Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

It allows a sizable disparity between those teams who choose to keep working, and those who don't.

We stopped working. You can too, if you want to.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

This doesn't change if there were no bag day. Take a day off. Go for it. Nothing stopping us. In fact many teams already take days off during the build season anyways.

To me it is a money thing. We just finished a third season with building two robots. We fundraise extra money to do this. But I feel it is somewhat wasted money. That money could go towards so many more things... more laptops that students could use for programming, more machining and fabrication equipment so more students could learn, more students could travel to a competition. If we want FIRST to reach more students, then things like this bag-day timeline (build 2 robots & witholding allowance) needs to stop. VRC seems to do just fine without it.

If you argue that in the real world there is deadlines, so too must there be in FRC. In what industry are you allowed to ship 62.5% of your product to the customer.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Why would the 6 week limit on build time be relevant if you keep working on it or another bot?

I guess we have been pretty naive to figure it was an honor system of 6 weeks and not more. Our robot is in the bag. We will finish our bumpers and wait until our first competition to open the bag.

What value is gracious professionalism to your team? And what other rules is your team trying to skirt?

Jim

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I've never viewed the 2nd robot as a waste of money. It's always a great tool to have. It allows us to get more students hands on the robot, giving them more machining experience, and showing them how we can iterate offline and perfect those iterations and apply it to the master product.

FIRST can't stop anyone from having a second robot and developing mechanisms offline or tell us how to use our own team resources. They give us a witholding allowance each year to develop mechanisms offline and bring them into competition. One of the better ways to keep iterating and refining these mechanisms is to build a second robot and steadily improve it after bag day. It's not so much skirting of the rules, just making use of the witholding allowance rule.

I've always been under the assumption that design is an iterative process, correct me if I'm wrong. Eliminating a withholding allowance kind of downplays the importance of iterative design. How else do I apply the lessons I learned at my week 1 regional when I'm unbagging my robot from week 5? It's not like I can fabricate everything needed using the crowded machining center at the regional.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

You don't need to be in the "haves" club to take advantage of the 45lb, or 30lb, or any withholding allowance. I wouldn't place us in the "haves" group of teams, more fortunate then others, sure, but not a "have". What did we do before bagging? Popped off an inconsistent intake to hopefully make it better by the time competitions roll around. You don't need a CNC mill and a $10,000 budget to pop a few screws off something you want to make better before you put the robot in its bag. Any team can do that. You just need the will to want to do better.

Do we build a practice robot? no. Could we? Maybe, maybe not. We never tried it. We just don't have the people, time, or money for it. Lack of resources is something we as a team have to recognize, deal with, and overcome. Unless FIRST wants to throw money and machining resources around, working within your limits is something teams have to master to succeed. To the teams who decided to build a practice robot: Congratulations. It is within your limits to do so, and you see it as worthwhile to spend your resources on. I see nothing wrong with this. If I were in a position to do so, I would do the same exact thing. As a team that does not build a practice robot, do I see this as unfair? No, not really. If it floats your boat then more power to you. It just makes me want to push harder to succeed over you. One of the most important lessons I try to teach on 2495 is perseverance, to never give up. Especially when you get your ro-butt handed to you by some fancy powder-coated CNC'd machine. You can sit there and complain that they cheat the system with their practice robot or you can try to manipulate our available resources to outsmart them. After complaining about teams like that myself for quite some time in earlier seasons, I think after the last few years I like the active approach much, much more.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I wonder if team size correlates with attitude about the Stop Build Deadline. Larger teams can have more students actively involved with building a robot if they build two of them. Smaller teams might lack the manpower to build a practice robot before bag day. I'm just not sure how best to craft a survey in order to get useful data.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Just to add onto this - it really is about hard work and allocating your resources. Having worked with 11 and 2495, teams with very different resources, it was clear to me that almost any team can accomplish a certain level of success if they put in the time. 11 has many sponsors, many machines, and a lot of man power. 2495 has the exact opposite, all in addition to being in a terrible school near Trenton. In 2012, $500 was a good robot budget for us. The next year, it was increased to about $1000. There's literally nothing stopping any team from using the 45 pounds, so I don't get what the issue is.

Additionally, we have found that having the district model and the unbagging rules, in addition to the withholding allowance, has really made it a lot easier for us to compete at a much higher level, and close to some teams who do create a 2nd robot. There's teams who build practice robots but still manage to be pretty mediocre.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I think that is "big thing".

We don't seem to have that will, so we finish our robot and do other stuff for a few weeks, until the regional competition. Sometimes we do well at the competition, other times we don't. Life goes on.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

You know....except money too. Which is a huge issue for the poorer teams who can get no funding and whose parents aren't rich enough to supply them with money either meaning that to even compete or get tools they have to spend almost as much time fundraising as building.... It changes nothing as far as the time spent a majority of the time just the cost. Fairness was never the issue here I (outdatted logistics? maybe fairness...no)

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

This is an interesting debate that seems to be ongoing. Since 610 was mentioned here as an exception to the rule, I thought I would chime in.

