FIRST Robotics Wish List
 

The annual FIRST Forum meetings are coming up on August 1st, where FIRST staffers listen to the teams' input.

FIRST has been doing this every year for the past 4 or 5 years and they really try to accommodate the needs of teams.

Just this past year, these things were requested at the Forums and FIRST implemented them in the 2002 game:
1. We requested them to let us design our own electrical hardware - they let us use $100 of stuff from Digikey.
2. We requested that they let us use any gears and sprockets... they did this.
3. We asked them to let us know who we will be allied with ahead of time, letting us plan match strategy in a reasonable amount of time instead of hustling through it right before the match - they did this.

Anyway... what I am trying to say is that FIRST does listen. Sure, they cannot grant all of our wishes, and some of their decisions are not popular, but they do try to make us happy as teams.

So, with that said...

What do you wish for?

Let's keep this thread to brainstorming ideas, not debates. If you want to debate these issues, start a different thread. So, think of any reasonable suggestion or any outlandish idea and keep this thread going until Aug. 1st.

Let's get thinkin',
Andy B.

More steel shapes
 

I'll start:

Let teams use any shape of steel channel, angle, or shape. This would let designers use steel much like they currently use aluminum extrusions.

The reason for this is that some teams have access to steel shapes which are free to them.

For example, team 410 had to remove their entire ball collection system at the LA Regional last year because their main support structure was a steel C-channel. This form of steel was not legal in the FIRST rules, since it wasn't on the additional materials list nor was it in SPI.

Andy B.

First and foremost, a game that is the same in the qualifying rounds and the finals. Like 2000. Actually 2001 had that feature too, but it was a performance not a game. This year's game could have been there with a few minor mods.

I like the idea of "strategic disengagement" encouraged by the end zone scoring. I'd push it further and require a robot to be touching the ground ONLY in the end zone to score. This would eliminate the entanglement controversy.

I like the robot rules the way they are. We do need to come up with an alternative to the SPI catalog if they're not participating next year.

Some different kinds of actuators and sensors would be nice.

The only thing I really want to add is commercial springs. Spring design and manufacture is beyond me and do-it-yourself springs can be dangerous. But commercial springs are OK as long as used within their limits. If we could use any commercial spring, then there would be less temptation to use an inadequate spring. Every tried to make a compression spring with surgical tubing?

I think we had a couple of problems with the shipping, but they were schedule driven, ie back to back regionals. Hopefully it won't be an issue next year.

Closing ceremonies need to be shorter, or at least keep to schedule. Of course, at least this year there was no "problem" filler material :D

Dump the FRCTECH group, it just caused more confusion. Mostly because decisions tended to be effectively reversed when "clarified". The Team Updates need to be the definitive document for clarification. I will say that it was a worthy attempt to solve a difficult problem, I just think it didn't work as well in practice as it needed to. One of the big problems was certain people (often rookies, but not always) asking the same question repeatedly in different ways, seemingly hoping for a different answer. (What part of NO did you not understand?)

Tech inspectors need to come from the teams. Preferably they should be experienced people from teams not competing at the event. (Hi Andy!) We might want to consider different inspection teams for different aspects of the robot. An electrical inspection to verify the wiring is right, mechanical to verify the motors and actuators are OK, and materials to verify that all materials used are legal. While the judges we had tried hard, there are too many subtle ways to violate the rules and get away with it. Volunteers from outside the team community are just not familiar enough with the rules. I know of one team that passed using a van door motor.:rolleyes:

I'm sure I, or my team will think of more later. I'm planning to be at the San Jose forum.

ChrisH

One thing I can safely say is that a different way of doing this is already in the works...I don't know all the details as of yet, but a VERY reliable source suggested that a setup similar to this site may be used...

Wish list additions - Servos and pneumatics
 

More steel shapes sounds good.

I think RC servos should be on the additional hardware list. Perhaps anything up to some max torque (the higher the better). These are widely available to anybody through a hobby store or catalog. They could replace alot of heavy, dificult to manufacture assemblies for minor actuation tasks (releasing latches, pulling pins etc.)

I would also like to see more pneumatics choices. More cylinders, valves and acumulators. If the sponsors don't wish to provide them, we will pay for them. Cylinders are, in general, much lighter and cheaper and easier to use in a design than an equivalent motor and gearbox system to convert rotary to linear motion. Incorporating air cylinders to do a job very often requires very few if any machined parts. The same cannot be said for adapting and electric motor to do the same task. Give us the choice of some small light acumulators or some heavier but higher capacity acumulators. I would gladly trade a couple extra pounds of accumulator if I could get that pump off board.

Bottom line, give us more component choices that readily adapt to our needs without alot of machining required. This helps everybody but most of all it helps the teams that don't have good manufacturing resources.

James Jones
Engineer/Coach
Team 180 SPAM

Pneumatics
 

I would definitly love to see a wider choice of pneimatic pasrt to choose from. It would also be great to see the rules not restrict us on the amount of air storage. I seen teams who used a spare piston for storage where it would be much easier if we could get another tank in the kit. This would reduce the strain on the compressor without changing the maximum air pressure alowed to exceed 60psi.
Another universal mode of frustration is the carpet on the feild. If FIRST sticks with a carpet this year than the pile should be unchanged at every competition. Not just the pile but more the understucture, because my team's bot had a very low ground clearance and worked perfectly on the carpet at every competition except our regional where it draged. This was because there was two layers of carpet instead of one so the bot sunk into the floor.
But i think that the one change that would cure many problems is to ditch the carpet altogether. that would be grate! maybe aluminum sections would be a better surface for the bots and good to ship and put together.

they should have every team implement some kind of recycle part in their robot.

Renzo,
Care to explain what you mean?

Coaches
 

Ok I think FIRST should bring back the 2 coach rule with this change

FIRST should make the 2nd coach optional, but if a team has a 2nd coach it must be a HS or College Student.....They may not be doing as much as the primary coach, but it gives them an idea what the student needs to do on the field, and maybe in the future they will have some field expierence that if the student stays with FIRST as an adult they have field expierence...

I dont know, im sure this could be worded better

More Weight!
 

I've always wanted this since i've been in FIRST....but now with the new motors i'de really like to see the weight limit bumped up to 150lbs....or even better yet....just have teams remove the battery when they weigh the robot during inspections.
:)

I would like to see Autonmous aspects of the game added (I.E. having to let the robot go somewhere where we couldnt see it and have it locate the somthing or so somthing), get us closer to a smarter robot than a smarter driver. Of course this would require better sensors.


I too would like to see bigger acumilators, but i like the pump. Maybe up the operating pressure.


I also would like to see the feild not be flat. Maybe somthing that would require a suspension system on your robot. That would probably entail a new surface for the feild too. After everyone figured out the filecard thing maybe its time to stop with the carpet?

