History of Tech High Robotics

M.A.T.E. Robotics team
In the fall of 2013, Tech High Robotics decided to compete in M.A.T.E. robotics. This is an ROV (remotely operated underwater vehicle) competition. In 2015, we won Most Spirited, Best Sales Presentation, and 3rd place overall.

National Robotics League (NRL) Combat Robotics Team
After the pandemic, we changed focus yet again to combat robotics. Our first robot, Free Hugs, was a 15lb horizontal spinner battle bot. The goal in combat robotics is to destroy or gain control over the opponent by building robots to be extremely durable, have highly destructive spinning weapons, and have a fast drive. The 15lb weight class is a scaled down version of the 250lb robots seen the the BattleBots TV show that makes it affordable for smaller high school and college teams. In 2023, Free Hugs won the Design Award and placed 7th out of 16.

2022-2023 bot: Free Hugs (aluminum weapon)
Design Award
7th place

2023-2024 bot: Free Hugs v2 (3031 steel weapon)
7th place (again)

National Robotics League (NRL) Combat Robotics Team
In the 2023-2024 year, we changed little about Free Hugs since most of management had graduated or stopped participating in robotics, causing us to need to quickly find new leaders. This ultimately led to our comparatively poor performance in the season. However, by the 2024-2025 season, we had skilled new student leaders and a strong plan. We created an educational division to teach the basics with 1lb plastic antweight robots, while creating two entirely new, cutting-edge, competitive bots in the 15lb class. These are Angular Aggression and REV 3 (based on a complete redesign of Free Hugs REV 2 – see above). Angular Aggression (AA) is a vertical spinner, loosely inspired by Riptide from BattleBots, while REV 3 is a horizontal spinner with unique weapon geometry. In the state competition in 2025, the bots got 2nd and 4th, allowing us to fight in nationals, where we achieved 4th with REV 3 and tied for 5th with Angular Aggression. Although we incurred significant damage over the course of the competitions, we have been extremely pleased with our performance and will continue to fight with the bots going forward. Pictured below are Angular Aggression, REV 3, and our old bot, the OG Free Hugs – the difference is drastic.