The research behind this article is motivated by robotic operations in radiologically contaminated environments, notably for nuclear decommissioning. However, the experiments reported within are based on a recently reconfigured, hydraulically-actuated, dual manipulator robot that is being used for R&D into both tele-operation and autonomy in a non-active laboratory setting. One element of this research concerns the development of novel control systems to address time-delay and deadband uncertainties. The article briefly discusses some preliminary results and plans in this regard. Recent improvements to the hardware demonstrator are also described.