Evan Rosenblatt

Foreign.

Justin Site

Welcome back to the HAVOC rundown. I'm your host, Justin Site. We're doing something a little different. This episode is our official college robotics special where we're sitting down with a group of builders who are right at the end of one chapter and about to launch into the next. Over the last few years, college robotics programs have become some of the biggest pipelines for new builders, new ideas, and honestly, some of the most ridiculous levels of engineering dedication we've ever seen. We're talking late night machine shop sessions, robots rebuilt hours before competition, group chats that probably shouldn't have been muted years ago, and entire weekends fueled entirely by energy drinks and blind optimism. Tonight, we're joined by an awesome group of graduating builders who help shape their school's robotics programs and communities. From wpi, we have Evan Rosenblatt and Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano. Representing Brandeis University, we're joined by Samuel Herman and Daphne Yan. Yeah, it's Yan, right? Did I say that right? Cool. And from Rose Hulman Institute of Technology, we have Ian Talbert. Hi, guys. Thanks for being on and talking to us.

Tony Baker

Hey, everyone.

Samuel Herman

Yeah, thanks for having us.

Evan Rosenblatt

Thank you indeed.

Tony Baker

Yeah, thanks for taking a few minutes out of your finals prep.

Justin Site

Oh, yeah.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

We're being invaded.

Samuel Herman

Finals is done now. I don't have anymore.

Justin Site

We have a lot of voices, a

Ian Talbert

lot of voices on today, like two weeks out from finals.

Justin Site

Today we're going to talk about real college robotics experience. Building teams, balancing classes with competition prep, passing knowledge down to younger members, favorite memories, hardest lessons learned, all that kind of stuff. But as usual, I am not alone. So joining me tonight are our game master, general Ryan Hunter.

Ryan Hunter

Well, hello there.

Justin Site

Our investigative journalist of destruction is Thomas Carroll.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Everyone, tonight we'll have the nightmare where they're taking a class, but they forgot about it until three months in.

Justin Site

And of course, our creative engine behind half the chaos on this show, it's Tony Baker.

Tony Baker

Hey, everybody.

Justin Site

Before we dive into the roundtable tonight, we're going to make our usual stop over in Ryan's game corner. Ryan, tell us what we're doing.

Ryan Hunter

Okay, we are playing a mini round of Jeopardy. I figured that you were all taking tests right now, so why don't I give you all another test to take? Hell yeah. So we're going to play standard Jeopardy Rules, but we have only two teams. We are going to do the the oldies on the HAVOC rundown crew versus grads. All right, Back in my day, as you can see, I have a four. I have a four by two Japanese square here. And the categories are History, life survival, engineering, and robot names. History is questions about history, life survival are. Is life survival. Tips for after college. Engineering is engineering principles, and robot names are trivia questions where the name will be a robot name.

Justin Site

And just for anyone that's listening and not watching, Ryan only has eight questions. So this doesn't turn into an entire game.

Ryan Hunter

This is very quick. We're gonna go very quick. As quick as possible. All right, we're going to use the normal dinging system. You represent the team that you come from. Everybody got it?

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Yeah, I guess so.

Justin Site

Yeah.

Ryan Hunter

All right. Since they have less people on their team, we are going to start with the rundown crew for picking the category and where you would like to go.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Oh, we got to go. Life survival.

Justin Site

Yeah. Okay. I'll let Thomas check first.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

100.

Ryan Hunter

100.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

I gotta make sure that we answer the question in the right way.

Ryan Hunter

This common kitchen ingredient can be used to put out grease fires.

Tony Baker

Ding.

Justin Site

Go ahead, Tony.

Ryan Hunter

I believe Tony dinged in baking soda. It is baking soda. All right, first question.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

See, I wanted to say the lid, but it said ingredient, so.

Justin Site

Yeah, the lid is good, too. You never want to use water.

Ryan Hunter

You can use a pot lid. You can use a fire blanket, and you can also use a class K extinguisher.

Tony Baker

Also, turn your significant other, you know, one of the.

Ryan Hunter

All right, the rundown crew continues.

Ian Talbert

All right, let's go.

Tony Baker

Engineering for 200.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

200.

Ryan Hunter

This principle explains how airplane wings generate lifts.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Ding.

Samuel Herman

Ding. Oh, damn.

Ryan Hunter

Who dinged in first? Who was that?

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

It was I.

Ryan Hunter

Okay.

Samuel Herman

It was Thomas. Yeah.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Oh, God. I'm gonna get this wrong. Is it Bernoulli's principle?

Ryan Hunter

It is Bernoulli's principle. All right, all right.

Tony Baker

I was trying to be nice to the grads.

Ryan Hunter

All right, College grads. We have to. We. You gotta. You gotta dig in faster. You got you. All right, Thomas.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

History 1,

Ryan Hunter

the name for empty pants pockets turned outward during the Great Depression.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

We were not that old.

Tony Baker

Oh, dude, that was in the 1930s. Like, really?

Ryan Hunter

Yeah.

Daphne Yan

They taught this in social study.

Ryan Hunter

Like, I remember learning about this whole thing. Yeah.

Daphne Yan

I feel like this is like an elementary school fact in terms of its relevance.

Ryan Hunter

It could be. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Justin Site

It is on the tip of my tongue. I don't remember what it is.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Someone just say a silly answer.

Justin Site

I don't even know what to start with.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Wait, do you lose points if we get.

Justin Site

I'm kick myself.

Samuel Herman

I'm going to ding in.

Ian Talbert

Okay.

Samuel Herman

Is it the dust bowl?

Ryan Hunter

It is not. The dust bowl happened during the Great Depression, but it's not what this is. No.

Samuel Herman

Okay. That's what I thought, but I wanted to make sure.

Justin Site

Yeah, I think the house is going to get this one because I'm going to kick myself. Like, I remember. I remember specifically learning about this, but I don't remember what the term was.

Ryan Hunter

I will. I will help here with either side can answer the I will help by saying part of it. This was named after the president at the very beginning of the Great Depression. And the president that was blamed for the Great Depression thing. Okay.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Is it Hoover flops? I should know this. I'm a history, like, edited history.

Ryan Hunter

Thing is, Hoover flags.

Ian Talbert

Okay.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Thank God.

Ryan Hunter

Yes.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Everyone knows the real answer is empty pants pockets turned outwards.

Ryan Hunter

All right.

Tony Baker

Or I have no money.

Daphne Yan

Kind of like, never heard of Hoover flags in my life. I'm sorry.

Ryan Hunter

It's. It's also. He's the same president that also commissioned, I believe, the Hoover Dam, but he was also blamed for a lot of the Great Depression.

Evan Rosenblatt

Yeah.

Ryan Hunter

All right.

Justin Site

Which just really cool fact. Did you know they had to pump, like, refrigerant through the concrete when they were building that? Because concrete gives off so much heat that it would never have set? It would have taken, like, a hundred years for it to set if they didn't cool it at the same time as being poured.

Tony Baker

And there is no bodies in the Hoover Dam.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

That is what they want you to

Ryan Hunter

think that you know of. Don't count the alien bodies. All right, college grads,

Ian Talbert

do you want to try engineering 100?

Evan Rosenblatt

Yeah, go for it.

Samuel Herman

Why not?

Ryan Hunter

This manufacturing process involves pouring a molten metal into a mold.

Ian Talbert

Ding.

Samuel Herman

All right, Sam, it's casting.

Ryan Hunter

It is casting. Yes.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Yeah.

Ryan Hunter

All right.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

She didn't say what is.

Ryan Hunter

Oh, damn grads.

Justin Site

It's fine.

Ryan Hunter

I'll give it to you. All right.

Samuel Herman

I'll go for life survival 200.

Ryan Hunter

This is the proper method for paying a credit card without accruing any interest.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Okay. There's a lot of answers that could be.

Ryan Hunter

No, there is only technically one answer.

Daphne Yan

Ding.

Ryan Hunter

Yes.

Daphne Yan

Paying all of the balance every month.

Ryan Hunter

That is not technically correct. No. Really?

Tony Baker

That is actually a myth.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Ding.

Justin Site

Yes.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

I mean, like, I don't know how in depth you want the answer to go. So, like,

Justin Site

I think he's looking for a word. He's. He's looking for, like, a term.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

A word. A singular word.

Justin Site

Yeah.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

How can you sum this up in a singular word?

Samuel Herman

Responsibly

Tony Baker

not using it.

Justin Site

Yeah, well, like, I mean, I don't

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

want to give the explanation because I'll say I will.