I dont know what I think about the weight limit and/or size limits. If anything maybe somthing smaller would increase our creativity. I think it is good where it is at.

Somthing that might be also be interesting to see is somthing like the minibots we saw this year for tethers but make them wireless to maybe go retrieve somthing

more pneumatics options. our team wanted to use FESTO pneumatics (they give us discounted stuff if we ask for it, as well as technical assistance) but couldn't because of the "bimba only rule" :(

i've mentioned this before...
 

I mentioned before in a different thread an idea similar to what Andrew said. Have the robot run on program code only and let it move for 20 or 30 seconds before the driver's controls are enabled. This would require a lot more programming and would open many new strategies.

Also FIRST has to stick to their own rules once they are made (I'm still mad about tape meassures, but this was discussed enough by now I guess).

Putting the weight limit up to 150lbs sounds good to me.

Also: I'm not sure about meassurements. More and more teams are sponsored by companies that build robot parts in the metric system. Maybe for all allowed material there should be given a maximum value for metric and non-metric that is about equivalent; sometimes the metric value should be the advantage in maximum thickness for a part and sometimes the non-metric value. That way it is equaled out and teams could you metric parts which are often only a tiny bit wider, thicker etc.

That's it for now, Phil

Chairman's
 

The Chairman's video should be due after the build period, much like the animation. Having it due during the build period makes it difficult for team members to work on both the Chairman's entry and the robot.

I want a segway for starters lol walking throughout the FL Nationals arena is tiresome.

actualy more motor, pneumatic options and maybe just maybe a change in weight restriction to maybe 175lbs. rather then 130 lbs. the FIRST teams might be able to put something even more worth while together even though we have accomplished alot already with the rules that were given as for size restrictions keep the size the same or change them for a couple more inches in each direction

More materials :-)
 

I'd love to see...

* More lax material rules: Allow carbon fibre in composites, instead of just fibreglass, remove size limitation of starting materials, so that teams can mill their own motor mounts :-)

* More motors: Put servos onto additional hardware list

* More electrical freedom: Maybe allow the team to use a 24V system?

* More wheel choice: Limit wheels by size, not by manufacturer.

Just my 2 cents :-)

-=- Terence

Maximize Matches
 

I would love to see a lot more variation in the match teams. This year, we had three or four matches against 219 and three or four matches paired with 551. We work closely with both these teams through the build season and openly share information and facilities with them when asked, and they do the same with us. We, and other teams, had other similar-match trends at Rutgers this year and at Philadelphia last year, but more so this year. I would have really liked to interact with more teams on the field, and I'd like to see these *almost the same each time* matches go away in favor of a different alliance every time.

Read other posts and some thoughts.

Steel extrusion: Sure, why not. It's just heavier. But easier to weld then aluminum.

Same game in quals and finals: Yes.

Dump the yahoo group. Yes.

Tech inspectors. I know there are a lot of college students that don't participate with a team for whatever reason. I bet quite a few of them would be able to donate a weekend to goto a regional and inspect and whatnot.

Pneumatics: This size cylinder with this stroke from any source.

Floor: How about using some sort of interlocking rubber tile for a change, or just staying with the carpet.

Leave the weight where it is, or lower it.

I like the idea of autonomy, but the field really isn't all that sturdy, and having robots run selfcontained for 20 seconds....run into each other or walls at high speeds. This would have to be addressed by game design.

Metric vs Standard: One or the other, but not both.

Make chairmans award due after Nats. Maybe in October. For example, the Chairman's award for Zone Zeal would be due this comming October. Summer tobe used for outreach and the cummlunation of that competition, in preperation for the new season.

Vertical changes for movement. Climb ladder/stairs/ramp. Prolly not a second story, for the construction involved, but maybe a few large platforms with 6"-12" in height.


Wetzel

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
What I want to know is how purifying water will fit in.....

Hello All,
I am very happy that we were allowed an electrical box this year but some teams who do not have experienced elec techs had some really dangerous outboard wiring. So the rules there need to be tightened up a bit. Also raise the $100 limit, $200 would be nice but $150 should open some doors for teams as well.
The weight and size limits are in place so two people can move the robot and get it through standard size doors. For these reasons I can't really see a need for any change there.
Over the years there has been some really interesting interpretation of the rules that required some informed (multi person) discussion before a rule question could be answered. Experienced teams have qualified adults who could help in this area. It is essential that teams get all the latest updates and not have to go searching for them. If there are team updates, perhaps they should be e-mailed to team leaders or at least be published in weekly updates.(Fridays OK?)
There needs to be better checklists for judges particularly with electrical. i.e. A simple volt/ohmeter check to insure no shorts to chassis at inspection. There were teams who also had battery mounting that was less than secure and placed the battery terminals very close to structural metal. Since battery damage is a real threat here for a 12v/17aHr battery I really cannot advocate larger batteries. Under no circumstances should teams be allowed to power up without tether in the pits and should not be forced to by judges during inspection. (This caused a great deal of interference at regionals.)
Finally, let teams know that this is open competition and they can expect help from any team. Hammer this point home and make sure that rookie teams understand the concept. Too many teams struggle through competition with a problem they can't solve, or don't have the tools or matierials to fix.

How 'about making a game that is easy to learn, hard to master, and can captivate an audience?

Sure, FIRST isn't into the Battlebots thing, but there are still ways of demolition that aren't viloent.

Dean, Woodie & Co. have been trying that for years

Othello.. thats all I have to say.

I think that 130 pounds is enough. I am a the one who has to carry it on and off the field and I think that 130 pounds is plenty. I think that dimensions should grow if the game grows. But what I would like to see is a lager variety of pneumatics, and more allowed on the robot 5 is not enough.

the only problem is, if you use more pneumatics, you need larger/more accumulators, you need a bigger compressor, you need a stronger battery, and so on, and that means it will wind up weighing much more than it does now. then we come back to the whole problem of fitting it through a standard size door. i think that no matter how the game changes, the size will never change. eventually, FIRST might allow heavier robots, but that's a big if. especially if there's only four people on the field, you can't make the robot too heavy. the only way around that is if they let you wheel the robot onto the field, although that could damage the carpet, so i doubt that.

i'm not saying i oppose changes to size and weight, it's just that it would be a very difficult thing for FIRST to do.

DEFINITLY...
 

I want to see the nematics to be more flexible. I want to be able to do more with pneumatics but at the same time keep the wieght low. If there are more vertical obsticals and climbing the weight should be lowerd and there should be more maneuverablitlity in the feild of pneumatics. i would really hate to see the weight go up because then either the gearbox or motor sizes would have to increase inadvertenly increasin g it's own weight.
What i m trying to say is that there is an inverse relationship with the weight and pneumatic options.
In response to the rubber tile idea for the feild, i think that that woiuld be a great idea. Alot like the interlocking puzzle shaped tiles in a weight room. that stuff would be awesome for tracktion and is very durable at the same time!

