Chief Delphi - Duct tape

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Well the amount of Duct Tape on this robot was crazy.... most of the pneumatics... shooter... loader(100%duct tape/polycarb)... climber...

but hey, it worked

http://i.imgur.com/KTaeVso.jpg

Quote:

Originally Posted by EricH (Post 1359429)

A couple of comments on this:

1) Duct tape (or gaffers' tape) is legal, for repairs at least.

Gaffer's tape is legal for repairs; it is cloth. Duct (or Duck) tape isn't cloth, and therefore not legal. Our LRI had huge rolls of blue, red, and white gaffer's tape ready for use; hopefully your LRI does the same.

Quote:

Originally Posted by EricH (Post 1359429)

2) If you're using it for numbers, and the numbers come off, someone really needs to talk to you--risk of non-compliance with G26.

We had a number of rookies at GKC that didn't have good numbers. White gaffer's tape with a layer of clear packing tape was allowed, but the teams all got a nice conversation with the inspectors about what they need to do next year. Coming in with numbers constructed out of tape won't be one of the options....

Quote:

Originally Posted by EricH (Post 1359429)

3) If you had it at inspection, the inspectors, NOT the refs, could have told you whether or not it was illegal. (Just ask--most inspectors won't bite you for asking if something is or is not illegal.)

As I keep telling teams, we inspectors are the nice guys. It's the refs that are evil and are out to get them. :yikes:

Quote:

Originally Posted by EricH (Post 1359429)

4) Just because the refs don't say anything doesn't mean it's legal. It may in fact mean that they don't care about that particular infraction, if there is one. But at your next event, the refs might have a little more time to care... and now you're not legal.

Yep. I always see a lot of bumper violations that never get called. Giving the refs the benefit of the doubt, I'm assuming that they have more important fouls to look for. ;) But pretty much every tournament I've inspected I've seen refs ask us to look at one or more robots & confirm that they're legal; such requests have included bumpers. And there was at least one bumper violation called at GKC (and remember, G20 calls for the robot to be disabled). So maybe they do care.

Quote:

Originally Posted by Jaxom (Post 1359531)

At IE, we hit the bumper calls HARD... on practice day. (Half the ref crew was also inspectors.) So, if we saw someone come out with bad bumpers and a valid inspection tag, they'd get sent back for a reinspection.

By elims, though, most of the issues were either gone... or too far gone for a flag to be of any use. (To the team with large zip-ties holding their bumpers/bumper fabric on: You were noticed, but I at least figured that your mounts had completely broken, and you were using a temporary setup to compete in one match while you fixed 'em.) If bumpers were pretty shredded, yeah, we called 'em.

We've used a lot of (zebra!) duct tape, but never to hold our robot together. It has proved very useful when turning sharp corners into dull ones though (to make sure we never accidentally cut/scratch the ball).