Ziggo was first conceived in late 1997. I had just returned from Robot Wars '97. I decided to build a robot that has the power of Blendo (the most destructive robot at that time) in a lightweight package. Ziggo originally weighed 25 lbs., which was the lightest weight for combat robots at that time.

The first step in Ziggo's design was deciding how to make the spinning top. I first thought about making a conical top, but I didn't have a sheet metal roller to create the cone. I briefly thought about a cylindrical top. It would have been space efficient, but I decided that sloped sides would provide better defense in case the top stopped spinning. I decided that a steel wok would provide the right shape. I went to the Wok Shop in San Francisco and started looking around. I weighed several ones and decided on a 20" model.

The next part that I got for Ziggo were two large (3.5" OD, 2.5" ID) ball bearings. I ordered some Fortal aluminum from a company selling cut-offs in order to make the bearing mount and top support. I bought a sheet of 0.075" 2024 aluminum for the bottom, some 1/4" bar stock for the supports and found a piece of aluminum in a dumpster at a recycling center that was the right shape for the central axle.

The bearing suppport was the most difficult to make. It started as a 4"x4"x2" block. I cut out the center by drilling holes and using a jigsaw. Then, I mounted it on my Sherline mill. I turned the head of the mill 90 degrees so that I could use the mill as a lathe. I turned the inside of the bearing support to mount the two ball bearings and the outside to have a "V" groove for the drive pulley. Next, I made the top support out of a 10"x4.5"x0.4" piece of plate. I machined the 3.5" center hole with the Sherline boring head (and a couple of boring bars made out of 3/8" drill rod). Then, I machined the outside of it using the 4" rotary table mounted as far from the spindle as I could. While creating Ziggo, I probably pushed the Sherline as far as anyone ever has.

I made the rest of the chassis using 1/4" aluminum bar stock. Screwed together, this made a very strong, stiff frame. The wheels were modified roller blade wheels, with the rear wheels driven directly off the Dewalt gearboxes and the front driven by 3mm HTD belts.

At first, I was going to use the Aveox motors from Ziggy '97 for the drivetrain. I had decided to switch to wheels, since the tracks on Ziggy had been destroyed and were generally a pain to work with. I looked around for motors to spin the top and found some motors from auto cooling fans. In testing, one of them seemed pretty good, but weighed about 4 lbs. I knew it was going to be tough to keep the weight under 25 lbs., so I decided to use an Aveox motor to spin the top and switch to 18V DeWalt motors for the drivetrain. I was already using the DeWalt gearboxes, so it was an easy choice.

I switched from the flaky interface for the Aveox controllers that I had created (at that time the Aveox controllers didn't have a forward/reverse option) to a Vantec RDFR-23. I mounted the antenna receiver inside of the central shaft and mounted a small Dean's antenna and receiver power switch to a plastic plate that held the bearing support on the central shaft.

The Aveox motor spun at about 20000 RPM so I wanted a good 10:1 gear reduction for the top. I happened to find some small V-belts used for rock tumblers. They were a metric, slightly smaller, version of a 2L belt. I didn't have much space to fit a gearbox so I decided to use a single stage V-belt reduction. The bearing support was large enough to make a 4" diameter pulley. The smallest pulley that I could make for the motor was 0.6" which gave about a 7:1 ratio. I knew it would take while to spin up, but it was the simplest solution at the time.

Next, I started building the top. The inverted wok had a round top, but I wanted it to be flat. I cut out a 10" diameter hole and welded in a piece of sheet steel. Then I mounted the aluminum top support to the wok with screws. The rim of the wok was very floppy, so I hammerformed a ring to stiffen it and welded it on. Finally, I built 1" tall blades out of 1/8" thick steel and welded the pieces to the shell. I added another set of smaller blades near the top in order to protect the antenna and power switch.

I did a weight check with all of the parts completed and saw that I was about one pound over. I milled holes in all of the 1/4" chassis ribs. I also milled out channels in the aluminum top support. This saved about half a pound. Finally, I took a grinder and thinned out the shell, dropping the final half pound.

Ziggo was tested just once before his first fight. I had balanced the top by standing Ziggo vertically and welding on or grinding off weight to the edge of the top until it would stay in any position without rotating. I brought him out to my patio, stood 10 feet away and spun him up. It was an incredible sight. He took about 15 seconds to reach full speed and sounded like a helicopter. I hit a couple of rocks and they were launched too far to see. I decided that it was too dangerous to do further testing in such a small space.

Ziggo's first competition was at an underground fight held in August 1998.