It's on too much though - the same episode Friday evenings, Friday late night, *and* Saturday lunchtimes.
What? The Hindeburg Disaster?
How else would the BBC be able to rig and make up viewing figures unless they repeated the same shows constantly in the same week?
Tucked away on BBC choice was a rather entertaining series called "Simply Complicated" which in essence was a remake of The Great Egg Race. Two teams had to make a machine, in true Heath-Robinson style, that would perform the simple task they were issued with (eg pouring a bottle of champagne, decorating a trifle). To give it Egg Race credibility, Heinz Woolf judged some of them, along with Johnny Ball and various arty/semi-scientific people. Presented by some woman whose name escapes me, who could have been a great deal more irritating than she actually was, and at times showed a reasonable knowledge of things mechanical.
Much more entertaining, for me, than the over hyped teen-testosterone that is Robot Wars.
They should do it in the open air, on an assault course, and get rid of the BBC robots.
the bbc robots are the only thing really capable of any destruction.
the rules are so tight and safety is such an issue that you can't build anything that would trouble a styrofoam block.
If they really want serious destruction then things like untethered projectiles, oxy-acetylene torches and large hydraulic cutting arms should be allowed.
it's a mismatched situation - you can put kevlar armour and tungsten carbide impregnaded shields on your robot - but your weapons are limited to things like circular non-shatter cutting tools that would have a hard time cutting a chunk of two by four if you steadied it first and worked at it - let alone a glancing blow in the heat of battle.
The speed issue is another matter too - fair do, you need torque, but more often than not peope use woefully underpowered motors to shunt their 150 lbs of robot around the arena.
If we had a lot more competitive robots that could take on the big "sir killalot" thing and win then it would be fantastic.
on another point, scrapheap challenge is fantastic for the "have a go joe" enthusiasm and the ingenious machines that result at the end of the show.
Animal Wars would be better.
man versus nature in a very real sense.
A bearded college proffesor and his teen-age 'ward', battling against a bat, a goose and a tiger. Armed with machettes.
Why not ditch the 'remote-control' nonsense and just have PEOPLE fighting it out with flame-throwers, axes, etc?
Keep the big robots to mop up casualties.