Robot Wars (TV series)/Epic Fail

Across 10 series, 2 Extremes, and international versions of the show, Robot Wars has naturally had its fair share of fail-tastic moments. Here are some of the most notable of such moments:

General

 * The biggest fails often come from teams who accidentally drive their machine into the pit when they are under no pressure whatsoever.
 * Any time a robot gets KO'ed by either one strike from the opponent, or by slamming itself into the side walls, often dislodging the robot's safety link.
 * Robots that die the second they enter the arena also count, usually due to a seemingly innocuous engineering mishaps in the pits, though said mishaps can have dire repercussions.
 * Even the House Robots are not safe from humiliation, whether they drive into the open pit, drive into arena hazards, or lose a piece of their bodywork.

The First Wars

 * Shunt often had a really bad habit of driving off the sumo ring in the Trials leg of the heats; if that didn't happen, then he would've been pushed off instead. This seems to carry over into the Second Wars as well.
 * A more humorous example, but in Heat D, which featured nothing but tiny little featherweights (weighing 15kg or less), one such robot, Demolisher, a fast, nippy little machine weighing the equivalent of 2 large bags of sugar, drove right off the side of the arena... as it was being introduced by Johnathan Pearce!

The Second Wars

 * In Heat A, Caliban's attempt at the gauntlet definitely counts; as it tried to take on the Sentinel, it was ambushed by Sir Killalot who proceeded to pick it up and shove it back to the start of the course. Caliban's final result was a pitiful 0.2m, the worst run ever recorded in the gauntlet on the show.
 * Also from Heat A, Pierce de Resistance is a box shaped robot that has a small flipping shovel at the front, but it was lightweight at less than 60kg, and was very slow at 5mph. It was such an under-powered robot that it didn't even have the power to knock over the bricks at the start of its gauntlet run. It only survived when Killalot intervened and carried the Yorkshire based machine over the wall it couldn't even knock over itself. In the Trial (in its heat the Trial was Skittles), Pierce de Resistance proved to be just as useless, as it failed to even knock over one barrel, leaving it scoring 0 points. To make things worse, it only needed to beat 4 points to go through to the Arena battles, and it couldn't even beat that!
 * In Heat D, First Wars runner-up Bodyhammer became the first and to this day, highest seed (3rd) to be eliminated in the first round in any domestic UK championship. In spite of having practically no ground clearance, the team took the right hand path (as the viewers see it), which has the ram-rig. Bodyhammer ended up beached on the saw trap only 3 meters into the run, eliminating it in last place.
 * Neither Onslaught nor Dreadnaught moved from their starting positions in the Head-to-Head rounds; the former broke down for unknown reasons, the latter when the team accidentally knocked the robot's safety link out as they set the robot down.

The Third Wars

 * The first battle of the Third Wars had the ever popular Stinger make its way into the pit only 50 seconds into the fight against Mace II, thanks to its haphazard driving!
 * A dinosaur shaped robot called Max Damage, which appeared in Heat C (also Razer's heat), failed to move from its starting position simply because the team forgot to switch it on before heading to the control pod.
 * John Reid showing poor driving in Heat N, when his machine Killerhurtz got some good axe blows in on Cerberus (even puncturing one of its batteries), only to veer away, no pressure whatsoever, and dive straight into the pit. [According to Reid himself, he forgot the pit was even there, since he was so used to the Battlebots arena in America, which didn't feature a pit].

The Fourth Wars

 * In Heat A, Medusa 2000 showed poor control when it backed straight into Sgt. Bash's pincer, and crushed its back wheel. It was already on the back foot as it was being tossed around the arena by the reigning champs, Chaos 2, but this driving error sealed its defeat.
 * Disc-O-Inferno's first ever fight in Heat E saw it immobilise itself when it bumped into its opponents, which caused a wire to move slightly and switch the robot off mid-fight.
 * The most infamous fail of the Fourth Wars probably has be Evil Weevil's untimely demise in Heat K/Round 1; the 12th seed only last a few seconds before it ground to a halt... all because the team unknowingly use the one set of batteries that weren't fully charged.
 * Díotíor's Sumo Basho run in Heat B only lasted 3.95 seconds, the worst run in the competition. In fact, Díotíor's Fourth Wars campaign in general was miserable. Not only did the team have remove the top armour because it was overweight, but the flipper broke as well. These factors resulted in Díotíor being flipped over by Ming II immediately in Heat C, scoring the Irish bot its only Round 1 defeat. If it's any consolation however, they did finish joint 6th in the Pinball Warrior tournament.
 * In Heat O, Team Trinity's Oblivion II was immobilised right from the start when Saw Point drove over the top of it, and bent the chassis. Yes, you read that right: it was immobilised by an opponent simply driving over it!
 * In a meta sense, X-Terminator 2's "axe" was absolutely rubbish; a piece of shrapnel on a flimsy piece of wire. It was so useless, even the team captain, Marlon Pritchard refuses to talk about it.

The Fifth Wars

 * Major Tom's defeat against Kat 3 in Heat J takes the cake; it drove Kat 3 onto the pit release tyre, only to then reverse straight into the pit as it was descending. Both teams were laughing uncontrollably afterwards.
 * Twister became the first UK robot to lose to a walkerbot in Heat L. For context, Twister had a flipper, a small drill...thing, and a bludgeoning weapon, and was up against Clawed Hopper, a 200kg walker that could only hit 2mph top speeds. A light nudge from Clawed was all it took to immobilise Twister!