What ever the game is, I hope it encourages robots to be speedy. I don't know, but this year seemed like a bunch of tanks. Watching 4 robots go after 3 goals was like watching slugs fighting it out. It was boring to everyone watching! But when a bunch of 'bots with high gearing went out and scooted all over, I noticed people getting really into it (not just team members). If you want people out side of FIRST to take notice, 3 fps drive trains just arn't going to do us much good. People don't like watching mack trucks, they like sports cars and formula one!

I just like speed...

-Andy A.

Another thing.....
 

This wont really help people looking for teams at an event.....but how about at the Regionals/Nationals mixing up the team numbers or integrating rookie teams/newer teams with the veteran teams?

This would help out with what Al Skierkiewicz was saying about helping teams...most (hopefully all) veteran teams are always willing to share tools/materials with other teams if they need them.

:)

A few suggestions...
 

1) Remove the anti-TJ^2 rule!!!! (For those who don't know it's using velcro. Watch the 99 season I believe Nationals

2) If the carpet is being used again ban filecards. Why because now everybody knows the secret and its not very entertaining

3) Can we PLEASE go back to everyman for themselves!!! Too many times has the alliance thing screwed teams over. Fine you say so what do you purpose 1vs.1vs.1vs.1 same amount of teams playing so the speed factor is ok. Plus nobody can gain up and dominate over one person because now their is that fourth person. With the alliance system now teams who are seeded 1-4 are victimizing their partners who might have a chance of either breaking into the top 8 or higher. This happened to my team this year and we were pushed down in the seedings to seventh at Florida and we felt very betrayed by the system.

4) Define all rules and be consistant maybe give a video demonstration with the team updates with the rules so clarity can be certain. A visual usually works better than words because words can be misinterpeted.

5) To qualify for Florida points have to carry over... And if spots are open the teams with the most points should be able to qualify. (Like say team X has 4 points and a spot is available after the odd teams they should be let in)

6) Have a cut off date for signing up for Nationals don't hold teams in limbo. Like say have all teams that are
qualified sign up on Jan.1
Odd numbered teams Jan15
Teams with most qualifiying points Feb 15

7) Devise a qualification system for Nationals that lets teams have the ability to travel to Nationals. Weeks notice is not good and not cheap...

8) Chairman's award needs more time robot is still being designed during the time the chairman's award is being completed.

Ok that's it for now that I can think of:D

Re: A few suggestions...
 

For #4 on the list... they sort of already do that at Kick off - they show (using people) how the game should be played... But showing better diagrams of rule changes (i.e. tethers under the goal, etc) would be helpful to us all!

As for #5, That's another thing FIRST did this year. Even numbered teams qualified first. Then people with a certain number of points, then people with a lower number of points and then they let anyone else who wanted to sign up, sign up (just because they didn't have enough teams the first two times around).

And for #7 - yeah, I definitely agree. Trying to get hotel reservations and, mostly, plane tickets with only a few weeks notice would not be fun. Our team was lucky enough to sign up when they let whoever wanted to go sign up. But if we hadn't done that, we would have found out that we were going a month before Nationals (for winning a technical award) - and a month is a decent amount of time compared to some teams!

A few more things (some echoing what others have said):

At both regionals and Nationals, have veteren teams play with rookies more often, and mix up the teams a little more! I know at our regional we played with some of the same teams three times during quals.

I think weight should be left the same or even lowered (make the bots lighter). That would be interesting ;)

Keep the size the same.

Up the amount you can spend at Digikey.

Let teams use whatever springs they want (ok, maybe have restrictions on what kind of springs can be used, but give more freedom than just what comes in the kit).

And make sure the same rules are followed by all of the inspectors at competitions (Don't tell teams at regionals that it is OK to use tape to cover up nuts/bolts that are sticking out - especially if it's electrical tape that won't really cover any sharp edges ... The checklist even says "electrical tape is used only as an insulator"!!) Yeah. When that team gets to Nationals with thier tape-coved bolts ... they won't be too happy when the inspectors there say "You need to take that tape off - and file down those bolts by hand." (even though that's what should have been done in the first place!). :rolleyes:

Ok, that's my $.02!!

- Katie

decrease
 

I say decrease the size of the robot and keep the same weight therefore making it easier to keep the robot under the weight limit!!! (Maybe by 6 inches?

3v3 would be nice for a change instead of 1v1v1, 2v2, and 4vthemselves!

If First did decrease the size of the robot and kept the field size the same it would allow 6 robots on the field at once.

3v3 would also give you a better chance of winning because if 1 partner dies you still have the other one!

I would like some suggestions/comments!

Oooooh
 

Here are my thoughts... don't know if they're worth much.

- Inspectors who have kept up with the rules updates and know their stuff, and who can recognize a van door motor from a chiaphua. A more comprehensive electrical and mechanical checklist would be great - their favorite words were "file those edges", and that was it.

- More judge coverage. I know there are only so many judges, but having only two spend 2 minutes with a team doesn't do many teams justice. Maybe a bit longer, or more judges patrolling the pit areas? I never saw too many...

- Enhanced pneumatics, I definitely agree. My pneumatically-driven Internal Combustion Engine model on a FIRST robot is still quite a ways away. More tanks, cylinders from anywhere... maybe a better compressor? Either that or a "black box" compressor that you don't have to mount with rubber feet (thanks goes out to the team members who decided to put the feet on with locknuts right before the chassis had to go to the welders...).

- More small electronics. The game is still virtually entirely based on the mechanical competence of the team - programming and electronics are wallowing in the dust. Let custom sensors be anywhere on the robot as long as they follow the FIRST rules of electrical systems - no grounding to the chassis, no open-air electric surfaces, etc. We could've done incredible trigonometric calculations with those optical sensors with a secondary basic stamp, if the sensors didn't have to be in the "black box" to be part of the package. And up the money level on those digikey parts.

- For crying out loud, change the playing field. Carpet has been mastered by the veterans and the rookies are generally left in the dust.

- Open up the default materials some. Aluminum and steel are fine, why are they restricted on types (i.e. 410's C steel)?

- Bring back the featherweight award! Teams need to be rewarded for how light they can make these robots, considering most of us are drilling holes while a select few stand back and watch with a smirk.

- More servomotors! Servomotors are excellent ways to control your robot's smaller parts, but only a few are allowed. There are tons of PWM outputs that remain unused...

That's all I can think of for right now.

The rules need to be a lot more enforced. My team spent hundreds of dollars and many hours on making a telescoping pole extender that was 25 feet long and would never touch the ground only to find out that they were now allowing "entangling" devices like tape measures to be used as an extender. We actually lost a match because the goal we were pushing got caught up on a previously illegal tape measure extender. All the rules need to be there from the start so there is no room for questioning or argument.