Ryan Hunter

I I am good with giving it to Daphne. At this point, I'm being a little pedantic about it.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

I want to know this answer. So that way, what the.

Ryan Hunter

Paying off the full statement balance. That's not what the full statement balance by the due date.

Tony Baker

So technically, that does not always work. Depending on how your credit card calculates interest, some of them actually calculate interest from the moment you buy the item. So paying it off by the statement will not work.

Daphne Yan

That sounds like a bad credit card.

Ryan Hunter

That's a very bad credit card.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Oh, there are lots of bad credit cards, and many people have them.

Tony Baker

Credit cards, by definition, are bad.

Justin Site

Yeah, they're.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

The next episode will be the Havoc rundown financial guide to not messing up your credit score in life and how to get it all.

Justin Site

Please, no. Yes.

Ryan Hunter

Don't tempt my wife.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Anybody out here that is listening to this podcast, freeze your credit, because that way it'll prevent you from getting your identity. Still, it'll significantly reduce the chances it's free. It used to be $20.

Ian Talbert

It's very easy.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Just do it or else I will haunt you.

Samuel Herman

Yep, this is true.

Ryan Hunter

It's not as easy anymore because it's not as easy anymore because you do have to go to all three credit agencies technically to do it.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

I always had to do that.

Justin Site

Yeah, but it's a website. You go to a website, you log in, you hit a browser.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Kids loves websites. They like TikTok. It's the same thing as TikTok.

Ryan Hunter

Go to the Experian website. It's just like TikTok.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

It is.

Justin Site

Go to TikTok. Say, I'm freezing my credit.

Ryan Hunter

All right, college grads, you have. You have the board.

Daphne Yan

Robot names for 100.

Ryan Hunter

These are created when the hot, humid exhaust from a jet plane hits extremely cold, low pressure air in the sky.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Vapor trail.

Ian Talbert

No, you dinged too early.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

What?

Ian Talbert

Before he was done reading.

Evan Rosenblatt

What?

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

You can't do it.

Ryan Hunter

No way.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Is that a Jeopardy.

Ryan Hunter

Rule.

Ian Talbert

That's like a counter ding. Yeah.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Okay, well, Sam also didn't say what is, so

Ryan Hunter

I. I am going to give it to Thomas. The answer is vapor trails. Because he did say the answer already.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Is it all. Is it actually a rule that you have to wait for the full question?

Ian Talbert

Jeopardy.

Justin Site

Yes.

Ryan Hunter

Yes.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

That's stupid.

Justin Site

I hate the buttons. Don't even. The buttons don't even turn on until after he is done reading the entire sentence.

Ryan Hunter

All right.

Justin Site

The entire question.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Lame.

Ryan Hunter

Thomas, you have the board

Ian Talbert

history.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Get ready. Ezekiel.

Justin Site

Yeah, his $100 question was this Greek city.

Ryan Hunter

This Greek city State Is most associated with developing democracy in 508 BC. Who dinged?

Ian Talbert

What is Athens?

Ryan Hunter

It is Athens. Yes.

Tony Baker

Don't ever go there in the summer. It's extremely hot. Even in May, it was hot.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

What about Athens, Georgia?

Ryan Hunter

I will. I will give our final.

Samuel Herman

It's probably worse.

Justin Site

It's not that bad.

Ryan Hunter

Read our final clue. It is robot names for 200, the nickname given to a plutonium sphere responsible for several of the worst nuclear experiment accidents that was originally supposed to be the third nuclear weapon used in World War II.

Ian Talbert

Now ding.

Ryan Hunter

Sam.

Samuel Herman

What is demon Core?

Ryan Hunter

It is Demon Core. Yes.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Everyone loves the Demon Core.

Justin Site

Good job, Gratz.

Samuel Herman

Everyone loves the Demon Core.

Justin Site

Yeah.

Ryan Hunter

All right. The grads win with 800 to 400 points. Congratulations.

Daphne Yan

You went to college for.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Congrats.

Ryan Hunter

You went to college for.

Tony Baker

What do you win? Lots of college debt.

Ryan Hunter

Yeah.

Justin Site

Yeah. There you go. Okay, cool. Thank you, Ryan. That was a taxing game on our brains, as usual. Okay, so we're going to move over to. We've done this a couple times in our last couple episodes where we talked before we got into the five and focus. And then we just talked to Alex and Gabe the other day, and we gave it a name. The Rundown Roundtable. So that is we're gonna be calling this segment from now on where we talk about the main subject of whatever our guests are on to talk about. So for this Rundown Roundtable, we are talking to, of course, our college grads about what it's like doing combat robotics and college at the same time and what it's gonna be like after college and all of that kind of stuff. So I think the first thing that I wanna get into. And you guys can answer these in any order, whoever wants. But just a brief. How did you get into Combat robotics? Was it before college? Was it during college? Like, whoever wants to answer and just tell us how you guys got into Combat Robotics and if college was involved or if you just continued it when you got into college.

Evan Rosenblatt

I mean, I can go first.

Ryan Hunter

Yeah, go ahead.

Justin Site

Do you? Yeah. Anybody can jump in?

Evan Rosenblatt

Yeah, I kind of got into combat a little bit before.

Ryan Hunter

Start by saying your name.

Justin Site

Evan.

Evan Rosenblatt

Oh, yeah, sure.

Ryan Hunter

Sorry.

Evan Rosenblatt

No, it's okay. Yeah, my name's Evan. I'm from wpi and I build the robot blunder. But I kind of got into combat a little bit before college. So I started following NHRL in, like, 2020, you know, Covid keeping me locked in. I started watching hours and hours of robot combat, but I never actually started building my own robot until I got into college. And so, you know, it just helps that the WPI team is so large that eventually someone will. Will tell you about it and you'll go to a meeting at some point. It's just kind of how it works around here.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

I. I guess I could jump in from that since we're the same college. Hi, I'm Ezekiel. I also go into wpi and I didn't actually know about Combat Robotics before college at all. I kind of just went to a meeting, started at the start of the year that they do their, like, joint meeting where it used to be like the Robotics club in umbrella terms. That's a whole different thing. But yeah, I joined through that. I made a plastic and the rest is history.

Justin Site

So WPI for WPI Robotics is just that huge of a thing that you're just eventually going to run into it? Yeah, absolutely.

Evan Rosenblatt

Club fairs and whatnot, and we're a huge presence there. But I will say robotics clubs, like, just in general, it's like half of the organizations here. It's a lot.

Justin Site

That's awesome. I like that.

Daphne Yan

What do y' all do for club fairs?

Evan Rosenblatt

I mean. Yeah, so we like specifically Combat.

Daphne Yan

Yeah. What do you do to get people in? We should take some tips.

Ian Talbert

Yeah.

Evan Rosenblatt

I mean, I'll get into it briefly, but we often have like a table set up. We have all of our members bring robots, different weight classes, and oftentimes we'll wheel out like, our rolling test cage. So we try to pick like a table, you know, near the end so we have a lot of space. And we'll put the test cage down, have people drive around in it, hit some test objects, just.

Ryan Hunter

That's sick.

Evan Rosenblatt

Try and be present. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Justin Site

Just.

Samuel Herman

I think I can go next.

Justin Site

Yep, go ahead.

Samuel Herman

On. On sort of the other side of the spectrum. Not only are there no other robotics clubs at Brandeis, but we're kind of the only engineering club. And as you know, a university where we don't actually have like a fully fledged engineering program yet, it can sort of be difficult to get people in. But for me, I actually found out about the club before I even joined, before I even started attending, because I found I. They have a. Basically a Discord server on the whole university, like Discord Hub. And I. I did robotics in high school, so I found that I joined it and started talking with the people and it, you know, the rest. The rest is history. Then, you know, I. I knew about Combat Robotics for a while. I grew up watching BattleBots, but I didn't know about these smaller Weight classes, actually, until I joined university and started building them myself.

Daphne Yan

I can go next. I have very. Had very, very little robotics engineering experience. I joined at the end of freshman year, beginning of sophomore year, because I was just really missing a comfortable collaborative tech space on campus. And from what I'd heard from Sam, that's what the club was like. And I. Our club is not a combat robotics club. It's like just a robotics club. I joined not even wanting to do robotics. I wanted to learn how to design, like, my own cyberpunky 3D insect models. But halfway through sophomore year, I went to 2023 world champs. And then it was game over. And I haven't thought about bugs ever since. Except for Beatles.

Ryan Hunter

There you go. It's Delane sex. You know, it fits. Ian.

