Blendo

**Blendo** was an early full-body spinner designed and built by MythBuster James "Jamie" Hyneman, with his future MythBusters co-host Adam Savage in charge of wiring the electronics and control systems. It was a full body spinner powered by a 5hp lawnmower engine. The body, made out of a salvaged wok, was surrounded by a sharpened steel ring at the bottom, augmented by two blades. Blendo had a spin speed of 500 RPM, and its destructive power was described by Jamie as "a piece of steel the size of a fist traveling at the speed of light". Blendo debuted in the Heavyweight Division at 1995 US Robot Wars, and was arguably the most destructive robot of that period.

Blendo's spinner was manually activated before the match by Jamie inserting a power drill through a hole in Blendo's top to start the internal combustion weapon motor. Thus, Blendo would theoretically spin unabated for the entire battle. While this made for a persistent attack, it meant that if Blendo's spinner were to cut out mid-battle, it would not be able to start up again.

Blendo entered every season of BattleBots through 3.0 - the BattleBox being sufficiently protective against flying debris - but did not achieve any success. Blendo's slow and poorly controlled drive system compounded with its opponents' highly improved armor made it all but obsolete. It lost every one of its BattleBots fights, including a grudge match against Punjar, one of the robots it destroyed in Robot Wars '97.

A brief clip of Blendo and Jamie controlling it was displayed during the intro to the MythBusters pilot episodes explaining Jamie and Adam's 30 years of experience in special effects, especially model building, animatronics and toy prototyping, as qualifications.

## Robot History

### US Robot Wars 1995

Blendo's first ever battle was against Namreko 2000. Blendo and Namreko kept approaching and evading each other but Blendo eventually hit its opponent and continued to hit Namreko now and again, buckling and bending Namreko's spikes and eventually immobilizing it. Blendo's next opponent was DooMore with Blendo emerging victorious.

Blendo was declared joint Heavyweight Champion in 1995 with The Master in exchange for withdrawing from the event after creating a safety hazard by launching pieces of its opponents out of the arena.

### US Robot Wars 1997

Blendo returned for the 1997 tournament where it destroyed Hercules and Punjar, but was asked to withdraw from the Quarter Finals for safety reasons and winning the Best Engineering Award and also jointly winning the Heavyweight rumble with BioHazard.

### Las Vegas 1999

Presumably due to its success in Robot Wars US tournaments, Blendo automatically qualified for round 2, where it fought against Punjar, which it had famously destroyed in Robot Wars '97. Punjar spent the match charging at Blendo, which stopped Blendo from spinning quickly enough to cause any damage and sent it flying across the BattleBox. After continuing to attack Blendo, Punjar knocked it into the wall of the BattleBox, incapacitating it and securing the win.

Blendo was still to compete in the heavyweight rumble, however. At the start, Blendo wandered around aimlessly, landing a few hits before its spinner stopped moving. After that it limply bumped other robots until the very end, where it was flipped over by BioHazard.

### Season 1.0

Once again, Blendo received a first round bye, where it met BioHazard (now in a tournament). BioHazard charged straight at Blendo and had its lifting front completely ripped off. However, this impact caused Blendo's engine to stall. BioHazard took advantage of this and flipped Blendo over for the KO (much like in the last time they fought).

Blendo wasn't finished, however, as it participated the heavyweight royal rumble at the end of the tournament. When the rumble started, Blendo immediately got rammed into by Vlad the Impaler as it was spinning up, bumping it into the blue square. After a bit of moving aimlessly in circles, it got tapped by Vlad the Impaler's rear end, causing it to run into Kill-O-Amp, which ran over the dome and flipped itself over. Blendo then moved into Voltarc, bouncing off after hitting the corner of its wedge. After a tap from Tazbot, Blendo headed straight towards Mauler, a fellow spinner, and disabled Mauler's lid when they clashed. After a moment of just standing still, Blendo got rammed by Mauler and Kill-O-Amp simultaneously, bumping it closer to a corner of the arena. After some off camera action, Blendo got hit by Kill-O-Amp and moved into the red square. When the camera cut away yet again, Blendo was seen riding the spikestrip with its shell, moving towards a corner of the BattleBox. Moments later, Blendo was seen pinned between a disabled Mjollner and the spikestrip and getting out of it, eventually spinning back up. Blendo was later seen moving in circles near the corner of the BattleBox for the rest of the rumble until, for unknown reasons, It stopped spinning and became incapacitated off camera. Blendo was left alone for the rest of the rumble, where it lost overall to BioHazard.

### Season 2.0

Blendo received a first round bye yet again, where it faced GoldDigger. It started well, tossing GoldDigger around the arena, but once again stopped moving after the impact of its first hit, meaning GoldDigger went through.

Blendo wasn't finished, however, as it participated the heavyweight consolation rumble at the end of the tournament. Unfortunately, Blendo failed to start moving and it lost overall to OverKill and Punjar.

### Season 3.0

Blendo's only match was against Bacchus. During the match, Blendo did massive damage to Bacchus, but then Blendo backed off and drove over the piston. The hazard was then fired, but instead of sending Blendo into the air, it pushed the internal components into the spinning shell, destroying Blendo from the inside. The spinbot stopped moving and it was being counted out. Bacchus won by KO and Blendo was eliminated from the tournament.

Because it lost in the round of 64, Blendo couldn't participate the heavyweight consolation rumble at the end of the tournament.

## Wins/Losses

* Wins: 5
* Losses: 6
* Draws: 1