Raising the $3500 limit?
 

Assuming that they waived the $3500 limit:

1. Besides professional machining, what would you buy for your robot that you cannot buy under the $3500 cap (please no stupid answers)

2. If they eliminated the cap, would you ever spend more than $3500

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

we only spent around $1500 on the bot this year

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

well... we keep it simple so we dont really need any thing more... so i think it would be pointless to raise it

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

i mean you could then use titanium or aircraft aluminum or diamond. it would add in a whole new aspect of "our robot is made of titanium whats yours?" and would defeat the whole purpose of graciuos profesionalism

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

All of our aliminum pieces would be changed to titanium. With the freed weight, we will create wheel hubs made of steel and then chrome them.
125 Stayin' Alive, Rollin' on Dubs! :yikes:

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

We keep our robot cost at about $1000. I believe a greater cost limit would lead to less competitive events. I would love to see more weight though :)

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

We don't spend that much in Canadian funds. I guess we could purchase more but we couldn't raise the funds. I would rather raise the weight limit by 10 lbs. With addition funds I would like to purchase a larger weight limit.

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

I dont think you will see the weight limit or size limit increase - if two average students cant lift the bot without getting hurt, then..... um.... someone will get hurt

and the size restrictions are there so the bot can fit through a normal size door, and fit inside a minivan - FIRST learned this the hard way a few years back - a team build a bot at school and couldnt get it out the shop door.

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

First off, how many teams COULD spend this much money??? Do you guys really have that much to spend each year? And second, with first being such an incredible competition with so much growth and recognition every year, is there really any need to change it at all? I hope the rules stay just how they are.

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

I say don't raise the spending limit. Why might you ask, it makes things harder some teams that are just starting. Very little sponsership and experiance. where as some of the veteran teams know some tricks and can creatively spend more than $3500 on a robot. It just wouldn't be fair in my opinion.

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

The story I had heard was that the original base size was 36"x36" which meant that robots couldn't easily move through doorways (doorways are usually 36" wide). I have no way to verify the truth of this story however. I heard this way back in 1998.

Matt

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

Same here...you don't need more money, just better use of what you've been given to work with.

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

I guess I should rephrase. I wasn't trying to ask if they should raise the limit, I was just asking what you would do if the limit was gone.

I was just trying to see if anything would really change, most teams don't even get close to the limit so if there was no limit it wouldn't matter. The only team I know of that got close was 45 in 2003 who built two robots.

Rephrase:

For all of the teams who do get close to the limit, would you spend more than $3500 if you could?

For all the teams who don't get close, asumming you had the money, what would you add to your robot? (again, please no stupid answers)

I guess what I am getting at is, not including labor or crazy exotic materials, what could you possibly buy to make your robot cost more than $3500

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

I think first should:
1. eliminate machining costs from the $3500 limit
2. eliminate the electronics sub-budget and the per electronic item limit
3. INCLUDE all spare parts costs in the $3500 limit
4. INCLUDE OI parts in the $3500 limit

Why?
1. FIRST ran into difficulties this year on whose machining costs can you waive and whose must you bill. The only way to truly solve the inequities of this problem would be to waive all machining costs.

2. The original electronics budget predates the $3500 limit. It is a relic of an earlier time. The $3500 budget and the $400 per item limits cover electronics as well as mechanics.

3. The problem with practice robots and the inequities of teams carrying bunches of spare parts would be solved if teams had to bill them as well as the main robot.

4. I don't know why this one really. It just seems that the OI is part of your robot and should be billed as well.

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

1 & 2: Agreed :)

3: Not sure what I think about spare parts...

4: I don't really agree with this...some teams use laptops and such when they are going for "Leadership in Controls" awards and such and that could take a major chunk out of the $3500. Besides, I don't see how an "expensive" OI would give teams a big advantage...It's an area where I'd like to see more innovation and quality.