As for the game, Robotica on TLC was really cool. I wish that FIRST could make it more like that and not just a flat, rectangular piece or carpet. We need some ramps and small stairs and sand pits and narrow turns and other obstacles. That way, the robots with their "slammed" bodies 2mm off the ground would be useless. I'm talking big tires, 4wd, massive ground clearance and perhaps suspension. Now that would be cool.

Just please no walking bots, at least not yet. The thousands of years old wheel is still rolling strong.

Lightweights, Lowriders, and other compound words brought to you by the letter "L"...
 

Lightweight award, here here! I would love to see that come back. No holes drilled in the robot rendered over yonder <-- that weighed in at 104.9 lbs; not the lightest robot that hit the carpet, but far from the heaviest, and quite possibly the most sturdy bot in Jersey. No welds either, but I won't step near that today.

Lowriders, like ours, work well on FLAT surfaces. I'd like to see the flat surfaces go away, maybe in favor of a moving floor (Naw, too expensive and BattleBots-like...) or a craggy surface. A rolling surface (~~~~~~~) would be neat too. Hey, how about a giant waterbed! Talk about making a skilled drive team mandatory...

Lemme think... Oh yes, FRC Chat. Chief Delphi and weekly updates from FIRST blow that idea out of the water. Calling FIRST up works better, and quicker too.

Lower-cost additional regional registration would be really nice. I would like to see that come into play. Just a bit lower, like down to half the regular registration.

LLLLLLLL... Well, that kinda ruined my theme, but anyway... Sending the animation software early is an excellent idea, and it really helps to be familiar with the software before the season's begining. And Autodesk's renderings of all kit parts are a good idea too. But FIRST should make an effort to make sure the shipping is quick and all teams actually recieve the software at the time that it was intended to arrive. And it should be made easier for teams, specifically the animation team members, to access Autodesk's rendering library.

Well, it's late, I think I'm pretty much done for now.

And another thing!
 

Eliminate all dimensional limits except the maximum shipping crate size and weight allowable. This would let in the real-world horror of engineering your own team out of competitiveness!

Put yourself in the place of a team that has a nearly dead or limited function robot. (maybe a rookie team with just a few students and adults) Wouldn't you like the random chance to play with a robot that would run up your qualifying points, or complement your strategy and function? Of course, and that idea doesn't beat down teams or make it hard for new teams to get excited about the competition. Knowing that any team can make it into the finals really makes it exciting for the competitors. I was here when it was 1 vs. 1 vs. 1 and it wasn't that much more exciting but it was demoralizing for some teams when their perception was they couldn't possibly win. After all the hard work they had put in on the robot, they still had no chance to come close to the finals. It is easy to learn when you are excited and pumped, but you don't want to do anything when you are depressed.
I am still undecided on whether to announce all alliances ahead of time or just give teams 2 minutes to figure out strategies and then play. Their is an advantage for large teams to have many students scouting and planning in either case, but it seemed more exciting for me not knowing who we were playing with until right before the match. Any other ideas on this one?

I know this sounds dumb but it makes sense . . . to me

I would like to have the music turned down when matches are playing.

Two reasons for this:

- Its very hard for friends, family members, and other teams to talk to each other with music blasting. Nothing like yelling "what!" ten times when the person is just trying to tell you to move over. :)

- Also it’s very hard to really concentrate on a match with the music. When you are really trying to study a robot the last thing you want is to hear a song that you absolute loath and see people dancing to it.

I completely agree. FIRST took a big leap forward this year by allowing the custom circuit and I think that was an extremely positive move. However, being able to place sensors outside of the housing would really open up the possibilities in regards to what we can do with the custom circuit. The $100 limit definitely should be raised. As Al said, $150 or $200 would be nice.

I would also like to request that we be allowed some other way of enclosing the custom circuit. That BUD Box was rather heavy for what it was. Also, why limit the size of the custom circuit by requiring that it fit in a certain size box? Perhaps a rule that requires the custom circuit to be contained in a non-metallic casing would be appropriate. This would allow teams to buy or build an enclosure that would be appropriate to their application.

I also liked it better when you didnt know who you were with untill right before the match. I was kinda disapointed when we got our matchs and we were already paired up. I think it ads an element of really knowing what you want to do when you get up there and having to comprimise quickly with the other teams. Either way the alliances definetly need to stay in place.

Makes sense to me too. They usually have a good choice in music but often its too loud to hear anouncements. It also makes it very hard to talk while driving:

"The goals are coming!"
"What about the plumbing?"

Even worse was at the LA regional where a team brought their huge drum set. Everytime any robot changed direction the drums were pounding. I lost my voice by the end of the first day shouting over them. Sorry if anyone who reads this is on that team but it was just really loud for everyone. Any other sounds besides the drums were nonexistant. I'd just like to be able to talk to someone without ruining my vocal cords.

Different weight limits?
 

I would like to see different weight limits.

1. Keep the 130 lbs. limit but allow 20 lbs. over with penalty points. This will allow teams from going crazy with the hand drills.

2. If the robot is 100 lbs. or less give bonus points. This will
allow new teams or small schools with simple designs be become more competitive because their lite robot's bonus points.

The penalty and bonus points will be determine by FIRST.

:D

Retire the Basic Stamp
 

A better controller robot controller. It's time for the BS2P to be upgraded dramatically better. I'm seeing all sorts of competitors with faster and better alternatives to the BS2P, including more memory and i/o capability.

PBASIC is not the best programming language to learn. I'd like to see people writing code in Java or C/C++ as those are the languages that are being used in industry.

Linux and/or Macintosh tools. Not everybody loves Windows and a lot of schools are Macintosh equipped. More and more Linux is happening because schools don't have the funds to pay the steep M$ licenses. Linux also plays much nicer on older hardware as well.

I'd also like to see a requirement for an electronics enclosure. I've seen many times during construction and competitions that the exposed electronics get damaged and that hurts the team.

I like the bud box approach. Make it bigger and raise the budget limit for it. Combine it with the above enclosure and simply set a budgetary limit for the whole electronics package. Allow people to drum up their own controllers.

Make the dashboard capabilities more accessible. Currently, you cannot see all of the input variables right there on the operator interface. Allow people to design their own packets to feed robot controller data back to the operator interface.

Switch to 802.11b or bluetooth wireless networking for RF communications between
robot and controller. This maybe a bit of a stretch for now, but it opens the door to a lot of possibilities. The gear is much cheaper off the shelf than the current RF system.

Btw, animation needs more time, like starting in the fall and ending just before the National finals.

Re: Retire the Basic Stamp
 

There is a new radio system that IFI is testing...i'm not sure if it will make it in this year or the next, but it would basically be integrated into the RC, eliminating the need for a separate radio on the robot. There is a possbility that the new system would be set up such that you would no longer need to bring an OI radio to the field(integrated with the arena controller perhaps)...