Ian Talbert

Yeah. So I'm Ian. I'm from Rose Hulman, which is in West Indiana. So I think Rose Hulman in. In my mind's eye, it's very similar to wpi where it's a small, um. Like it's.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

It.

Ian Talbert

We don't do liberal arts stuff, like, at all. I'm not sure that you can major in that. It's all like, engineering stuff. So. I joined up in a different strain of robotics initially. But I came to combat, like, before Rose. I wasn't. I maybe watched a couple episodes of BattleBots. Honestly, I didn't really care much because I. It wasn't something I could aspire to. Um, but I think in my. In the middle of my sophomore year, I joined the team here at Rose Hulman. Cause my. My roommate was in it and he was like. We would sit down and watch. I think we watched like NHRL All Stars. And I was like, oh, my God. Chainsaw Kitty is like, amazing. Like, that bot is like tearing up other people. Darts around the box. It's amazing. So, yeah, I think what's.

Ryan Hunter

What was everybody's first robots? Everybody has their own robots, right?

Ian Talbert

I guess I'll keep going.

Evan Rosenblatt

Yeah, we go for it.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Nobody built robots.

Justin Site

Anybody can answer. Answer whenever.

Ryan Hunter

Oh, yeah.

Justin Site

And like, we can. Don't worry about, like, spaces or anything like that.

Ryan Hunter

Yeah. Orders or anything. Well, yeah.

Daphne Yan

First robot that we liked or first robot that we made.

Justin Site

That you made. Yeah. Talk about your robots. Yeah, yeah.

Samuel Herman

For me, the first robot that I made was called Sustenance. It was a Fingertech beater bar. The weapon system was basically handed to me by some older members. And I basically just designed around it. I only ran it at one competition. It actually did fairly well. But from there I just started Iterating, designing upgrades. I eventually, um, ran a newer version of it called Epsilon, which did absolutely horrendously at like three competitions back to back. Uh, and I haven't touched that since. Uh, but then I moved on to the robot that I'm probably best known for now, Colossus. Um, and that has been an absolute blast.

Daphne Yan

Um, kind of following cell students. I forgot to introduce myself also. I'm Daphne. My first robot was called Frogspawn, and it was Sam revamping sustenance a little bit and then giving it to me and saying, hey, this is your robot. Learn how to put it together. The first robot that I ever designed myself was my current. The current 3 pound that I'm running called Phelana. And what I've learned from making and designing this robot is that SAM is better than me.

Ryan Hunter

Oh. I mean, you know, he's Sam like you. You both collaborate and make robots, so that's good. Evan, I don't know what robot. What? You have a robot, right? I know.

Evan Rosenblatt

I've got a couple. They're like, okay. My, My first robot was called Whoopsie Daisy. Of course, fighting it. The plastic antweight comps that we run at wpi, its first event was like, pretty, pretty okay. You know, for a first bot, like, you know, going two in one is not bad at all. But liked to explode plastic ants. You know, no one, no one was really that into super PLA at the time. So I was running like marble pla. And yeah, so exactly what you would expect happened, happened. But it got a lot better after that.

Ryan Hunter

Sweets, what about. And the other side of. Of wpi. Ezekiel, what was your first robot?

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

I guess. I guess my first robot was. It didn't really work because it never graded into the box really. But when I was a freshman, I made a two wheel drive drum called I think Blitz. And it was a belted drum. It wasn't like a hub motor drum. And I think it was. It was my first time making a combat robot. At first I was trying to make like a Minotaur clone, and I wasn't very good at CAD at the time, so that didn't really pan out. And then ended up making this, this plastic ant. And I wasn't very strong at like, wiring. I'd never wired anything before. And so it just. It didn't function. But it got in the box, it spun out, and that's kind of all it did.

Justin Site

It counts.

Ryan Hunter

Don't worry about that.

Justin Site

Counts. Yeah, no, that's fine.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Our.

Justin Site

Our brother just had his first Robot this past competition and they tried to use too small of an ESC for the weapon motor and blew the entire bot up in the test box.

Ryan Hunter

So, you know, it went on fire.

Justin Site

Yeah, yeah, the ESC caught on fire because it was trying to push too much electricity through a tiny little 45A ESC. So.

Tony Baker

And that exploded right in the actual box.

Justin Site

Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's how you learn. That's how you learn how to build better and do it better next time. So which, I mean, now you have blink, right? Blink is yours.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Yeah, I have Blink and I have my 12 pounder supernova.

Ryan Hunter

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Justin Site

So see, you learn from the mistakes and you do better. So. Very cool.

Ian Talbert

Yeah.

Tony Baker

I want to know if you've ever missed a test because you were trying to compute your robots.

Justin Site

I was literally just about to get the time management and Combat Robotics stuff right now, so. That's a good question.

Samuel Herman

I've never missed a test, but I've definitely missed a lot of homework assignments. Yeah.

Justin Site

What is it like trying to time manage with Combat Robotics? Because we all know that, like Sam was just saying, spending eight hours a day for the last two weeks in the lab trying to get a robot done, I'm sure that doesn't do very well with trying to get schoolwork done at the same time. How does it feel trying to balance those? Yeah, how does it feel trying to balance this too? Trying to get both of those done and you know, having, trying to figure out what priority is what and what to do first and all that kind of stuff.

Evan Rosenblatt

I mean, it's got impossible. You know, I, I can't say that I'm the best at time management, but throwing robots in there has not made me any better. I'll say that I, I've, I've I've like skipped a couple homework assignments because I'm like, oh, well, you know, it's Friday night before nhro, I need to, I need to put the robot together. And so I haven't improved in that regard. But I will say, you know, I'm graduating and my grades are okay, so I've come to the end of it and I didn't fail. So we're good.

Ryan Hunter

All that matters in the end, that you're being handed the diploma. Right?

Evan Rosenblatt

Exactly.

Daphne Yan

I think joining robotics was probably the single best and single worst thing to happen to me that could have happened to me in college. Even beyond working on robots, I just. Robotics club is my friends now. And so doing homework, hanging out with friends, doing arguably the coolest hobby that exists, it's kind of very tilted. Work life, school, robot balance does not really exist. I think the only saving grace is the fact that the automation lab is in the library, which has to close at some point. I've just been kind of trucking along and you know what, I'm graduating so it's been fine. I don't regret the amount of time that I've spent in robotics. I regret how I allocated that time.

Tony Baker

I think that would be the biggest difference between like your school and like the WPI and the other tech schools is that theirs is totally related around that. So their labs probably never closed and they want them there all the time.

Daphne Yan

Can you be there 24? You can be there all night there.

Evan Rosenblatt

There are some labs like that.

Ian Talbert

Yeah, we don't have machine shops, but

Evan Rosenblatt

yeah, the machine shop and like some of the academic labs do close, but there's, there's one very specific like community maker space that is open 24 7.

Daphne Yan

That's awesome.

Evan Rosenblatt

And we've known to be in there until like 3 or 4am Is that

Justin Site

because a lot of people that build robotics, you know, don't have that as close sometimes. Like the lab space. Cause you have the school, you have the lab space, you have all of that kind of in a central location. So is that a common occurrence to just be like, I'm just gonna stay here until 3am I'm just gonna just. Cause like it's a short walk maybe back to where my dorm is and I don't have to worry about that. Is that like a common occurrence that you guys had in your experience?

Evan Rosenblatt

I mean, at wpi for sure. We'll, we'll have people who are like, oh yeah, I'm going to the lab. Anyone want to come hang out? So they'll just like, they'll bring their robot and then someone else is like, ah, sure, I'll go bring my robot too and just sit in there for a couple hours. That's. It's a fun night. That's, that's what we enjoy.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

They're fighting robots for a couple hours.

Evan Rosenblatt

No, working on the robots. Thankfully our test cage like gets closed at 11, so we can't, we can't be doing that.

Daphne Yan

That's like.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Have you ever considered like an underground fight club where you just host events at 3am assuming that you could get

Evan Rosenblatt

in there at 3am I mean we could go through the effort of taking the cage out from the building that closes, but I don't know. That's a lot of work.

Ryan Hunter

The, the funny thing to me is there are far less healthy, like, college activities you could be doing at that land. I. It's actually very nice and very wholesome. That you go to the lab and work on robots is actually great. It's a good thing.

Evan Rosenblatt

That's what I tell my parents. They're like, oh, you're spending so much time and money on combat. There's so many worse things I could be doing and spending money on.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Oh, there's things that we can't even say in this podcast you could be doing.

Ian Talbert

Yeah, very true.

