & 2011. For the 2011 UK Championships, the team built Tilly XP, a wedge-shaped robot with a front-hinge flipper which was granted a Wild Card seed placing at the event but was beaten in the heats by the teams on Tilly 2 Evo. The team also built TillyEwe 3 in 2013 which debuted at the 2013 European Championships, but this version hasn't done well as its predecessor as it has had to lose armour panels a lot before going into the arena, presumably to lose weight.
F7 (Force 7)
Team Tilly also fought with a featherweight called Dizzy Tilly, an orange and black circular robot armed with a full body spinner, and have since acquired the second version of Hatchet, an axe-wielding robot, from Sam Price, renaming it Red Hot Tilly Pecker. Team captain Shane Lale also drove Iron-Awe 5 and Iron-Awe 6 at Mechatrons 2018 with the permission of Gilbert Grimm, which ultimately finished first and second in the tournament.[4]
In August 2018, Red Hot Tilly Pecker competed in the Fighting My Bots World Cup in Shanghai, China, achieving a 3-2 win-loss record in its group.[5] Later the same month, it competed in the inaugural King of Bots UK featherweight event at Insomnia 63, Birmingham. Red Hot Tilly Pecker initially fought Binky and Blunt Force Trauma Remix in the first qualifying round, finishing the battle second after getting itself stuck on an already-immobilised Blunt Force Trauma Remix. In a three-way melee against The Claw and Neon, Red Hot Tilly Pecker finished second, after being immobilised by Neon. Ultimately, Red Hot Tilly Pecker was eliminated in its final melee, finishing second for a third time after its wheel was ripped away by Sabre20. At the Robodojo Autumn Featherweight Championship in 2018, Red Hot Tilly Pecker suffered two surprise losses in the Sportsman division, before redeeming itself by causing significant damage to The Tragic Roundabout[6]. Shane Lale also drove Mattock at the January 2019 Robodojo event in the Sportsman class, finishing in fourth place.
Team Tilly also built a middleweight robot, F7 known in full as Force 7, armed with a lifter, originally designed by Adam Hamiltion. F7 was initially intended to enter RoboGames 2018, but pulled out[7], and ultimately first appeared at the Extreme Robots Manchester event in April 2018. There, it participated in numerous battles against heavyweight competitors, including a head-to-head against TR3 and a melee against Eric and Crackers 'n' Smash. Team Tilly have also designed two new beetleweights, the former of which made its live events debut in 2018.[8]
Tilly, the Clash Bots entry from Team Tilly
Alongside Team Outlaw, Team Tilly competed in the Chinese show Clash Bots with Tilly, a 104kg full body spinner with a 6mm HARDOX 450 shell, which had been converted from Hammertime, a live events competitor which started life as Corkscrew Two. It fought Catfish, a Chinese vertical spinner, and opened the battle with a devastating hit which appeared to immobilise Catfish. However, the Chinese robot regained mobility, and delivered several huge blows, throwing Tilly through the air. Both robots remained mobile for over ninety seconds, with Catfish starting to release smoke, but Tilly eventually became immobile near the arena wall, and lost the battle, eliminating it from the competition.
Dr Thwackenstein
Sophie Clarkson of Team Tilly also competed in the web-series Bugglebots with Dr Thwackenstein, a beetleweight thwackbot inspired by Gabriel, which had also competed at a previous beetleweight event. It was unsuccessful at the event, suffering from damaged speed controllers against Weewoo, before losing one of its wheels in the redemption round which was ultimately won by Rev 2. Shane Lale was also present at Bugglebots as a referee.
Shane Lale (left) at BattleBots in 2019 with Nelly the Ellybot
Shane Lale also competed in the 2019 season of BattleBots as part of Team Pun-Chant, with their robot Nelly the Ellybot. For more information, see the Nelly the Ellybot article.
Robot Wars Live Events
Meggamouse competed in the first live event of the touring Robot Wars at Barnsley in February 2013. Mini Mighty Mouse, the team's featherweight, then debuted in the Portsmouth event in March. Meggamouse was a regular competitor at these live events up until their rebranding to Extreme Robots.
Honours
Trivia
- Team Mouse was one of three teams to enter more than one heavyweight robot into a single series of Robot Wars, alongside Team Vader and Team Ming.
- Team Outlaw, Dorset Roboteering Team and Team Make Robotics were the only teams to reach a Grand Final with four members present.
- Along with TR2 and Griffon, Team Outlaw are one of three Grand Finalists who were not selected for the main competition of the following series. Their planned successor to Ironside3 was also the only robot of the three not to have been chosen as a reserve following its initial rejection.
References
- ↑ https://www.facebook.com/Teamoutlawironside3/posts/1883363775313132
- ↑ https://www.facebook.com/TeamMouserobotics/posts/1678734508832224?comment_id=1681500898555585¬if_id=1517445826946278¬if_t=feed_comment&ref=notif
- ↑ https://www.facebook.com/EruptionRobot/posts/1926518734316438
- ↑ https://www.facebook.com/TeamTillyRobotics/photos/a.845752518905086.1073741832.754371364709869/937851843028486/?type=3&theater
- ↑ https://www.facebook.com/TeamTillyRobotics/photos/a.845752518905086/1089071487906520/?type=3&theater
- ↑ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=amF3Mn84JHs
- ↑ https://www.facebook.com/TeamTillyRobotics/posts/964413507038986
- ↑ https://www.facebook.com/TeamTillyRobotics/posts/931219533691717
External Links
| ||||||||||||||||||||||||||