Some $ considerations-

1. do everything possible to get free shipping from Fedex again. It saved thousands of dollars.

2. since the kit has been "abbreviated" and there is no more Sm. Parts stipend, reduce the entry fee for the contest. If nothing else do not raise it past the 2002 season figure - only fair since the odd teams were largely left out.

3. offer a direct contact e-mail link on the FIRST website for posting of events. Our team is still waiting for a post requested two months ago- there is no direct link to the site evident other than FRC engineers.

4. Continue to use the same shell playing field. Offer a link to the manufacturers so teams can purchase fields for regional events. These regional fields could be left near the sites of regionals and used in the off season for local competitions. I am willing to bet that consortiums of teams would invest in setups if they knew they were a constant from year to year.

5. making the Chairman's Award due at the end of the building period makes great sense.

6. continue to maintain the dimensions for the starting size of the robot. Years ago the footprint was greater than 30" and robots couldn't fit through the doorways at venues. The 30x36 footprint is fine and allows reuse of shipping containers.

7. Increase publicity on a region to region basis via the parent organization. How about some magazine ads in trades based mags to interest sponsors? Progress is being made but more could be done.

8. Have ladies only rounds at all regionals as a small sub event. It would definitely encourage teams to get more girls involved.


A few things to chew on...

WC :cool:

Those stupid gates!!!!!!!
 

Did anyone notice why they added those gates this year???

Because Dean had to drive his Segway in the field ah haha They even made little ramps!!!!!

I say either get rid of those gates or make them longer, I found them more of a pain that anything else!!! because they were to short and there was allways a line waiting to get out.

What do you think????

some part of the robot has to be build out of recycled materials

-Diffrent playing Surface

-Feather weight award sound cool

-Chairman's due at the end of the Competitions

-Better enforced rules

I heard rumors during the competition season last year of an idea bouncing around at FIRST for a new surface...how likely that will be remains to be seen, however
While this would be nice for timing purposes, looking at the award structure as a whole, it's not really possible...with the regional chairman's awards this year, it's a requirement that the submisson date is before the first week of regionals. As well, with the amount of time that is put into viewing the various entries, and considering that there is at most 2 weeks currently between ship date and the first set of regional events, it is not viable to have a "bring it to your event with you" policy, nor would this be fair to all teams as it would create a "floating" submission date, rather than a fixed "out of your hands by this date" scenario. The only truly viable way that the Chairman's award submission could be restructured is if the requirements for the coming season were released in the fall, as that would give teams time before the build season to start work on it, and the only things that would need to be added were those aspects of the submission based on the build. Even if FIRST did not go officially to this type of format, it is still a way that teams could prepare for the coming season. Using the award requirements from the previous year, develop your entry during the off season, and then adjust or add to it as needed throughout the build season, perhaps even shipping it on the same date as the robot, maybe even with the robot(?).

Dr Joe Speaks...
 

A lot of very good points.

Some comments:

Constant section steel -- why not?

more pneumatics -- good if FIRST can afford it, especially more valves.

2 coachs -- very very big YES to that.

springs from anywhere -- of course this only makes sense.

more motors -- for once, I am going to say that enough is enough -- we had enough motors in the 2002 kit (imho).

Batteries -- keep the size batteries we have, just pitch those Exides that they gave out last year -- they were no were near as good of batteries as the batteries they gave out in prior years (really my data shows that the 2002 batteries had something like 60% of the current output of the 2001 batteries)



Now for some new points:

Breakers with the game design and the many motors, we have reached the point where the breaker can be an isssue, especially when shock loads are introduced. We need a shock resistant breaker -- perhaps a bit larger, but mostly just shock resistant. Self resetting would be a DREAM, but I have not found a source -- if anyone knows of a source, please forward it on to me.

The custom electronics were great, but getting data in and out of the custom board to the Pbasic computer was well... ...less than ideal. I propose that FIRST allow RS-232 communication with the custom electronics board via Port 0 (i.e. the programming port). Read the Pbasic manual, this is doable. It makes debugging code a nightmare but that is our problem not FIRST's. Give us the rope and let us hang ourselves if we screw up.

Finally, we need a good set of clutches and/or brakes in the kit. Think of how cool a clutch would have been for shifting or whatever. Now if only we had a willing donor...


All for now.

Joe J.

Allow confined, shielded electromagnets... For Whatever your use may be... They're frequently the lightest option for strong holding of things that can be useful... Don't ask why, just figure it out yourself... Electromagnets are good!

heh, i propose liquid nitrogen and high temperature superconductors. talk about power :p. here at my 'work' (summer research) at bnl, they have some really neat superconductors, that work at rather high temperatures, high enough so that liquid nitrogen turns them into superconductors. then you could do some really neat stuff, like repell other robots, if they have magnitized parts :D. now if only liquid nitrogen wasn't so dangerous... ;)

ZONE ZEAL was really easy to learn and it was entertaining to me and other people who have never seen a FIRST match before.

From a strategy standpoint it was way too easy...

i'd like a game similar to this year again. some smashing and fighting as part of the strategy, for two reasons. you have people watch and say, that's cool, they're smacking in to each other, and because as everyone says, it is fun :p. but, i believe that should only be a small part of the game. the rest of the game should be based on manuverability and function. for instance, make like, 4 or 5 different ways to get points. one robot would never be able to cover all 5 ways. so, you would have drastically different designs. then, every match would be unique. but one request is to make the game so that a whole lot of brute force won't win it for you. those are just boring, to both driver and everyone else. i'd love to have something that actually took more skill to drive, but didn't create a huge disadvantage to us.

but by far, the most important thing is that the general public will be able to understand it, and maybe even say wow, this is really cool. i'd love it if we could get the local communities to come to the competitions, but they don't understand the game, or don't think it's cool. so, we need a bit of the destructivness to make it cool, then at least a simple game to understand, but only from the spectator's view. this means having clearly marked scoring zones, and obvious scores. no multipliers or crazy things like that. but, just because your grandmother understands the point system, doesn't mean she can make an effective strategy. i'm sure if FIRST works hard enough, this mix can be attained. if there ever was a game like this, i believe that's when our best chance would be to get out to the community.

ALSO...
 

I think that the Specs for the robot shouldn't have to be submitted so early in the six weeks. We had to pick our robot name befor we even started to design it, mainly because we wanted to "CALL SHOTGUN" on the name. The name of the bot should be a reflection of the basic characteristics of the bot itself. This would also help when trying to identify a robot on the feild.

Re: ALSO...
 

While I can see your point, I'm not sure how much could actually be done...the deadline is not one that FIRST sets arbitrarily, but rather one which is imposed by the submission deadlines to get the program books done in time....

i really like the idea of autonomy at the start and/or end of the match. i also think the size and weight of the bot shouldn't change. pnuematics need a boost, and pbasic needs to be replaced with something better. i think they've got a good combination of motors (except that stupid torque motor).

i also love getting the alliance pairings ahead of time. this is what makes the one coach rule possible. i think having 4 people on stage makes things less confusing. as a strategy guy, knowing who we're playing with and against makes my life much easier.