Justin Site

So how do you guys. So we've talked about the teams and we've talked about WPI and the difference in the teams. Ian, I don't think we heard from your school. How does the engineering, like the robotics club and stuff work for your team? Is engineering more intact, like, more connected to it at your school, or is it more like Brandeis where it's a more blossoming thing that you're trying to get off the ground? Like, where. Where does your school set?

Ian Talbert

Yeah. So I think one really awesome thing about Rose is we have regular funding. This. The. The team has been around since forever. I think the team is eight years old now, maybe. So, like, we. We have like, regular funding. We have kind of like, maybe not preference, but, like, the administration knows that we're going to be here and like, yeah, we need funding and we'll do certain things. And we. We operate pretty much very similar to wpi. Like, we'll start people off on like a plastic ants event at the start of the year and then do one or two events.

Evan Rosenblatt

What.

Ian Talbert

What's kind of tough is, and we've kind of been adjusting is we didn't have an nhrl. So compared to wpi, WPI could do NHRL much more frequently with different batches of folks. We don't have that in the. Well, yeah, we don't have that really in the Midwest. So it's kind of been like, okay, you know, you could drive like 10 hours up to Minnesota for RSLs and that happens very regularly. But a lot of the other ones are even within the mrca, are kind of like one or two a year. And it doesn't really line up super well. But Purdue, Purdue has started to host events in the fall and that's been really awesome.

Ryan Hunter

That's cool.

Justin Site

Yeah.

Ryan Hunter

Do you. How much can you do in your actual. At Rose Hulman? Do you have any actual events at Rose Almond except for plants? Or is it.

Ian Talbert

We've grudged beetles in our cage. We've got like a six by six with a metal floor, it's permanently up. Oh my God, that's so amazing because we, so we can always just toss robots in there, test them, grudge them, do whatever we want. But yeah, we haven't really gotten to the point of like public events. I think part of it is like, oh, you know, we don't want to put in, honestly, like, frankly, like, we don't want to put in effort and then have people not show up. But I think that there's kind of a, there's enough folks in that region now that if we do put on an event and it's our first time doing it, there are enough people in the region who are going to give us a shake on that. So maybe that's happening for us soon. Our, like, ability to do stuff in house with like manufacturing. Was that what you meant?

Ryan Hunter

Oh, no, I meant if you could run events, if you had a cage to run events. But yeah, tell us about the manufacturing as well.

Ian Talbert

Manufacturing. So we, we've got like water jet, we've got a CNC mill, CNC router. Weld shop is huge for like bending wedges and welding forks together.

Ryan Hunter

That's sick.

Justin Site

What's it going to be like now that you're graduating, knowing that? Because I, I've talked to college students that have graduated in the past couple of years, like Brian from wpi. Why am I, I'm blanking on Glenn. Why am I blanking on their name? Yes, Boxel. I, I talked to Brian. We talked to Brian and, and Brian talked about the fact that he was going from having this machine shop that he could do literally anything he wanted to at any time. And then graduating and stepping into a world where that wasn't possible. How, how does that feel knowing that, like, if you want to continue, you're not going to have those resources?

Ian Talbert

Well, I'll be less resourced in terms of like, how efficiently I can do stuff. So I can't buy like a one foot by three foot piece of tie and get like 10 wedges out of that for 80 bucks versus one off senkat send is like a hundred bucks. But I guess, you know, I'll be having a real job. I'll be an engineer. So, you know, maybe I'll have more money that I can, you know, just burn in this hobby. So, hell yeah.

Justin Site

Welcome to the real world.

Ryan Hunter

No, you won't.

Tony Baker

College students thinking you're gonna have money.

Justin Site

I, I mean, you will. I, I, I don't want to be negative about it, but

Tony Baker

you'll have some Just not what you think you're gonna have.

Daphne Yan

Yeah.

Samuel Herman

Always had this.

Ryan Hunter

Yeah, go ahead. Yes.

Samuel Herman

Oh, no, I was just saying that's

Ian Talbert

always how it is.

Ryan Hunter

Yes.

Justin Site

Yeah.

Tony Baker

And if you actually got like a job at a place that has a lot of that equipment and stuff that you could possibly use there, that'd be kind of cool.

Ryan Hunter

That does exist. Yeah.

Daphne Yan

I want to add that at least for brandized robotics, what we lose in tools and resources, I think we gain in time and flexibility. Because our automation lab's no longer going to be in a library that has restricted hours. It's going to be in our house, which means that we will have even less incentive to get sleep. And also because we're still going to be living close to Brandeis, there are things that, where we can, you know, recruit a current student to help us cut parts out, which is really awesome. We have a pretty strong alumni network in that sense. A lot of people are close by. So there's definitely going to be some big holes burned in the wallet, but hopefully I will still have a wallet.

Ryan Hunter

So instead of send, cut send. Is that send cut student. Is that what that is?

Justin Site

Is that like a. Yeah, Senca freshman.

Daphne Yan

It was sand cut send for the longest time.

Evan Rosenblatt

Like for.

Daphne Yan

For our friend Dan Deschino. For Bot Barons, it's Sam cut Sen. But yeah, yeah.

Samuel Herman

I just did a round of parts for Overlord and Grandeur for Pro League.

Justin Site

Nice.

Samuel Herman

I've cut parts for probably most of team Pandemonium at this point.

Ryan Hunter

That's cool.

Justin Site

It is. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I wanted to talk about skills as well, because that is. I mean, you come out of college and you have the skills that of course college gives you. But do you feel that you have skills specific to your college experience with combat robotics that can be applied to maybe not just the engineering, because I know you guys are going into engineering, but just life in general. That's stuff that you've learned. Time management, robotics, engineering. Anything from blending these two things together that will benefit you, you know, after the college years. Do you know what I'm. I'm trying to ask? I'm kind of like beating around the bush with the question, but, you know.

Samuel Herman

Yeah, I think, I think robotics has added a lot to what I'm getting out of college, especially. Cause Brandeis, we don't have like a fully fledged engineering department yet. And I'm. I'm not an engineering major. I'm doing a double major in applied mathematics and computer science. But I want to go into engineering and being able to have this Space to learn about that, I think has really helped me, you know, gain that understanding. Definitely helped me get a job. I don't think I'd be able to get a job in engineering without any experience or a degree. And yeah, I think that it's just been really useful to have that sort of, you know, you go to school, you learn about the computer science, math and stuff. And then I can get some real world experience with robotics and engineering.

Ryan Hunter

Is everybody putting robotics on their job resumes?

Daphne Yan

Oh, totally.

Ian Talbert

Oh, yeah, yeah.

Daphne Yan

I, as someone who had literally zero engineering or manufacturing robotics experience prior to joining the club, and also as someone who doesn't really learn that well from classes, like, I've learned stuff on paper, but in terms of skills, I think robotics makes up the vast majority of what I've learned. I, looking back at where I started versus where I am now, even though I'm not pursuing a career in engineering, I'm pursuing a career in just like software, computer science right now. It's taught me a lot of persistence, a lot of being very comfortable with failure. And boy, have I failed a lot, which is, I think, pretty valuable just in the STEM field. And also I think it's just made me a more practical, useful human. Like I know how to use a drill now. I didn't know how to use a drill two years ago. More comfortable with handling tools and being safe with knives and just someone who's less likely to die on their own, which I think is awesome.

Ryan Hunter

The survival skills of going to robotics competitions and stuff.

Tony Baker

Whoever would have thought combat robotics, making robots that destroy things teach you survival skills.

Samuel Herman

It's full circle. And we're back in Ryan's game corner.

Justin Site

Oh yeah.

Ryan Hunter

See, it's been Ryan's game corner all along. That's just how this works.

Justin Site

Is there any major skill or major thing that you feel that you're way better at now that you think other students that are graduating may not have the same kind of experience that you do?

Daphne Yan

Probably in general a lot of. Again, because we just started having engineering classes, 3D modeling is a big one that I can think of because it is so interdisciplinary. And I think the school is starting to realize the value in merging engineering with other fields. But as of now, yeah, Robotics club is kind of the go to for helping, for us helping other students with projects such as 3D modeling, designing, 3D printing, aside from our design and innovation department. Don't want to undermine them at all. But we are kind of the second line of defense in that regard, which is pretty cool. That's not going to be the case in a few years, hopefully. But currently, basically a majority of the skills that we learned is not taught in other classes or other areas of the school.

Justin Site

Is Brandeis considering an engineering degree? Is that something that they're working on?

