Originally Posted by marshall (Post 1548353)

For one, it needs to/should be clarified about what makes a robot a ROBOT and I suspect there will be an update on it this week. If it is the control system then can a team replace their RoboRIO legally if it breaks? Can we swap them between rounds for code updates without being reinspected? If it is the drive base then can a team swap out drive bases if they dent their frame beyond repair?

For two, my proposed solution to the potential problem is simple. GET RID OF BAG AND TAG! Build season is not 6 weeks anymore and 30 pounds of parts that doesn't include COTS items is just silly.

Originally Posted by Jon Stratis (Post 1548369)

First question... did you have a nice looking BOM for that second robot this time? Just kidding :)

Originally Posted by marshall (Post 1548353)

Oh boy... here I go again.

As the team with that second "robot"... I can tell you exactly what happened from my point of view (For everyone who has been wondering what 900 is up to this season, here ya go). Before I do, I want to say thank you to Jon and Frank from FIRST for working with us to clarify the rules and for being gracious professionals. Also, a massive thank you to all of the volunteers, staff, and especially the robot inspectors for the Palmetto regional. It has always been my personal favorite regional event to attend and you are the reason why.

We tagged two bags on Tuesday night before midnight (just like everyone else) and then we drove down to the event on Wednesday. It made no sense to us to leave our practice "robot" sitting in our lab when we could just bag it and use it as spare parts. We arrived at the venue for load-in and immediately explained the second bag to the inspector who checked us in (Hi Ben!).

The next morning (Thursday) we were the first team to weigh in for inspection and then we helped walk about 5 inspectors through the robot inspection process. Both the robot and spare parts were in our pit at this point and as we explained to everyone who asked about the well constructed set of spare parts, it would NEVER touch the real field without going through inspection (and it never did!!!!).

The only thing we were asked to do was to not take up space on or near the practice field with our spare parts if the ROBOT was on the real field or in the queue for the real field. Eventually someone (I don't know who) said something and the ban hammer came down hard and fast. We were told to cease operations on the spare parts and we did for about 2 hours on Thursday. At that point, Frank was on his way to the venue and we were waiting on him to arrive and give us a final ruling on our interpretation of the rules.

Frank arrived and I imagine a lively debate was had. We were eventually given the approval to go back to work with our spare parts and again the provision was that the spare parts should not be on or near the practice field if the ROBOT was on the real field.

We had a dynamics problem that was causing some pain for our driver while crossing defenses with the ROBOT. We ended up having to buy leg weights from the local Wal-Mart on Thursday night and adding them to the robot Friday morning. We went through an inspection after adding them to the ROBOT per the rules. It brought our weight up to ~117 and fixed(-ish) the dynamics problem.

Now is where it gets interesting... We had been modifying the spare parts to a lower height on Friday morning/afternoon to solve the dynamics problem more permanently. At the end of the day on Friday we made a choice to pull the shortened mechanism (shooter assembly and superstructure) from the spare parts and place it on the ROBOT after removing the full-height mechanism from the ROBOT. It was a frantic herd of Zebracorn momentum but we almost got it done completely on Friday night (Just ask 1114 how fast 900 can mobilize and they'll tell you!).

This of course ended up with us needing to be inspected again on Saturday morning. To make matters more interesting, due to the way the scheduling worked out, we happened to be in the 3rd match of the morning on Saturday so we sent our drive team to the QUEUE to wait for the ROBOT to arrive. We went through inspection again after opening ceremonies and the inspector found things that we needed to resolve and we all missed a loose wire on our radio (this impacted us in the match so we paid a real price for all of this frantic work). We were fortunate enough to just barely make the match and the inspector had to meet up with the robot near the field to apply the inspection sticker.

I'm proud of our students and mentors. Our team likes to do fun and interesting things and this regional was no different.

For one, it needs to/should be clarified about what makes a robot a ROBOT and I suspect there will be an update on it this week. If it is the control system then can a team replace their RoboRIO legally if it breaks? Can we swap them between rounds for code updates without being reinspected? If it is the drive base then can a team swap out drive bases if they dent their frame beyond repair?

For two, my proposed solution to the potential problem is simple. GET RID OF BAG AND TAG! Build season is not 6 weeks anymore and 30 pounds of parts that doesn't include COTS items is just silly.