Extreme Series 1

 * In one of the Wild Card Warrior battles, The Executioner put up a poor showing against Dominator II by trying and failing 3 times (!) to release the pit, only to then drive straight into the pit itself!
 * Hypnodisc suffered its most embarrassing defeat against a wooden robot: the German entry, Nasty Warrior. What should've been complete fodder for Hypnodisc ended up jamming its internals with the splinters it tore from its opponent.
 * Also, in an unaired Wild Card Warrior battle, Hypnodisc broke down only 20 seconds into its fight with TX-108, despite a strong start. The fight was so anti-climatic that the producers did not air the fight.
 * Of all robots, Chaos 2 had its own Epic Fail moment in The Second World Championship: as it was tossing the Italian robot, Mastiff, around the arena, Chaos 2 went for the fancy "flip the opponent into the pit" manoeuvre, only to flip Mastiff away form the pit, and then drive in itself. Double fail considering George Francis is known as one of the best drivers in the competition, so a blunder like that was a shock.
 * X-Terminator's atrocious performance against Panic Attack in one of the many Vengeance Battles that took place across Extreme definitely counts. They were turned over very quickly by the former champions, and couldn't self right (the team foolishly added a spike on the front of the robot) and was eventually pitted. The team called it the worst fight they had ever had.

The Sixth Wars

 * In Heat H, Spam was dominating its second round bout with the 10th seed, Spawn Again. The latter clearly was not functioning properly, and seemed set to go out, until Spam suddenly ran straight into the pit for no reason whatsoever, and while under no pressure at all.

The Seventh Wars

 * In Heat E, Thunderpants didn't even make it into the arena, so the fight started with them immobilised at the entry gate. The reason this happened is because its drive belts took damage in the qualifiers, and the team had no time to repair them.
 * In Heat O, Disconstructor out of nowhere drove into the descending pit having opened it itself.

Series 8 (2016)

 * During Dantomkia's final Round Robin battle with Big Nipper in Heat C, Sir Killalot managed to get himself impaled on the arena side wall, spearing his lance in the gap between the steel and perspex panels. He remained impaled there for the rest of the fight.
 * Kan-Opener once again continues its pattern of being totally win-less in the domestic championships, falling in Heat D/Round 1 when a strong flip from Apollo knocked its removable link out.
 * Or Te, the successor to the highly successful Bigger Brother, was KO'ed in five seconds in Heat C by Supernova.
 * Speaking of Supernova, the team continued to leave the disc running, even after it lost its teeth earlier in the fight. This cost them dearly, as a bump from TR2 popped it up on one wheel, and the speed and momentum of the disc carried it into the open pit, and out of the competition.

Series 9 (2017)

 * In Heat B, Behemoth's final opponent in the Round Robin stage was Cherub. The team had a sure victory on their hands, but the team opted to use some untested Gripping Claws instead of the scoop (much to Ant Pritchard's dismay). The result is the claws ended up being hideously ineffective, and it ultimately cost Behemoth a place in the Heat Final thanks to a judges' decision against them.
 * In Heat D, the second group battle was a massive fail for newcomers Apex, and veterans Crushtacean; both robots were knocked out in one hit, the former by Pulsar, the latter by Ironside 3.

Series 10 (2017)

 * In Heat C, Apex lost in spectacular fashion against a weaponless Trak-tion; Apex's giant bar spinner hit Traktion's wedge twice (borrowed from Vulture) and then tore itself apart. It was quite the sight to behold mind you, but it is still rather pitiful that a highly advanced machine like Apex was defeated by a team of teenagers' school project.
 * Before that though, it only took one strong charge from Terrorhurtz to immobilise Apex's weapon almost immediately.
 * Iron Awe 6 returned with a lot of fanfare considering its success on the live circuit after Robot Wars initially ended in 2004, and was considered the pioneer of the "modern day flipper" as we know it today. When it fought in Heat D however, the flipper never even worked once, meaning it had to resort to use its wedge and pushing power to survive its battles to go through to the 10 Robot Rumble, where the flipper still didn't work.
 * Shunt managed to break his own axe not once, but twice in Series 10:
 * The first time this happened was in Heat E, in the redemption battle between Hobgoblin and Coyote; Hobgoblin is left immobile in Shunt's CPZ, but its unique "eggbeater" is still running. Shunt brings his axe down, only for the titanium tip for sheer off completely.
 * The second occurrence was in the second episode of the World Series; the final fight between Eruption (UK) and Cathadh (USA), Eruption strayed too close to Shunt, but the UK robot's armour is so strong that Shunt's axe literally broke in two.
 * Expulsion was a gift that kept on giving in Heat E; it got flipped over in every battle it had in the heat, yet still survived long enough to make the 10 Robot Rumble, where it quickly found its way into the pit only seconds after it was opened.
 * In Episode 1 of World Series, Team UK defeated both members of Team Rest of the World in a single hit; Terrrorhurtz knocked out Díotíor's safety link almost immediately, and Sabretooth did the same to Rabid M8 shortly after.

International Versions

 * In Heat D of Dutch Series 2, Cyclone had an easy win against Amok. Not because it was the dominant robot, but because Amok was disabled by the floor spinner of all things. Granted, it isn't clear why the spinner was active at the start of the fight, but the fact that the centrifugal force was enough to dislodge the removable link in the first place is especially poor. So in essence, Amok is the only robot in Robot Wars history to be immobilised by the floor spinner!
 * When Spawn Again fought in the US version's War of Independence, it was KO'ed after the first hit from its opponent, Joker. Sure, it was unfair that Joker spun its weapon up before activate was called, but that is still a poor display for Spawn Again to fall that quickly, even taking its status as The Alleged Car into account.
 * In the German version's 5th place melee, Mr. Psycho picked up a defeated Junkyard Queen and paraded it around the arena; however, he raised his claw with his prey still in his clutches, and spun around so fast that he toppled over like a drunken idiot! It was admittedly quite funny to watch, though.