Daphne Yan

They're making an engineering school right now, which is awesome. It's gonna take a few more years, but it's been developing for a while because the school, I think, is realizing that there is a real demand for engineering, even in a school that's more liberal artsy, like Brandeis.

Justin Site

That's awesome. Have they come to the Robotics Club for input, like that kind of stuff?

Daphne Yan

Yeah, they have. There's a few clubs that are relevant, like the 3D printing club, women Engineering. I forget the exact name. There's like a few other.

Justin Site

Like the women.

Daphne Yan

Yeah, we're probably the biggest that interacts with every aspect of engineering, which has been really cool that Sam and I have been kind of on the forefront of giving our input and advice because we are somewhat representatives of the engineering that Brandez has to offer right now. I think that's fair to say.

Justin Site

Yeah, that's cool being able to see that. And I think that's one thing that I also wanted to cover because I know wpi. I'm much more familiar with WPI system just because I've talked to a lot of other WPI students and past students. So I know WPI has a huge network of Robotics Club alumni versus, you know, and the younger students coming in. But what is your experience on bringing in new members? Like, you talked about the robotics fairs and trying to get people on board and getting people into the plants and stuff when they first start. But what is it like and how does it feel of getting that new generation addicted to this? I want to call it sport. Yeah, well, it's sport. But this, you know, the addition. We all know the addiction that this has. We all know the pull that this has on our lives. So how does it feel getting that next generation in the school setting addicted to this robotics that we all love?

Evan Rosenblatt

I mean, it's awesome. Uh, right about the end of the year for us is when some portion of the freshmen finally get to debut their Beatles. So this is. This is about when we start to see it pay off. And it's so much fun, uh, like seeing all of the freshmen that have just joined be in the same place. I was like, maybe a year and a half ago, and they're already like, going out there getting their first, like, fight, win. Not even a Year into their college experience is wild to think about. And it's kind of. It's kind of a big, like, moment because Ezekiel and I were both part of our, like, executive board at wpi, so we were kind of instrumental in the whole process. And it's. It's just super cool. Like, there's a lot of different paths that people take as a part of the club. And, you know, it's. It's incredible how many different ways people come across and, you know, end up in the same goal of destroying the other robot and making sure you could actually repair it.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Yeah, I guess just speak on that. Like, every as, like Evan was saying, everyone kind of comes from a different place. Like wpi. I know CAD coming in. So that's like one. One thing. And it. It's kind of cool because we kind of. We kind of like, hold these. We have like, a very not rigid schedule, but we like, kind of like start people off with plastic ants. And we, like, work worked our way up to like, designing and reviewing these specific designs. And it's kind of cool to see all the variety and teach people how to work with their own design specifically, and then watch them get up to the stage where they can finally wire things. And some people know how to do that, some people don't know how to do that. We hold, like, different workshops and it's. It's really. It's really fun to eventually see them all kind of compete in our classic ant cage and just get their first. Get their first match out and just see them progress from there.

Justin Site

Okay, Ian, Daphne, Sam, go ahead.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Okay.

Ian Talbert

I think it's. It's like really fulfilling. That's just the best word for it, like, introducing people. Like, I. I love doing robotics and competing, I think, and I think like, robot combat is something that you can start when you're a college freshman and you can continue doing throughout your, you know, into your professional life as well. So getting people, introducing that to people and like, you know, not everyone likes it.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Yeah.

Ian Talbert

But for those who do like it, who are men, get a lot out of it. It's super fulfilling. Yeah.

Daphne Yan

I think Brandeis is still figuring out a system to get people in and then keep them. It's been a little bit challenging, especially for Combat Robotics, because Combat Robotics is such a time sink. Like, Combat Robotics is basically Sam and my only extracurricular. It's the only thing we spend all of our time on. Whereas a lot of Brandeis students tend to be in two or three clubs, they tend to be in research. There's a lot going on for the average Brandeis student. And I think it's a huge commitment to get into combat bots. But every year we do have a few students who stick with it and it is so gratifying to work with them and seeing the, just like seeing the ideas click and like this has been reflected already. But the feeling of teaching something that you didn't know a year or two ago is probably the best visual indicator of my own progress, which makes it makes me feel good for the future of the club and the student I'm helping, but also makes me feel very proud of myself. We definitely need to figure out a better system in terms of like starting with a plant, working up to Beetle. Right now we're kind of free form with like what do you want to do? Okay, we'll help you do that.

Justin Site

It sounds like you guys all need to form like a college robotics planning discord or something. And I'll, I'll talk about like hey, this is how WPI does it and this is it. Like and just try and figure like help each other, you know, make the, the clubs better and, and that kind of stuff.

Samuel Herman

So.

Justin Site

But that's really cool.

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Evan Rosenblatt

Foreign.

Justin Site

Hey everyone. You're already listening. So you know the fights don't end when the episode does. But the Havoc rundown now lives over@ Havocrundown.com again. That's Havocrund.com. that's where we're posting Combat Robotics news, hosting every episode of the show, and running the largest Combat Robotics bot registry that's ever been put together. Stats, history, teams, and results, all built to grow alongside the sport. We're also curating fight videos, rolling out community games, and dropping merch for anyone who wants to rep the chaos. And the 2026 fantasy league is live right now. You can create your own fantasy league for a full season or spin one up for a single day event. Draft robots track performance across events and compete in a way that actually fits how Combat Robotics is run. This year, our focus is the sport as a whole. If robots are fighting, it belongs in the conversation. All leagues, all formats, all rule sets, from local events to competitions around the world. We have got you covered. Thank you for listening, everyone. Let's get you back to the episode and back to the chaos right now.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

So has anybody either caused a rule to be created in one of their labs workrooms, or is there a really funny rule that is in existence already?

Daphne Yan

I don't know if anyone's caused a rule. I will say that we have a very rigid system for working with lipos. Like, whenever you test, there has to be another person. They have to be on sand bucket and grabber. We like clear, clear a path. We run right out. And we've always been able to brag. That's never happened, though. We've never had a lipo fire in there until this year when Sam had a.

Justin Site

Until this year when Sam did it.

Daphne Yan

Sam, we can't say that anymore.

Samuel Herman

I blew up. I blew up a lipo because something in an ESC shorted. It was like a experimental ESC that we were given testing out.

Daphne Yan

It was also the tamest lipo fire that there's ever been.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

You killed the experimental ESC that you

Samuel Herman

were passed down for generations. It was passed down for one generation

Evan Rosenblatt

by, like, one person.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Yeah, that could have gone to your grandchildren.

Samuel Herman

It's. It still can. It just won't work.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Here you go.

Samuel Herman

Here's burnt esc.

Tony Baker

Most things get passed on us, Grandpa.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

What the heck is wrong with you?

Daphne Yan

The only thing I can think of, this is not a rule that was created because of me, but I kind of helped put the rule into existence. I was reflecting with Tim of Chubby Unicorn and also our staff advisor about how I felt like it was a good thing that I didn't have spares of my first robot frog spawn for the first few competitions because it forced me to be intimately familiar with how to repair it after being decimated by Prince and then having, like, 20 minutes to rebuild the entire robot. It was obviously really stressful in the moment, but in retrospect, it was a good experience. And then from that, we kind of verbalized the rule or expectation that students are not allowed to have a fully completed spare robot done until they've run the robot at least once. It had to do, like, a really stressful repair of the robot in a time crunch. It's just really good for helping you understand the robot, especially when it's a robot that you've been handed from a past member.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

That's a pretty good rule.

Justin Site

Yeah.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Especially for teams.

Ryan Hunter

Yeah.

Justin Site

Yeah. You gotta run the gauntlet before you can have those extra spares ready. I like it.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

No, I mean, if you make someone do that at NHRL as a first time, I mean, I could see that just being, like, a death sentence, but anything that's not, like, oh, yeah, you have to win nine fights in order to win this event.

Samuel Herman

Clyde, now rebuild your robot.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Yeah, I know you just fought, Clyde, but you have to fight in 15 minutes.

Daphne Yan

I think the rule could be addressed.

Samuel Herman

Remember, no spares.

Daphne Yan

That Clyde was in the group. I think that's fair enough.

Samuel Herman

Yeah.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Maybe two for nhr.

Daphne Yan

Clyde is not like. Clyde is not repairing a robot. That's just rebuild. Rebuild.

Tony Baker

Just show the video of Tom Hetta being rebuilt after Thomas attacked.

Ryan Hunter

No.

Ian Talbert

Yeah.

Ryan Hunter

I didn't even do that.

Ian Talbert

He did it.

Justin Site

He did it.

Ryan Hunter

He ate the airbag.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

I was already out. I would have been counted out.