George
S.P.A.M.
Team 180

I really think that is a big problem with some teams. The mentors definitly don't get the respect that they diserve and i think that the coaches of the teams are responsible. I have heard many instances where the coaches look at the mentors as a few more students to look after. But i have also talked to people that said that the teachers make the mistake of putting too much pressure and too much responsibility on the college students to the point where all descisions fall onto the mentors. There has to be a balance or conflicts will ruin the best of times (beleive me it gets pretty nasty).
There actually have been ideas to try to pan out the balance of power between the two groups. One thing that was mentioned was to actually compensate the mentors on behalf of FIRST. But it turns out that compensation would render this "volenteer" aspect of the students involvement in the program and most of the colleges look very highly on any volunteering done by it's students. So for next year i definitly think that FIRST should find some way to give a more important role to the college mentors as coaching is concerned on the feild but having two coaches behind the controller at once is way too much. Take it from a driver, it gets kind of hectic having three poeple behind you screaming out orders, another would be make it impossible to function all together!

RESPECT
 

Maybe this is just on my team, but I really hope you can resolve whatever causes the yelling at you by the other three in the player station. On our team anyways, myself and the other driver don't even talk during the match, to each other (telepathic communication) or to the coach or human player. The human player doesn't talk to anyone either. The coach tells myself and the other driver everything to do, and at the right time tells the human player to start shooting.

Also, with mentors not getting enough respect I think it depends on what perspective you see them from. I personally don't think my team in general knows all that my coach does on the field. However, all three of us in the player station know how much he does for us. He is the brain out there and everything that we do is in result of him. The only reason our team had success this year, was because myself and the other driver were what you could call 'in-sink', we had Moose, we had a good human player, and our coach was 'awesome'!

Personally, I like the current control system. PBASIC is easier to teach rookies than a language such as C and MUCH easier to teach than something object-oriented like Java. It's one of the few languages that is easy to learn on a fundamental level and yet still powerful enough that advanced programmers can find ways around its little quircks. As of yet, I haven't found anything I wanted to do but couldn't do to limitations of the language. Besides, the Isaac32 is one of the best robot controllers out there.

What I wish would be different:

Larger/more fuse panels in kit: This year, almost half of ours were spliced to drive multiple relays. Definately not ideal.

Allow teams to hold the circuit breaker in the "on" position with a metal bar. The internal mechanism of the circuit breaker will still trip without the physical switch moving, but it prevents impact shocks from tripping the breaker.

Add an award for software engineering. Some teams have some truly amazing programming and it needs to be recognized.

Switch to NiCads: I know this won't happen, but I'll dream about it anyway. NiCads are smaller and lighter than the current SLA's, but are a bit more expensive. The problem with SLA's is that their capacity plummets as you pull more current out of them. For the 2 minutes we use batteries for, a 9Ah NiCd would probably provide more capacity than the current 17.2Ah SLAs we are using, due to the inefficient nature of SLA's. The only problem is that they would cost 3-4 times as much as the current SLA's.

Bring back the old chargers: Let's face it, the battery charger's they gave us this year sucked. The old ones were so much faster and made it so much easier to keep all the batteries charged.

Technical/Maintenance Personal
 

I wish they would have additional two passes for technical and maintenance personnel onstage. These two individuals would not be in the coaches box but merely would remain on the sidelines. Our drivers, human player, and coach were not part of the pit crew and consequently made repairs and maintenance during the eliminations difficult. The rule became fairly a lax on the main stage, but up until then, getting our maintenance and technical people to the robot was very difficult.

Mr. Bill

Dear Santa,

I want:
more contact
more ways to score
hps on segways (hey why not)
3 vs 3 (or something to that effect)
a puppy
more qual matches
hula hoops as scoring pieces
more of that NYC carpet:D

-Evan

p.s. would it kill ya to give me a job w/ FIRST?

Bill, that is a great idea. Trying to point from far away and talk over all the noise to get a minor problem fixed is a real drag. If nothing else allow one student and one mentor or two students.
Al

Al,

Right on!

On the Newton field, I saw another team roll their robot over to the fence so two mentors could help with repairs. The officials were giving them a tough time. As soon as a match was over we would have our two drivers run out and give their badges to our student pit leader and a mentor to check out the Beast and try and get it ready for the next match. During qualifying, it isn't a problem because you alwas have time to return to the pit.

Mr. Bill

Send the copies of 3d studio max and organizational tools (Microsoft stuff, assuming they are giving it to us again) as soon as a team registers. This will allow more use of the software. For example, it is hard to bust out the copies of MS Project and just start using it right at kickoff. It is a tool for organization and if it is given to u earlier then we can get more organized ansd utilize all we are given. Also, we will be getting a new version of 3ds Max this year so giving it to us a month or 2 ahead of time would make the transition easier. This also makes it easier for the rookie teams or teams that have not previously done this part of the competition. Both of these wont affect the main competition but it would give us a better timescale for the Animation competition. Just a thought :)

I want a competition with something other than balls. I know they had rings one year.

Also I didn't think Zone Zeal was as exciting as the 2001 competition, whatever the name was.

I think 2002 was MUCH more exciting than 2001. It had more action, and the head-to-head aspect makes it much more suspenseful than the "everyone hold hands and be friends" mentality of 2001. Granted, I think Zone Zeal had a little too much contact, but I think it struck a better balance than Diabolic Dynamics (that was the name for 2001, wasn't it?).

What we really need, however is something like 2000. That game was awesome. From what little I saw of it, I loved it. A good game should have head-to-head action, multiple ways of scoring, and an offensive/defensive mix for strategy.

PS: Also, about the metal bars to stop impact tripping: that doesn't work. The breakers will still trip, even if they are held over by a bar. It just makes it a pain to reset.

I think parts of this year were exciting. I think the preliminary rounds were great but the finals sucked. Your stradegy changed. You weren't trying to get as many points as possible, just more than the other team. this just sucked. I remember one match with beady where they grabbed the goals and that was the end of the match. little movement, low scoring, just plain boring. I think that they should keep the objective the same as the rounds go on, not change them. I think this is where last years game shone. Each team of 4 tried to do as well as possible which made it exciting, and also almost maxed out the point system. This is why people go to these things, to see what we can do, not to see who can play a waiting game and see who can grab everything the quickest and kill the game. I also think the teathers kinda took away from the game. While some times these teathers made the difference in a close game which made it exciting, many times it was just an easy way to score 10 for each team, which just inflated the scores. I liked how last year there were obsticles to get where you needed to be (teater totter and bars). I hope next year they integrate the pros of both games to make an exciting and difficult game that will keep everyone envolved and interested.

just my $2.02 :), i haven't written something that long in a while

Again, like I said, we need something like 2000. Something with a major field piece that allows for some sort of extra scoring, be it a bar, ramp, stairs, pit, platform, or whatever. It adds an extra dynamic that makes strategy tougher, less predictable, and more exciting.

