Suspension

"*We want to rename the competition to be 'Queen of Bots', so we're quite confident!*"
— Sabrina Skilling after Suspension's first match

**Suspension** was a heavyweight robot which competed in Season 1 of *King of Bots*. It was entered by a team of female British students, with the robot's name referencing the team's occupation as students. In its first battle, Suspension defeated WU66 by knockout, before being eliminated by Greedy Snake in the second round.

## Design

"*Our strategy is to lift the other robot to get its wheels off from the floor, which will leave them exposed. We'll then have to smash them into the wall, with 13 horsepower.*"
— Sabrina Skilling

Suspension was an invertible robot driven by two central wheels, boasting 13hp of push. Its primary weapon was a broad scoop, which functioned as a lifter not unlike that of *BattleBots* entry Stinger: The Killer Bee, as it would fire forwards to directly overturn robots, or hold them in place atop of its ridged mechanism behind the lifter. The lifter mechanism also incorporates a top-mounted, front-hinged arm, which is primarily used for self-righting. Concealed beneath Suspension's lifting wedge is a flamethrower weapon, which the robot could fire when its lifter was raised, or indeed fire directly into the weaponry to scatter flames. Suspension displayed great speed and manoeuvrability, and thick armour, but a lack of damage output. The wedge also brandished the Brentwood School logo, and spikes facing the floor at each side, although the steep nature of the wedge meant that Suspension could not drive under opponents with low ground clearances.

## Robot History

### King of Bots (Season 1)

"*Oh my gosh, this thing goes quite fast. We really didn't know what to expect.*"
— Sabrina Skilling on the spinner of WU66

In its first battle, Suspension fought the Chinese entry WU66. It quickly slammed into the side of WU66, and controlled its movements while resisting its opponent's spinning bar. Sparks flew as WU66's bar skimmed the top of Suspension, but the British machine rolled WU66 into a Grinder, which took a second hit from the hazard by its own accord while Suspension tested its flamethrower. Suspension swiftly drove into the side of the fleeing WU66, and drove it back into the Grinder for further damage, although Suspension made a glancing contact with the hazard itself. Suspension proved unable to get its steep wedge under the ground clearance of WU66, but it pinned the Chinese representative against the arena wall, and survived one final blow from the bar spinner before rolling it against the arena spikes. WU66 had lost mobility, so Suspension retreated and earned its win via knockout, allowing it to qualify for the second round.

"*It's one of the first ones we've won with this robot, so it's a good feeling. With the circuitry, that should be really easy to fix, but the fireworks looked cool, and the driving was good.*"
— Sabrina Skilling on the win against WU66

In the next round, Suspension fought the snatch lifter of Greedy Snake. The Brentwood School Roboteers were confident and relieved ahead of the match, and modified their robot to make its safety links easier to remove.

"*When we found out who we were up against, it was a bit of a relief, because there were a lot of other teams that we could've been against that... so, we're really excited!*"
— Sabrina Skilling on the matchup against Greedy Snake

Immediately, Greedy Snake darted out of the red square and rammed into Suspension at high speed, launching it into the air as Suspension's wedge immediately proved to be inferior. Dodging its opponent, Greedy Snake attempted to grab Suspension by its wedge, but initially failed to do so before both machines reversed away from the grinders. Suspension mounted an offence and drove into Greedy Snake, failing to get underneath but it moved its scoop around while driving onto Greedy Snake. When Suspension next drove onto Greedy Snake, it was trapped by the opponent's lifter, but Suspension broke free in mid-air using its own lifting plate, although it landed on the beam of its lifter, briefly pinning it before it self-righted. As soon as Suspension self-righted, Greedy Snake charged in, grabbed and hoisted it aloft, immediately throwing it over itself before Suspension again broke free. The two competitors separated, with Suspension missing with its charge, and Greedy Snake capitalized by clamping and lifting it by the wedge. Greedy Snake bumped into the wall trying to force Suspension over the top, before dragging it back and lowering it.

Suspension fled, allowing Greedy Snake to again grab and lift it, ramming it into the wall spikes, and almost overturning it. Greedy Snake proceeded to repeat this tactic immediately, this time while pushing Suspension into one of the grinders. For the next few moments, Suspension and Greedy Snake traded slams, with Suspension unable to use its scoop or flamethrower before it was eventually cornered close to another grinder. The two robots met by the floor rods, with Greedy Snake briefly hesitating as it lowered its weapon. Eventually, it pursued Suspension again, until finally grabbing, lifting and throwing it over itself.

"*Oh, suplex!*"
— Commentary over replays of Greedy Snake’s knockout flip on Suspension

Suspension’s self-righting arm had stopped working, and its wheels were not turning, rendering it inverted and immobile; Greedy Snake nudged Suspension during the count-out, and the British representatives were eliminated at this stage.

"*It's amazing being here, I'm so proud of my team and what we've done, we've learned so much, and we've spent so much time getting to know each other, and we've done really well to make it this far in the competition.*"
— Sabrina Skilling

## Results

### Wins/Losses

* Wins: 1
* Losses: 1

## Outside King of Bots

Before competing on *King of Bots*, Suspension was originally designed as a 70kg robot armed with a set of rear flails shaped into the letters of Suspension's name. It made its live events debut at the *Robots Live!* event in Burgess Hill, where it was thrown out of the arena by Weird Alice in one battle and immobilised in another against Eruption and Big Nipper. Later in the same month, Suspension competed at the same *Extreme Robots* event as Expulsion, managing to pick up a combat win.

In September 2017, the *King of Bots* version of Suspension fought, also using loose chains at the rear to allow sit-and-spin tactics while spinners were still deemed unsafe at live events. It fought at the live event *Extreme Robots* in Colchester but lost group battles to Cyclone twice, TR3 twice, Eruption, Behemoth, Meggamouse, and Iron-Awe 5 respectively. The original version of Suspension became known as **Internal Suspension**, but was thrown out of the arena by Eruption.

Before competing with Suspension, the Brentwood School Roboteers competed on *Robot Wars* with their original robot, **Expulsion**. The first version was an invertible robot armed with a unique horizontal spinner, but it was immobilised during Series 9 in its battle with M.R. Speed Squared, Heavy Metal and Foxic, which was shown during *King of Bots*. The second version of Expulsion used a unique tool spinner, and the robot was more successful, defeating Push to Exit and Coyote to earn third place in its heat, despite losing two other battles in its heat, and becoming the first robot to be defeated during the 10 Robot Rumble. The third version of Expulsion competed only at live events, where it took significant damage from Apex.

## Trivia

* At the time of Season 1, Sabrina Skilling and Rebecca Ashford were students in Year 13, Juliette Skilling was in Year 11, and Mary Hirst was listed as the 'head of school', each studying subjects relating to STEM.
* Suspension along with Ink Thorns, Deep Sea Giant Shark and Scorpion appeared in a teaser trailer for the series.

## References

1. ↑ https://twitter.com/robotexpulsion/status/855910818336165888
2. ↑ http://www.essexlive.news/news/essex-news/brentwood-schoolgirls-taking-killer-robot-623337?utm\_source=dlvr.it&utm\_medium=twitter

## External Links

* Suspension on the official *King of Bots* website (Chinese)
* Team Suspension KoB Twitter
* Team Expulsion Facebook page
* https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-Blc0z03lk