Originally Posted by marshall (Post 1548353)

...
For one, it needs to/should be clarified about what makes a robot a ROBOT and I suspect there will be an update on it this week. If it is the control system then can a team replace their RoboRIO legally if it breaks? Can we swap them between rounds for code updates without being reinspected? If it is the drive base then can a team swap out drive bases if they dent their frame beyond repair?

For two, my proposed solution to the potential problem is simple. GET RID OF BAG AND TAG! Build season is not 6 weeks anymore and 30 pounds of parts that doesn't include COTS items is just silly.

Originally Posted by FrankJ (Post 1549141)

An definition observation. Take off the roborio and your practice robot is no longer a "robot", but a collection of spare parts.

Originally Posted by MrBasse (Post 1549207)

But did the practice bot weigh more than 30 lbs? If so, I don't see how this could ever be okay. Especially since parts were used from it on the competition robot.

I'm guessing every part on the practice robot was assembled, so none of it was COTS.

I don't even think it matters that you modified the part that was swapped over. If that works, why can't we all bring second robots, grab parts off and drill some holes to modify them, then slap them on the robot and say we "manufactured" them in the pits?

Originally Posted by meg (Post 1549208)

Why does it need to weigh less than 30 lbs? It was bagged before midnight on Tuesday. The are no restrictions on how many spare manufactured parts or extra weight you have in the bags. Where is the difference between building and bagging a spare mechanism in case the first broke?

Originally Posted by MrBasse (Post 1549210)

I'll admit I missed that part. Then I pose the same issue unless everything in all bags not including bumpers and battery weighed less than 120lbs.

Originally Posted by meg (Post 1549211)

Where is there a rule that says that? The only restriction is there are only two bags allowed. Whatever you can fit in them, you can carry in. No where does it say what you may or may not bag.

Originally Posted by MrBasse (Post 1549212)

Section 5.3 in the administration manual refers to the robot, and as Al likes to remind us it isn't plural for a reason.

Couple that with r5, and that is where my question comes into play.

Originally Posted by Jon Stratis (Post 1549229)

There is nothing in the manual that limits how much stuff you stick in your bag. You could have 500 lbs in there, if it fits, but I don't think that was really the point you were driving at... it's all about how many ROBOTs a team can have at an event.

The question does come down to the definition of a ROBOT, which i copied in here form the manual a few posts ago. So, if something is missing one of the requirements listed in the manual definition, is it still a robot?

What about a team that brings, in its bag, an extra electrical board with everything needed on it, an extra drive train, and extra manipulators? If they are all disconnected, you'd have a very hard time arguing s were a robot, yet it may be a matter of a half hour to get everything hooked up once it's unbagged. Is it a robot at that point? Technically, no, because it doesn't have bumpers attached to it... but I think most people would look at it and call it a robot. Backing off a little, at what point do you NOT call it a robot and say it's legal?

Then in another issue, how would you take modifications into account with the "one robot" philosophy? To use a simple analogy, If you have a broom and replace the handle, then later replace the bristles, is it then the same broom? Sure, that's a little excessive, but you can see how it applies to robots - you can make legal modifications to your robot until it looks completely and totally different, yet we still call it the same robot. A few years ago in Ultimate Ascent, there was a team here in MN that used their withholding to have a different shooter at almost every event they competed in. They went from being tall to being short to being tall again, using different wheels and different designs... a lay-person, looking at snapshots of their robot throughout the season would probably have called it 3-4 different robots. But from a legality and inspection standpoint it was only 1.

So, where do you draw the line? You have to draw it somewhere, and it's not terribly clear where that somewhere is. And even then, you can limit what's brought in, but what happens when a team (cough 900 cough) builds a second robot from COTS parts while AT the competition?

Originally Posted by MrBasse (Post 1549243)

Reading section 5.2 in the admin manual clearly calls out "the robot" and even says the two bag concept is specifically for disassembling the robot for ease
of transport. So the 120 lb limit is a part of what I'm getting at. The competition robot has a weight limit, and at stop build you bag the robot. Nothing in there says bag anything and everything you've built to that point.

Did they build the whole thing there from COTS components? The way I read it was they brought an assembled group of components.

I'm just looking for clarity on this, this has potential to be either a learning opportunity for a select few or a missed opportunity for a whole lot of teams.