On the bright side, I'm glad that the electronics cost limit is going up :)

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

There goes almost a quater of the budget.:)

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

The 3,500 budget is fine. This is a good balance for teams that do not have much money and teams that have too much money.

If anything weight in the robot without the battery. I have seen batteries that have a weight difference of .3 pounds.

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

I have actually heard a story... not sure if it is true (I'm full of rumors this week :rolleyes: )...

There was a team who one year couldn't make the weight. In order to make weight they emptied the contents (lead, acid, whatever) out of the battery. They went to the inspection booth with their faux battery. They were snagged when the inpector asked for them to turn on their robot to verify the team number was set correctly on the robot controller.

"Could you please turn your robot on so I can verify your team number is set properly."
"Uhhh.. Uhh... hold on let us get a fresh battery from our pits."
"I don't need to see it move, I just need to see the RC turn on..."
"Uhh....Uhhh...."

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

I think what may probably yield a greater weight savings for most teams would be some really rapid finite element analysis of structures on the robot. Its amazing how many robots have such severely over-constructed parts. If we only had a couple of on demand engineers to run the software and a nice farm to do calculations quick, i bet we could eliminate all these overly heavy parts.

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

We were close to weight so I weighed our batteries. I got weights from 13.2 - 13.9. I couldn't believe it. Maybe we could have a 125 lb robot without battery.

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

I think the $3500 limit is pretty comfortable. As said in an earlier post getting rid of the electronics cap is a good idea. If a team wants to spend a good chunk of the $3500 on a custom circuit or electronics let them. Raising the $3500 limit doesn't sound like a good idea. FIRST already relaxed the rules this year, also eliminated the ban on exotic materials, AND if they decide to also raise the amount the more unfair the game will be between teams, especially rookies and teams with no or limited sponsorship.

My two cents ;)

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

This season I think the most money we spent was on food... o.O We don't have many local companies to give us money, so we have to make due without. Other teams, on the other hand have seemingly unlimited funding, so the cap is what saves smaller teams like ours.
I don't think I would add anything to our bot if they did raise the cap because we ended up with a very competitive robot on a pretty small budget.

This year we got a Leadership in Control award, and the only laptop we used was an old WinBook MIT donated to us. Judges don't care whether you have PowerMacs (as one team did) or flashy stuff like that when they are looking for the Leadership in Control Award--they're looking for the team who put the most effort into making their control system work perfectly. Though, I don't think our programmer would mind much if we had some better hardware...

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

We're using a 75 mhz laptop to program at the speed of light...
If you really wanted to get your robot under the limit, take out some code..........

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

The limit is fine, especially as many teams find ways to hide cost, anyway. Nobody can seriously tell me that the machining cost on many sponsor made parts does not exceed that amount! But that is somewhat beside the point. We are incouraged to find inventive ways to deal with that, and we do. If there was no cap, many rich teams (ones that have more than $50K at hand) would most certainly spiral the cost up, leaving the majority of teams in the dust, and without a chance to win. That could easily lead to a sponsor draught, because many medium sponsors would not want to pump money into a team with the knowledge the team doesn't have a chance to win. Such cenario currently exists in Formula One, and utlimately threatens the survival of that sport.
I like it the way it is. It's more fun, anyway.

IndyStef

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

I think you missed his point. There have been teams that invest quite a bit into their operator interface such as T3 this year with their mini arm to control their real arm. If FIRST were to include the OI into the 3500 dollars, teams might not even have enough money left of that 3500 to even build an OI and then they end up having their OI mounted on a piece of plywood with 4 joysticks. Anyway, there have been some awesome achievements when it comes to OIs, such as T3 and 25 (I think they did too) with their mini arms or 447 with their glove controls, which probably wouldnt' have been possible if FIRST were to put the OI into the $3500...so to the original person who suggested that, I disagree.

Re: Raising the $3500 limit?
 

I also believe that the OI hasn't been included because it simply doesn't matter as much. Do you seriosly believe that if a team that spent 100k on thier OI would be better than someone who spent $25? It all comes down to the robots.