Ryan Hunter

I don't know. I still haven't rebuilt my robot after Evan got done with it, so, you know, there's always that.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Evan, how could you.

Evan Rosenblatt

It's the name of the game.

Ryan Hunter

Does WPI have any rules like that?

Evan Rosenblatt

I mean, the only one that comes to mind is that I'm the reason that our shuffler Bonus is now 1.25 instead of 1.5. I needed. Apparently, I needed to be nerfed.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Oh, yeah, you do.

Evan Rosenblatt

I, like, swept an event, like, 6, 0.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Like, with a broom.

Evan Rosenblatt

Yeah.

Ryan Hunter

Oh, yeah, that's it. Yeah.

Evan Rosenblatt

I mean, I did do that after the fight, so I was responsible for cleaning up the cage sometimes.

Samuel Herman

Oh, is this in plants or beetles?

Evan Rosenblatt

Plants, yeah.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Oh.

Justin Site

Oh, no. So.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Oh, you've seen the. This is me when I try hard plants, right?

Evan Rosenblatt

Yeah. Yeah. My argument is it was only my second event, so I did. I wasn't, like, a veteran coming in, like, just looking to beat up on all the freshmen. It just happened.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Yeah. Second event's fine.

Ian Talbert

So Rose doesn't Oh, sorry.

Daphne Yan

What's the NHL shuffler bonus now?

Evan Rosenblatt

It's still. It's still 1.5.

Daphne Yan

Okay.

Ryan Hunter

It's still 1.5. Yeah.

Ian Talbert

Ian, thank God Rose doesn't have anything crazy for, like, safety rules. But one of the rules is, like in any. Any space that you're supposed to have PPE on, PPE includes safety glasses as well as long pants. So, you know, now it's. It's springtime, right? Everyone's walking around in shorts, so people get dinged on that. But you can. You can like borrow these super colorful pattern pajama pants. They're called pants of shame. So I have so many memories of like my friends with the, like, everyone has like their own preference. Mine is like a hot. It's like a super bright pink, like Christmas pants. And my friend would do like minions themed pants.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

So just imagine like made out of.

Ian Talbert

Is it like, I think the cuddle

Tony Baker

melt to your skin or parachute pants. That's all I'm thinking of now.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

I'm just imagining if it's like something polyester or nylon and then you have a hot grinder sending stuff and it just melts to your skin. I really hope they're not that.

Ian Talbert

Yeah, like weld shut. You need to have cotton pants. So I think most of them aren't good for that. But like for general workspace, if you're doing like drilling and stuff, it just means that the shavings are not going to go in.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

So they do have different materials or different. Okay, that's. Yeah, that is good to hear because I've. I've seen some things.

Ryan Hunter

See. See, all my memories of college and visiting my friends at colleges is just like. I had a friend that just wore pajamas 24 7. No matter what, wore them to class, warm, everything. He would have been fine. He doesn't care.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Oh, wait.

Oh, yeah. I have a. I have a combat robots college story. So one of my friends from high school, he went to western New England and you could like do a night over stay. So I did that. I stayed at his dorm and he like, showed me classes and stuff. His roommate was Jonathan Schultz, so.

Daphne Yan

Wait, are you kidding?

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Yeah. Well, no, I'm not kidding you. It was Jonathan Schultz.

Justin Site

So.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Yeah, that's. That's kind of wild.

Daphne Yan

Thomas Lower unlocked. Wow.

Ryan Hunter

Thomas Lore is deep and it's good.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

This was many years before I even knew that combat robots was a thing. This is. Oh, God. What? This is like before. When did BattleBots come back on TV? Like 2015 or something.

Tony Baker

2015?

Ian Talbert

Yeah.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Yeah. This was before that, so I didn't even know who he was. It wasn't until later on that I was like, oh, oh.

Justin Site

He was watching a BattleBots episode and he was like, oh, it's that dude. I slept in that dude's room.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

No, it was. It was like, I forget. I forget even who told. I think someone mentioned it. I'm like, wait a second. Maybe it was Jonathan that mentioned it. He was like, oh, yeah.

Justin Site

Like, oh, I remember you.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Yeah.

Justin Site

Okay, I'm going to ask one more question for to. To everyone, for anyone to answer, just a simple one. Before we get into listener mailbag. What is one thing that you hope every new builder would know? Maybe not specifically just one starting your school, but just advice for the future generation. What's one thing or one tip or one thing that you think every new builder should know? Don't all rush in at once.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

I guess if I had one, was to. No, no matter. No, no matter what. Because like this, this program teaches you to, like, be very perseverant, right? Just never be afraid to, like, come back and just rebuild over and over again until your robot works as expected or exceeds your expectations. Because in the box, anything can happen, including destruction of your own robot, and more often than not, you are going to get destroyed. And just learning to kind of keep persevering through that. I know, I know from experience.

Ian Talbert

Damn, that's hella deep. That's, like, hard to follow. But like, I think my, my tip would be like, like figure out your electronics and the way that you. Your transmitter talks to your receiver talks to your ESC talks to your motor. I think that chain is something that, like, because it's not physical, people kind of neglect in their understanding of the robot and that like, bites them in the butt.

Evan Rosenblatt

Like, they.

Ian Talbert

They don't configure their ESC properly. They don't understand what their radio is talking to the receiver. So, like, they really struggle to debug, you know? Why is the robot not, like, turning the right way? Why isn't it going straight and stuff?

Evan Rosenblatt

I would say my thing is a lot of people will go into a fight, get the bot absolutely wrecked, and pull it out and go, all right, cool, that was fun. And then just build the same thing again. So learning how to analyze your failures, figure out what went wrong, what you need to change, and most importantly, why. Some people will look at it, go, oh, this part failed. I'm just gonna change it in for something different. Figure out why it's important to change it to something Else, like just. Just going, oh, someone else is using this. I'll just throw that one in. Is it good enough? Why, why, why is that one better? Why should you use it?

Samuel Herman

It sounds like you've seen this happen, like, dozens of times.

Evan Rosenblatt

Yeah, yeah, a couple times.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

But somebody else's homework that people have done only to realize, wait a second, this is a horrible idea. Why did they do this?

Evan Rosenblatt

Yeah, it's like you're. You're in a test, you look over at the person next to you, and it turns out there were two versions of the same test. So you copied all the wrong answers.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Oh, yeah, that old esc. I was only using it in my joke bot because I had 20 of them laying around.

Evan Rosenblatt

They're all. And they only work if you just copy someone and they're like, oh, yeah, I changed that after. After you saw it. Like, it was. It wasn't working for me either. Yeah, yeah.

Tony Baker

I tell my students, fail fast, fail forward.

Samuel Herman

Yeah, that's. That's a good motto. For me. It would be probably trying to learn from other people. I think there's a big resource of, like, community knowledge, especially in universities, but just like the NHRL Discord, like, there's so many people that are so willing to answer questions and do design reviews, and being able to really take advantage of that is definitely a huge boost for a new member or a new builder.

Daphne Yan

I think a lot of members, especially when they come in from a different type of robotics. Like I've heard a lot about FRC Vax Robotics. Their idea of success is winning on paper, having high number, high ratio being. And then as a result being try hard about it, being down on yourself when you lose and not wanting to seeing other people as opponents. I think that the joy that comes out of this sport and this community infinitely comes from getting to know other people, even your opponents, before or after a fight. Being able to see a catastrophic failure as an awesome fight rather than just a loss and pulling your robot out of the cage and seeing that as something to workshop. The mindset is kind of make or break in a sport that has so much violent failure and violent loss.

Ryan Hunter

Okay, very cool.

Justin Site

Um, so with that, we are going to move out of the round table and we're going to check our voicemail to see what we can find in the listener mailbag.

Evan Rosenblatt

You've reached the voicemail of the Havok rundown.

Justin Site

Please leave your message after the tone. Uh, okay, so the first question that I have comes from Alex G. And it is for Evan and Ezekiel. He Says the WPI team is going to miss you next year. I have two questions. One, what was it like when the dinosaurs were around? He said that you'll understand that question. And what was the best, most valuable part of the club? And what is one thing you still think needs improvement?

Evan Rosenblatt

Well, I will start this off by saying Ezekiel is actually older than me, so I don't know what the dinosaurs were like. Thank you very much. That's all for me.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

That's all folks.

So imagine a world without hub motors as an off the shelf item.

Justin Site

First of all,

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

that's the kind of

world we're talking about.

Justin Site

I remember that.

Ryan Hunter

I remember that.