This year's finals compared to last years...
 

Personally, I thought that 2001's finals were rather bland, unless you had two equal alliances going up against each other. You usually could know who was going to win, and there was nothing the losers could do about it. If they had somewhat inferior robots, they were pretty much screwed because they couldn't affect the other person's score.

This year's finals, however, were different. It was frequently the case when the so-called underdogs came out on top (anyone remember VCU? #1 seed vs. #8 seed?), due to superior strategy rather than superior robot. I think that kind of balance is needed - there is a place for excellent robots, but if you don't have an excellent team balance (driver, secondary, coach) the robot won't get any points. Granted, in 2001 there was extreme influence on the team balance, but if your robot could only drive around you had no chance.

Anyway, those are my additional thoughts for right now.

Off to robot camp next week! Woo!

1. I wish that they would allow us to take our robot home after competition, as they did in 2001 (Coopertition FIRST) and then ship by the ship date (Tuesday after a competition) to the next venue.

Regardless, I wish they would announce whatever "repairs and new stuff" rule right from the beginning and stick to it.

2. I would like to have another coach/mentor position. In 2001 at Regionals, we used this position primarily to give another high school student the opportunity to get out on the playing field and get into the competition atmosphere before driving/playing in a subsequent match.

At Nationals, our second coach was the person who had all the scouting and partner capabilities info. We only had a couple of minutes to plan strategy. Two people (one to discuss, the other to filter the info) were invaluable.

3. They should continue to post the alliance pairings at the beginning of the competition. This adds another dimension to the game (discussing strategy with future partners). Those of us who weren't actively repairing damage had a ball working on strategy with other teams.

4. If Small parts is used again, ban the use of the "tools" section for use on the robot. Although it was very innovative, the use of file cards and tape measures seems to be at the edge of what is acceptable. What's next, using a butane torch or a melting pot?

5. Put an overall dollar limit on the robot. This would include everything purchased external to the kit. This would mean setting a standard price for raw materials (e.g. .25" aluminum).

6. Instead of unlimited gears, sprockets, bearings, allow the use of anything in the Stock Drive Products or Boston Gear catalogs. Put a dollar amount limit.

7. Zone Zeal reached (and maybe exceeded) the safe limit of "violence" that FIRST (with its message of gracious professionalism) can tolerate. If there is going to be more pushing, shoving, and grabbing than in the past, the referees -must- enforce the actual rules when a team goes over the top.

The actual rules of engagement must be more precise, as well. Although we, as competitors, can police ourselves, different interpretations of loosely worded rules lead to hard feelings.

That's all for now,
Andrew, Team 356

I actually felt that the amount of violence or contact was far less than anyone expected. I would really like to see a little bit more contact. I feel that this would promote the building or strong, durable robots that are not flimsy like many I saw in 2002.

Also, an elevated drivers' stand would be nice so you can see if your goal grabber is fully attatched or if you are about to run over an extender.

Now that is a good idea even a foot off the ground would be good. A kool thing also going with this train of thought is maybe have a few video screens in the hp station maybe one that is an overview of the feild or one of your robot.

Great idea
 

This is a great alternative to SPI. SDP does not have as much other things, but they have tons more power transmission components.

As for what was wrong with Zone Zeal...

Too many times games turned into shoving matches. This was interesting for the players, but not for spectators. Also, this tore up the carpet.

One main thing that was present in '99 and '00, but not in '02 was the fact that you had to be off of the ground at the end of the match to get extra points. Sure, FIRST tried to get us away from the goals by giving us points for getting to the end zone, but they did not expect so many extensions.

If FIRST would've given us 20 points for robots being completely off of the ground at the end of the match, that would've added another dimension.

Another thing about Zone Zeal that was different from years past was the fact that almost all of the required tasks were easy to do by a robot. Grab a ball and put it in the goal... fairly easy. Latch onto a goal and push it around... easy. Latch onto two goals and push them around... somewhat easy. Grab three goals... hard (the only hard thing). FIRST initially made the task of lifting a goal difficult (by only grabbing the pipe and flange), but then backtracked and let us lift the goals easily by the metal trim on the edge of the goal.

My wish for future years is to make more functions of the game that are difficult to perform, as they have with every other year before 2002.

Of course, there needs to be a combination of this sort of task challenge with a game that is easy to understand and watch by spectators... that's why we should play robo-basketball in 2003. :)

Andy B.

The top part of our robot was so strong that we put it on the bottom of the crate and it never got bent. I think everyone kindof prepared for heavy contact but then realized that it really wasn't necessary to win a match (for example, having the little robots or tape measures to score points instead of running back through people.) I think more contact was a good idea, with poor execution due to changing rules.

reply: Elevated Drivers
 

I love the idea of having an elevated drivers stand. It is especially hard to even see your robot if you'r at ground level with it. a more "aerial" veiw would definitly help. that would also be great because it is close to impossible to even see your bot if your's is the shortest on the feil and the tallest is parked DIRECTLY IN FRONT OF YOU!

P.S- and this is coming from me who is 6ft tall

It depends on the philosophy. If FIRST wants to see the best improvised play possible, with elements of suspense to the players, they should keep it the way it is. If FIRST wants to see the best possible play, with strategies fully explored and thought out, which I believe may be more exciting for the audience, they should announce the pairings at the beginning of the competition.

Personally, I vote for the second.

I would like to see another day added to the competition...

Wed. Unpacking, Tinkering, and Inspection Day
Thur. morning: Practice
Thur. afternoon: Qualifying Matches
Fri: Qualifying Matches
Sat morn: Qualifying Matches
Sat. aft: Elimination Matches

Wednesday would be used to unpack robots, tinker, and inspect. Only three team members would be allowed in the pits. The practice field would not be available for teams to use.

On Thursday, practice could start at 8:00 am, since robots are already unpacked and inspected. Since teams would be mostly ready to go for their first practice, you will have fewer no shows and teams can get the most out of their practices.

Although I love the chaos and adrenalin of the current practice day, it would make inspection much smoother if the number of people in the pits were fewer. Also, it takes us about 2 hours to get unpacked and ready to go, even when our robot is just coming out of the box. In three years, we have yet to make our first practice (usually scheduled for 10:00 am).

I envision that 1-3 team members would go out in advance of the team to get the robot prepped. On practice day, when the full team arrives, they would know that their robot is ready to go and could make the most of the practice and competition time.

This scheme would also give us another 1/2 day of matches, without increasing the amount of time away from school for the majority of the pre-college students.

