Robot Wars: St Agro we salute you

Cult TV show Robot Wars, which pits machine against machine in spark-inducing death matches will once again play host to St Agro this weekend - the robot creation of silicon.com reader Terry Carlin.

The robot, which hails from St Agnes in Cornwall, made it through its earlier heats in grand style, even managing to throw one of its rival machines clean out of the arena of battle.

However, the team behind the machine aren't getting carried away ahead of this weekend's show and have already surprised even themselves with the progress they've made.

Terry told silicon.com how St Agro has already exceeded expectations.

"To have got so far is brilliant - all we were hoping for at the outset of this series was to win one battle on TV," he said.

But the success to date is something Terry and his two sons Ben and Michael are hoping to build on in the future. Terry doesn't expect to win Robot Wars this year but believes the experience will serve them well in the future.

"There are some things we need to improve on the robot," said Terry. "The wheel design is not good enough so I'm dreading a fight against a spinner unless we can get a flip in first. And we definitely don't want to meet Matilda again as she broke off one of our wheels in the last fight."

Robot Wars rules state that machines must go into subsequent rounds unmodified, so for this year Terry can only cross his fingers and hope the machine's weaknesses aren't exploited.

Tune in to see how St Agro fares in the semi-final: 13:10, Sunday, Channel Five.