Evan Rosenblatt

As far as club value, I would say the best thing has just been a community of people who are all like trying to get better. Having people who also want to learn the best ways to improve their bot and also work, trying to share what works for them with each other. That's been the biggest thing. Our club has been becoming a lot more of like a community. Recently we had a moment where we went from a very tight knit community of people to the year after. It was just a large spread out group of like tiny little groups. And now we're back where we're one big friend group again and that's been huge. Um, one thing that needs improvement, it's kind of tough to answer, but I think the big one is getting people in our manufacturing shop get em to actually learn the machines. We rely a lot on like single numbers of people who are familiar with the machines and going to them and being like, please make me pulleys.

Ian Talbert

We're looking at you, Christian.

Evan Rosenblatt

No more of that please. And thanks.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

That's usually how it goes because everyone just graduates. The people that take the time to learn, like, oh yeah, I'm gone now.

Justin Site

By Daphne's reaction. I feel like that is something you all share across the board is that

Daphne Yan

sentiment is the club's lifeline.

Samuel Herman

I gotta train someone else on that. It's like that's actually an important thing.

Daphne Yan

Never. Oh, I don't want to say never. I've never seen Sam as stressed as the two days before the most recent C mark where he had to single handedly basically help everyone get their robots together and fix issues and also cut all of our parts because he's the only person who's comfortable using the cnc. So good luck, Brandeis, we're out of here.

Samuel Herman

Tim knows how to do it. It's fun. Yeah, make him do it.

Justin Site

There you go. Ezekiel, do you have anything to add?

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Well, mine was going to be about the manufacturing shop. I took it. But yeah, I guess I'll give my version of that. At wpi, we have an amazing machine shop where you can kind of do whatever you want with it. All the machines are convertible to the fourth axis. You can do all these things. We don't have a water jet, but that's. That shouldn't be a limitation to any of you guys. I, I think that, as Evan said, we do rely on single amounts of people to actually get any parts done. And I would like to see the club go back to how it was a few years ago, where everyone kind of got their hands in the machine shop and there was just a lot more of a community in there. I would like to see that come back. I think that would be really cool.

Justin Site

Okay, so Max Morningstar has a similar question. He says, hey, folks, I know some of you or all of you are graduating this year, and as such, we'll make a ton of institutional knowledge and combat robot experience with you as you leave. What are you doing to make sure your respective clubs or groups maintain their level of competitiveness?

Evan Rosenblatt

I mean, at least for wpi, it's been kind of a long term thing. We've been trying to increase just the amount of information that's publicly available and not just stuck in someone's brain writing things down. We've been creating slowly and slowly more presentations that we give throughout the year for new members like that. That's been our big push. Not relying on word of mouth, but starting to rely on people actually putting information on a page.

Justin Site

Cool.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Yeah.

Justin Site

So do you guys have. In the IT world, we have stuff like IT glue that keeps track of all the information and passwords and stuff that we need to know. Do you guys have that for the clubs? Like a document library where things are written down.

Daphne Yan

It's somewhere in the discord if you search for the right thing.

Evan Rosenblatt

True.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

That is one of those things.

Evan Rosenblatt

I mean, discords are just notoriously awful. We've been trying to not rely on that. We have like a Google Drive folder where we have like presentations and I don't know, all of our, like meeting history and stuff. It's okay right now. I know I knew the new exec board, that's like one of the things they're working on. So I don't, I, you know, credit where credit's due. They're. They're going to get it done. But yeah, it's rough right now.

Justin Site

Hey, if they want a suggestion. Sorry. If they want a suggestion, IT glue is awesome for that stuff. I know it's like more in the IT world, but, like, you can keep track of a lot of stuff in that, so. But yeah, we have not a sponsor.

Daphne Yan

We have a club Gmail. And I think I'm the only person who uses it for the Google Drive. I've been trying to make sure everything I do is in there. I think the. I don't know if the club is going to be as competitive after we leave just because, well, Sam is obviously super competitive with robotics, but also we're kind of the upper limit of students who are willing to give all of their time to the club. And I think the younger members are more chill, which is fine. As far as transferring things over. We're still going to be very involved in the club. Like I said, we're still living close, so we're still going to be coming by to use the room and as a result also helping other members. And one of my personal projects that's been going on since sophomore year is I'm trying to make like a GitHub repo of all of the stuff that I've learned since I started from the beginner. Things like, how do you measure a screw? That's been my personal project and it's still going to be ongoing. But I'm hoping that when I'm more than 5% done, I can pass that off to the new members as a resource, especially for the people who started at the very bottom, like me.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Yeah.

Samuel Herman

I think another thing that's really nice about the Brandeis community specifically is we have a lot of connection with our club alumni. So, like, if you guys are familiar with Daniel Dechino or Nathan Kai, both of those alumni from our school, they both live close and, you know, as a club, we still keep in touch with them. We'll go to events together. And having them interact with, like, new members and them getting to learn from those alumni is a really great way to help keep knowledge in the club.

Justin Site

Yeah.

Ian Talbert

I think for the most part, like, people who graduate Rose, like the team members, they kind of just like, geese out. I don't think we write much down. Like, we kind of struggle to, like, find the passwords for, like, the team Gmail. I don't know if we, like, have that right now, but I think one, like, cool thing is, like, we have, like, the discord that has like, a bunch of, like, Rose alums. Like, we have Peter in there. Peter Grenache. Grenache, sorry.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Who?

Ian Talbert

Like, like, sometimes he'll chime in. Like, people will Post a design and he'll be like, ah, yeah, this. This was tried. Here's like, another, like, reference that you can compare it against and maybe learn from that. But yeah, for the most part, people will just peace out after graduation. I'm planning on doing that, honestly.

Justin Site

Fair enough. So Charlie from WPI says this is another one for Evan and Ezekiel. You two are very close during your time in college. What's going to happen to that special relationship once you graduate? It says, from Claire and Charlie.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

I.

Evan Rosenblatt

Unfortunately, I will say Ezekiel and I are getting a divorce.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Yeah, it's pretty bad. I'm sorry, guys.

Evan Rosenblatt

You know, the distance is going to get between us. Unfortunately. That's just how it goes sometimes in life.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

You have to, you know, move apart.

Justin Site

It's not your fault Mommy and daddy are splitting. It's okay.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

It's not you, Evan. It's not

Ryan Hunter

okay.

Justin Site

Tom Farkas, the. That says, given the impending deadline of graduation, is there anything interesting you're going to do or make with your school's resources? I think we've kind of covered this a little bit as far as.

Samuel Herman

Yeah, yeah, 30 pounder.

Daphne Yan

I mean, we. Our school. One of our rules is it's very integrity based, but basically, if you have a component like a motor or something like that that can be reused by a future member, you return that. If you have anything custom made for your robot, so like custom weapon, things like that, you can take that with you because what are the new members going to do? Design around the arbitrary part. So I bought like a hundred dollars worth of foam sheet. I bought like 16 square. No. Yeah, 16 square feet of foam that I'm trying to turn into a million wheels before I leave so I can take them all with me. I don't think the club wants. I don't think the club wants all that foam is the thing. I don't feel bad about it at all.

Samuel Herman

They don't. Yeah, they definitely don't.

Daphne Yan

The finger type wheels exist. I don't know why I did this to myself.

Tony Baker

You were inspired by a hunter. That was the problem.

Ryan Hunter

Oh, is that what it was? Oh, I. I still have half a sheet of foam downstairs and I will use it because my robot Thelana is

Daphne Yan

kind of like a mix of a Bobby style and a monkfish. So I need the fat wheels.

Ryan Hunter

Yeah, I have the nice fat foam. I love my foam. It's great. That's.

Justin Site

That's exactly why Ryan did it.

Ryan Hunter

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

Daphne Yan

If you remember, at Seamark, I checked with you what the wheels were to make sure that I Got the right thing.

Ryan Hunter

Yeah. Cross leg polymer.

Daphne Yan

Yeah. Shout out foam by mail.

Justin Site

Okay. So John from Hydrax says as a fellow college student, it's often hard bouncing schoolwork and designing building common robotics for those lace nights. What's your go to building snack?

Samuel Herman

I don't eat. It's pure adrenaline.

Daphne Yan

Because at that late we can't leave the library or else we can't get back in. So we just, we just tough it out.

Justin Site

You don't bring anything in with you

Daphne Yan

that requires not building robots.

Justin Site

Okay.

Samuel Herman

And planning ahead.

Daphne Yan

Yeah.

Samuel Herman

Both of which robotics students are notoriously bad about.