Andrew
Team 356

That would be great. They are always in a rush between matches and if a close call comes up on the score it takes more time. We would have more time to set up a more organized pit area for more efficient fixin'. There would also be the possiblility of testing robots on a tether just around the arena/event site. This time could also be used for some intense strategizing as most teams plan strategy in the minute or so they have before the starting buzzer of their match. Also, this time would help rookie teams (or any team for that matter) work out the problems with their robots. And if your robot is absolutely perfect and your strategy is all worked out, you can still go around the pits to get the inside scoop on team 123's drive train or ball shooter etc.

There are just two concerns I have.

1. There would be a lot of school work to make up after being out for 3 days or more depending on travel.

2. I would not want to see teams take advantage of this time by using to add a variety of illegal parts and/or mechanisms or fabricate something new or make darastic changes or anything illegal like that.

I think this is a very worthwile idea. What does everyone else think?

I think these are good ideas, but might need a few changes. It would be nice to have an extra day, but that racks up the expenses for teams that have to stay in hotels. It also brings up the issue of missing school which was mentioned. I think only three people allowed per pit is a little small. You are going to be crowding your own pit, so if teams want to be cramped, they should have the option. Id like to see that raised to at least five. This plan also costs first more, because they have to rent out the facilities for an extra day, which is quite expensive. To rent the San Jose state event center was something like $8000+ a day, but overall these are good ideas

How about have...

Thur. Unpacking, Tinkering, and Inspection Day
Fri. morning: Practice
Fri. afternoon: Qualifying Matches
Sat: Qualifying Matches
Sun. morn: Qualifying Matches
Sun. aft: Elimination Matches

You would still only miss two days of school, but you would spend your whole weekend with robotics. (if that is even a bad thing ;) )
Any thoughts about that.

Good idea, but FIRST should keep competitions off of Sunday for two reasons. First is that many people like to attend religious services on Sunday. Second is that teams that travel to competitions would return home late on Sunday and wouldn't be well rested for work / school on Monday.

Mike

I would keep the extra day on Wednesday so I have time to recover after the comp. I think if it could be on Wednesday with no additional costs other than travel, and as many people allowed in the pits as normal, that would be great. Besides, what would you do on that day if you weren't in the pits? Also, for teams who do not have the funding, this day would not be mandatory to attend. But that does make it kind of unfair though. Hmm. Still has some bugs to work out. Someone else want to give it a try and make it work??

I have a problem with this plan for personal reasons: with teams only having 1-3 members in the pit it causes problems for teams that had problems during the build season. Any team at the NYC regional should remember all for the problems we had due to our engineers bailing on us during the build season. Thanks to fully staffed teams like 237, 810 and 340 (not to mention many others) we were able to compete with a working robot by the end of Thursday. With the plan proposed we would only have unpacked our robot and done minor repairs, we also would have missed all of our practice matches and some qualification rounds. Therefore, we would have been victimized for an occurrence out of our control

Thankfully its going to be my team next year if the school ok's it

While extending the event to another day would be nice...there's a number of logistical and other issues that would need to be resolved first...

-Almost every event has the equipment brought to it from another site. At every site I've worked, the truck is packed before we leave Saturday night(well, I guess Epcot is the exception), and then leaves Sunday morning for the next site. If the opening of the event was pushed back, setup would have to start on Monday morning(your average regional takes 2 days to set up), which would only give one day for the truck to get to the site.

-FIRST also uses the time between events as a "breather," to keep from going completely insane during the 6 weeks :). If things were pushed ahead, they would not get this very important day off...

More on the extra day...
I threw out the idea (and it wasn't original to me. I'm sure I stole it from someone else) and didn't really think about all the logistics.

I had assumed that FIRST must have the site under their jurisdiction on Tuesday and Wednesday to set up the playing field, shop, pits. If they set up the pits first on Tuesday, they could be setting up the playing field on Wednesday, while we have access to the pits. I don't know the details about how FIRST works their magic, but this looked like a "no cost" solution.

I would recommend the 3 members at a time to keep the pits cleared. 5 members per team would be fine too. 20 members per team results in chaos, although it is the best chaos on the planet.

My original thought would be that 3 (probably adult) members of the team would fly/drive out the day early and that the rest of the team would come a day later. This would make the additional team expenses minimal.

The bad part of this, of course, is that fewer people would get the experience of unpacking the robot, tweaking, and seeing it start to come to life.

This year, I think we had a minimum of 10 people (mostly pre-college students) working in our pits from 8am-8pm on each practice day.

On the other hand, teams would be more likely to be inspected and would have more time to get their robot running.

I actually think that teams who have problems in the build season (we were one in our rookie year in 2000) would have more "mental space" to get them resolved. With a less crowded (and noisy) pit and with the focus on getting unpacked and running (instead of also trying to make your practices) teams should be able to focus more on solving technical problems.

Since you will know in advance how much work you would have to do, it might be possible to petition the regional to allow extra personnel into the pits.

Above all, the objective for FIRST is to have all robots performing well in competition, while maintaining a balanced playing field for all teams.

Andrew
Team 356

Another thing to keep in mind is with the current schedule....the field, pits, and other equipment gets set up simultaneously...meaning that in most cases, the robots do not arrive until sometime Wednesday afternoon

What about the teams w/ no adults and almost no members present w/ experience with a FIRST competition and no other support really but the other teams and the volunteers? With the schedule the way it is now everyone has the same time and the same chance to correct everything wrong w/ their bot

Better Food / Food availabliity
 

On the topic of food, I feel that this is quite a problem at the LA Regional. While there were sufficient fast food places nearby, there weren't inside the event site. We were not allowed to bring any food at all into the arena and were forced to pay for overpriced sodas and very old pretzels. Come on... 5 grand for that? We have how many kinds who are in there all day for each of the three days and it'd be nice if we could bring in our own food to have something decent to eat.

As to extra days...
This would add an immense expense to each competition. The cost is usually the same whether you are doing anything in the venue or not. If you book it you are paying by the day/hour for the use of the hall and electrics, security, clean up, etc. I would suspect that any of the midwest venues we use would be in the neighborhood of $30k+ a day with east coast being even higher. I know at the Midwest Regional, the site is cleared on Saturday evening with the bigscreen, speakers and cameras packed before the video crew can go home. Add to that the sheer numbers of volunteers who need time off. The Motorola volunteer staff (non-robot team) for Midwest Regional is enormous so I suspect other regionals are equally staffed.
As to the food issues, I agree that food is an issue. Part of the deal on the venue includes getting the concession people some profit. So that makes it neccesary for there to be no outside food. OK, so place and order and eat outside if you can, but some events are fundraisers for the home team or the local schools so use your own judgement and support the locals when you can.
As to parts, there was a requirment to document the cost of parts and matierials and not exceed a certain amount. I think that would keep the design more equitable and hold teams to more real world constraints. I know there are mechanical guys who will disagree here, it does add to the workload.