Back in 2011 we built a practice robot. It was our first year with our CNC router, so we thought it was doable. Unfortunately the new machine wasn't as magic as we hoped, and it took a huge amount of time to build two robots. After putting in all of that extra work, I'm not even sure we benefited much from the practice robot. Our autonomous code that worked on the practice robot didn't work at competition. Our drivers didn't even get a lot of practice time since they were away on outreach trips and march break. The time between build season and regionals is very busy at our school, so there isn't much reason to build a second robot.

After that, I swore off practice robots. I see them as a waste of time and money. That doesn't stop our students from asking me to build one every year, but until our situation changes drastically, I refuse to consider it. We work hard during build season, making the most of the time we have. Then we stop. It's a conscious decision.

You don't need a second robot to be competitive.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Getting money takes time and persistence,...

If you want to win regionals or at least contend, work at it. Get more money, get a sheet metal sponsor or whatever. Do what is needed to get to the level you want to be at.

2495 is a great example of this, Brandon and Akash have both echoed the fact that the team has gradually increased its budget despite being in a bad school with almost no resources. (Which means they have pushed and pushed to get more sponsors). It's also worthy to note that 2495 won a district event last year (note sure if it was their first)

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I agree with the bagging policy. It gives all teams an equal timeframe to work on their competition bot. If teams work after bag date on an identical bot to improve it, they have to spend time at their first competition to make identical changes to that bot or swap mechanisms.

The concept behind FIRST is to make a marketable product in a 6-week timeframe, and compete with it. Bagging the robot makes it possible to keep build season separate from competition season. However, you can't exactly shut the team members brains off after bag and tag, so FIRST allows you to carry in a certain amount of fabricated parts for last minute adjustments.

Last year, our team went into our first regional a 3rd level climber. We failed miserably, and between our first and second regional, built a shooter to replace our climber. We spent almost half of the first day changing our robot over and missed several practice matches. It's a sacrifice we had to make to improve our bot after bag.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

If you think teams are just handed money without any work, you need to talk to way more well-off teams.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

I think the point is you're not guaranteed access to money and sponsors simply by dint of hard work. It'd be pretty naive to deny the roles of socioeconomic status of team members and luck in determining team resources.

Re: Why do we bother bagging?
 

Having had this discussion with a lot of folks that I have a ton of respect for, I will say that there are a few different camps and folks are they are pretty well entrenched in them.

The "second bot" debate is actually very similar to industry. I work in Defense, and we often have a date when we ship our vehicles to USG for testing... even the prototypes. Some companies choose to make a duplicate that they can continue development and learn from. Some companies don't. They have the same debate about resources and efforts and...

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It is a healthy debate to have as long as both parties understand that people have different values and different value systems. This is the crux of a lot of debates with the program. Some teams are focused on program excellence and strive for excellence in the area they choose. Think of this as being similar to the Olympic athelete that devotes all their spare time to skiing down a hill or skating the perfect routine, or running a particular distance really fast.

If you have ever devoted yourself to "a" goal with all your heart, sole, and being for an extended period of time, you may understand the benefits and/or the losses associated with such a strong single minded effort. You learn a lot about your limits. You learn a lot about the details that make a difference. You learn a lot about what it takes to succeed at an effort.
This video does an excellent job of expressing "the desire for excellence":
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ok8OHYQdDDI

From the outside, witnessing the performance, you may find an Olympians performance admirable and maybe even inspirational. I would garauntee you that every person that has dug that deep has had a fight with someone that doesn't understand the time being invested, doesn't understand the money invested, doesn't the hardship, the late nights, the blood, seat, and tears involved. Many don't understand.

Some do understand what is involved. They may haev even gone through the process, and found that the sacrifice was not worth the efforts. This is a real result of chasing the passion for excellence. Divorces, loss of friends (cause you never there), grades slip, personal injuries that cause a person to live the rest of their life in pain (physical or emotional).

These hardships though are not universal, and for many that experience them, often it was a worthwhile exchange.

I bring these up, because it comes down to values. It is not my place to tell someone else what their values should be. It isn't your place to tell me what my values should be.
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I do think there is a lot of value to the stop build day. I do, personally, believe that FIRST would/should allow for some development windows outside the stop build day. I would love to see 6-8 hrs/week unbag time, and do away with the "with-holding allowance". The folks chasing perforamnce excellence will still likely build a second bot. Most will utilize it to make development improvements. Some will not utilize that timeframe at all. This would most accurrately align with my values, and I think it would help teams learn about the importance of development.

With the Current FRC system, I think the "with-holding" allowance is a poor substittue to development comapred to controlled windows of access to the "competition robot". You have virtually un-limited time with a frustrating chunk of the system.

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MrForbes shows a lot of wisodm when he says "We stopped working. You can too, if you want to." He seems to have a ton of dedication to his team, FIRST, and the effort involved in making a competitive robot. He also shows his team values balance of other activities.

It is perfectly fine to go skiing without going for the gold. You can smell the fresh air. See some interesting sites, and enjoy the exhileration of speed.