Question About Withholding Allowance

[GorginFazli]

Does the withholding allowance let us keep our control board? If it helps, our control board includes the roboRIO, four Talons, a relay, a voltage regulator module, a power distribution board and a pneumatic control module.

[TogetherSword8]

Yes, you can keep your control board, just this board with all the components and any other items you withhold must be under the 30 pound total.

[mman1506]

Yes, you can keep your control board, just this board with all the components and any other items you withhold must be under the 30 pound total.

Control system and KOP components are considered COTS and do not count toward the 30 pound total

[EricH]

Control system and KOP components are considered COTS and do not count toward the 30 pound total

Unless they're on the board. Once you've attached them to the board, the whole thing is a Fabricated Item. To have the control system/KOP NOT be COTS, you have to return it to its COTS state--by removing everything from the board.

[Daniel_LaFleur]

Unless they're on the board. Once you've attached them to the board, the whole thing is a Fabricated Item. To have the control system/KOP NOT be COTS, you have to return it to its COTS state--by removing everything from the board.

and unwiring everything.

[GeeTwo]

This is the main reason we invested (last year) in a second cRIO and (this year) in a second RoboRIO and control components - we held a special piggybackr campaign to buy the Robo.

Our first two years, we just pulled the 'RIO from the control board before bagging and built a mockup control board so we could continue coding and testing between bag and competition. Then, we just had to re-mount and rewire the one COTS component.

OBTW, we didn't think of this until more recently, but servos would be great for the mockup board - the direction that they point indicates the speed you're trying to drive them as motor controllers.

[rmmitch]

After reading through this, I am still unsure what the ruling is. Is it legal to detach wiring, remove the RoboRIO and keep it out of our robot bag? Then put it back in at the competition, not counting towards our withholding? Would also like to avoid having to purchase a second Rio just yet, but would like to have a practice bot with the most up to date controls.

[Daniel_LaFleur]

After reading through this, I am still unsure what the ruling is. Is it legal to detach wiring, remove the RoboRIO and keep it out of our robot bag? Then put it back in at the competition, not counting towards our withholding? Would also like to avoid having to purchase a second Rio just yet, but would like to have a practice bot with the most up to date controls.

If the RoboRio is not attached to anything, and has not been modified, then it is COTS and will not count against WITHHOLDING ALLOWANCE.

[GeeTwo]

Yes. If you remove one or more individual COTS parts before bagging, they do not count against the withholding allowance. Only Fabricated Items (including the weight of COTS items incorporated into the items) count against the allowance.

If you build a new control board to test with, and remove COTS items from it to put on the robot, they don't count against withholding. If you swap out the whole board, the whole board with attached COTS items counts against withholding.

[jnicho15]

Isn't the robot the things attached to the RoboRio, or is the robot whatever you want?

[Bryan Herbst]

Isn't the robot the things attached to the RoboRio, or is the robot whatever you want?

The glossary in the game manual defines a robot as:

an electromechanical assembly built by an FRC Team to perform specific tasks when competing in RECYCLE RUSH. It includes all of the basic systems required to be an active participant in the game: power, communications, control, and movement. The implementation must obviously follow a design approach intended to play RECYCLE RUSH (e.g. a box of unassembled parts placed on the FIELD or a ROBOT designed to play a different game would not satisfy this definition).

A "robot" is not defined by what is or is not connected to the control system.