Daphne Yan

If we're in that situation, we're clearly not planning ahead, so.

Justin Site

Right. Anyone else?

Ian Talbert

It's like kind of the worst like snack. Cause it gets all over your hands. But like goldfish, they're kind of like everyone, dude, everyone loves goldfish. At Rose, I think. But it's like horrible cuz everything that's on your hands, like what did solder fumes residue kind of gets in there. But yeah, goldfish.

Justin Site

Okay.

Evan Rosenblatt

I mean at wpi, I will say a lot of. A lot of. At least my closest friends, you know, we're, we're at that Taco Bell. You know, say what you want about Taco Bell, but it hits at 3am when there's nothing else open.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

He knows what's up.

Ryan Hunter

Wait, Wait until you're over 30 years old. You will no longer believe that I don't want to smell Taco Bell anymore.

Evan Rosenblatt

I'm hoping that hits a little bit sooner than 30 because you know, I'm going a little too often.

Ryan Hunter

Oh, at a Taco Bell. Yeah.

Evan Rosenblatt

Yeah.

Justin Site

Okay. So Nick from Crafty Crafty Cat Combat says, as someone who's never lived on campus and didn't do anything like robotics in college, make me a little sad about what I missed. What's a good story or experience that you've had during your time in school? So just. Yeah, so just something short. We've shared a couple stories, but is there anything that comes to mind that you think is funny? Just a funny like short, funny story. This is a little bit of pressure from Nick. He's like, tell me a story that you think of in two seconds.

Daphne Yan

Most recently at May NHR. So May 2, the night before the Friday before Cheese and Quacker's, the Hammer Saw multibot that Sam designed for us did not work. Our alum's robot, which she registered in xp, did not work. And after we spent all day in the pits re soldering and things were still not working, we brought stuff back Home back to the hotel to solder. And it was late and it was Sam trying to fix whatever was wrong with death stare and Daniel and Emma going freaking feral. That was pretty. That was pretty fun. Just late night feral behavior mixed with robots is a really terrifying and also awesome combo.

Justin Site

It's okay if nobody else has anything for this.

Daphne Yan

I guess I'm the only one who has fun in this room.

Justin Site

No, that's fine.

Samuel Herman

You guys have fun.

Justin Site

Alex from Pandemonium says, I love to hear a contrast of the programs in the Northeast. We have dubbed certain styles to certain colleges. There's a. If there's a Brandeis Special and a WPI Special, then what's the RHIT Special and what factors have led to each of those? So I'd love to hear what the Brandeis Special and WPI Special is because it sounds like he's saying there's a Brandeis Special in wpi. WPI Special. And Ian, if there's an RHIT Special. So the specific styles that you guys have seen come out of your schools like that are specific to your schools.

Evan Rosenblatt

I mean, starting off with the WPI Special, I feel like this is the one that people joke about a lot. It's probably the most well known one. We love our 4 wheel drive verts here. We love them the long way. Where it started is kind of hotly debated. I argue it probably started with Fireball and that was. That was kind of where it grew from. And then you get Blink Comet, Red Panda adjacent. Just kind of taking it from there.

Ryan Hunter

Okay.

Samuel Herman

I think with the Brandeis Special, very recognizable. It's all sheet cut, UHMW and hdbe. It definitely stems from the fact that we have our big machine in the automation labs is Shapoko xl and boy has it been used. And so being able to basically buy a bunch of sheep, cut plastic and then cut stuff out of that instead of relying on ordering carbon fiber from Canada when you really don't need it. It's inspired a lot of creativity in the way we design our robots because we have a lot of constraints to design around. And it's led to a lot of robots looking very similar from us also, just like the institutional knowledge, how, how, you know, we teach other builders, show them the way the previous robots have been built. Definitely everything is stemmed from Chubby Unicorn. Likewise bots.

Daphne Yan

From my perspective, because we both mentioned like vert. I don't know if Sam mentioned vert. The main thing that I see with WPI is your color palette is like black and then a bright color Whereas Brandeis is usually a white sheet cut robot because we have a huge stock of white, uh, and htpe. Um, I think that is a big visual divider of the WPI special and the Brandeis special.

Ryan Hunter

What, Ian? What about Rose Holm, dude?

Ian Talbert

So I guess like, from my perspective, seeing, you know, a lot of the bots that don't go to NHL or go to NHL regularly, I kind of think like, oh, damn, there's like a, there's a lot of like, variety. But I think all of the NHRL relevant bots, which are like the most competitive bots, are like not four wheel drive verts. Right. That's are, you know, undisputedly the best, but like in the wide. So I think that's that kind of stems from like flashbang. Well, flashbang's more of a mobility four wheel driver. Tristan Hart's Gore or not Go, he designed Gord, but initially his like, I think first like personal three pound was Elytra, which is like a wide vert that is very inspired by fully defined. So that I think like the, the okay, reach verts. I think like reach verts is definitely something that everyone on the team is thinking about when they decide to make a new robot. So yeah, Reach verts, wide verts. And then sometimes like, I think Pipeline is like kind of in the middle there where it's like kind of reachy, it's kind of mobility tries to take. It's like when I was designing, I tried to steal all of the best stuff from everyone on the team. So yeah, all the mobility.

Ryan Hunter

Yeah, because it's, it's not quite the long ways. It is kind of a wider than a long ways. I, I, I like Pipeline a bunch. It's very, it's very awesome robot.

Justin Site

So, so I, I seem to align more with RHIT because that's turn. That's currently what I'm turning my bot into is more of a wider reach.

Samuel Herman

Yeah.

Justin Site

Okay, very cool. The last one that I have in the listener mailbox before we close out was actually just submitted like 10 minutes. But this is specifically for Ian. So Che is Rain's mother. And I guess that you had some interaction with Rain. So she has a couple of questions here. I'll just sum it up as that she's very excited that you interacted with Rain and you had as much of an impact as you did on him, which she said, how does it feel to make a child's dream come true? But I think the one that I want to ask out of these that she gave us Was how have you handled all the fame now that you were a celebrity across the D8D F A DFW metroplex. I don't know if you want to explain what that means, because I'm guessing it's a Midwest competition.

Ian Talbert

No. So DFW Metroplex is Dallas Fort Worth. Yeah. So I've been down there for a couple of the past, like, TRC events. Um, I. Like my first one, I think I made it to the finals and I lost to warhard. And then this most recent one Texas cup in December, warhard. I didn't meet warhard and get to like, have my revenge or get closure there. Um, but I ended up winning that one. Um, I don't know, I guess it feels. I guess it feels cool to be okay. It's. It's super awkward for me to think of myself as like, someone who's like, good and maybe a source of inspiration because I've been doing this like two years. I've been doing like, robotics related stuff, adjacent stuff since like, eighth grade. But I started combat like a little bit over two years ago. And before that I had, you know, I'm not like a BattleBots historian or anything. I think like, my, my, like, main cultural, like, but I think of culturally as combat is more aligned to like, NHRL than BattleBots, which is kind of like, crazy to say, I guess.

Ryan Hunter

Okay.

Ian Talbert

Yeah, it's, it's, it's, it's like, it's super strange because I've not been doing this that long. I try to, I try to keep a perspective where, like, this is based on my experience only when I give advice, like, but I'm not that experienced, so.

Justin Site

Well, it seems like you had a big impact on, on Rain because Che was very excited that, that you were on. So very cool. Okay, so with that, we're gonna wrap up this very special College Robotics episode of the HAVOC rundown. Huge thanks to Evan, Ezekiel, Sam, Daphne and Ian for joining us tonight and sharing stories from your time at College Robotics. It was awesome talking to you all. Thank you so much for being on. We appreciate you guys being here.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Now go graduate or something.

Samuel Herman

I'm trying.

Justin Site

Sometimes it's easy to focus on the fights and the robots, but episodes like this are a reminder that the real heart of the sport is a community built around it. The friendships, the late nights, the problem solving, the terrible ideas that somehow become great ideas and all that stuff that people remember years later. And honestly, hearing how much passion and talent is coming out of these college programs should make everyone excited for this future of Com Robotics. Congratulations to you all on graduating. We can't see can't wait to see what you guys build next. So don't forget to check out the have a Grown down website and follow us on all of our socials for future episodes, clips, announcements and more chaos from around the Combat Robotics world. And if you want to support the show directly, make sure to check out the merch store and all the links in the episode description. Until next time, we will see you in the arena. Everyone say goodbye to our listeners please.

Ezekiel Gonzalez Solano

Bye Bye.

Ryan Hunter

Goodbye.