Re: Ball deflectors.....don't
 

Yes it is a T foul and we will be on the look out for this.

Re: Ball deflectors.....don't
 

I have seen a robot get on the bridge with balls trapt under it. Tonight at Kettering's practice 33 did it a few times, but I do not believe they knew the balls were there due to the fact the were driving towards themselves.

Re: Ball deflectors.....don't
 

From looking at a bunch of videos, it looks like lifting the bridge only a little bit will allow a trapped ball to roll free. So if your bridge manipulating device can both push up and pull down you should be able to wiggle trapped balls out if they are on both sides. Push the side you are on up to get that ball out. Then push it down and drive up, freeing the ball on the other side.

Re: Ball deflectors.....don't
 

Many of the past eight years we have made a critical mistake of one kind or another, usually in terms of assuming some kind of nominal value wasn't nominal. Thus, we paid a lot of attention to the bridge "help"ing keep the balls from jamming underneath... ...which doesn't mean they won't.

With the 14" extension restriction, they do appear for the most part to make the balls accessible to robots with the appropriate mechanism to knock them out (and/or suck 'em in).

Instead of railing against the unfairness of it all, teams should be considering what they can do between now and their own events (or now and tomorrow's first match) to be able to clear balls from underneath the bridge.

------------

And on that note, from what I can tell watching Alamo and KC today, lifting the bridge doesn't seem to work more than maybe 50% of the time (or less), so another method might be desirable.

Re: Ball deflectors.....don't
 

Pat's post is exactly how I interpreted it as well. The ball deflectors do keep the balls from jamming up near the pivot base of the bridge (where all the balls would go without them). The definition said it would help keep the balls from jamming....which it does. It never said anything about rolling them with grace out from under the bridge so your robot can sweep them up with ease.

With the right manipulator, the balls under the bridge are accessible to all teams. It might not have been as readable as "a mechanism to put balls into hoops", but it's clear many teams thought of this problem and built devices to compensate. In my mind, it's all part of the game.

Re: Ball deflectors.....don't
 

*hikes pants up a few inches above his waist*

Suggestion: Consider this a part of your engineering education.

If I had a nickel for every time a vendor's product didn't *quite* perform according to spec, or some library or application fell short of the claims in its documentation, or behaved in some odd way that got in the way of my efficiently-planned project or solution, I'd be long retired.

Sometimes you can get a vendor to fix what ails you. But often, there isn't enough time, enough money, enough material, or enough staffing to do it. (You may also not be a big enough customer/client to accommodate.) You will usually work around it as best you can, and move forward. Maybe you and the vendor can fix it for release 2, but business or market pressures say you gotta ship release 1 without that fix.

If you choose this for a profession, you will run into this a lot.

You might study other teams' designs--even if their robot design is radically different from yours, there may be an element you can adapt this weekend, or carry in to the next competition. Or maybe it will help you design workarounds next year, if you're an underclassman. Learning from others' work is half the fun, anyways...

Re: Ball deflectors.....don't
 

In KC today, several matches saw balls under both sides of bridges. It turns out if the ball is near the end of the bridge, the thing has to be tipped all the way to the floor on the other side or the ball won't move.

I wouldn't complain about it as an impediment, it plays the same for all. If FIRST's goal is to make coopertition a cool thing for the crowd to see though, they missed the boat. The ball under the bridge seems to have a randomizing effect on how successful teams are. It is a very specific type of mechanism that can deal with it the way it is currently playing out.

Ivan

Re: Ball deflectors.....don't
 

Relevant- https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?f...type=1&theater

Re: Ball deflectors.....don't
 

Tape measure grappling hooks. :cool:

Re: Ball deflectors.....don't
 

Stacked on top of other robots to start the match.

Re: Ball deflectors.....don't
 

Another RI team used one of these to hang in 2010 quite successfully. Didn't even need an arm to lift it up to the bar, they just extended it up and lifted themselves up by retracting the tape.

Re: Ball deflectors.....don't
 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y63OV_E7M-4 - nuff said

Re: Ball deflectors.....don't
 

Head ref announced new rule today: teams are allowed to have a fifth team member on the side of the field giving hand signals so they can tell if there is a ball there, or anything else they want to signal apparently. Interesting.

Re: Ball deflectors.....don't
 

Well, that's a new development... (Okay, so there were two coaches in 2001...but it's practically new.)

Can any of the other Week 1 events confirm this change?

Re: Ball deflectors.....don't
 

Watching the streams of the Hatboro-Horsham MAR District and Smoky Mountain Regional, this doesn't seem to be the case (of course the camera angle at HH doesn't show the middle, but Smoky Mountain shows the whole field). Though that would be an interesting change...