Re: Least favorite rules?
 

A few things.
1. Tape is prohibited because FIRST doesn't want to backslide. Letting us use tape for something besides insulation will lead to the eventual construction of robots held together by little more than duct tape and zip ties as opposed to nuts and bolts. If you want to use grippy material, find something that is pretty much the same, but is not described as tape. We used "safety tread" and passed inspection, and it was virtually the same as grip tape except in name.

2. If your robot falls over, hit the e-stop. Doesn't that solve the problem?

3. Multiple tube containment would be ridiculous. The reason FIRST eliminated this is for many reasons, but here are what i think are the primary ones.
A) When people can store something like 10 tubes, it broadens the gap between rookies and veterans.
B) The game isn't about making a storage device, its about either scoring, playing D, and/or ramping/lifting.
C)when people store tubes, its BORING for a long time. In 2005, watching teams (like 868, 469, 279, 71, and countless others) sit there, driving in and out of the loading zone so they could fill up with a ton of tetras. This is not fun for spectators. It does result in a little more excitement at the end (arguably) but it lowers the total energy in the arena.

My least favorite rule is regarding timeouts. From the end of a match, you have 4 minutes (at least) until your next match, but only 2 minutes to call a timeout. WE ran into a problem where 302 would have liked to call a timeout, but the referees would not let us call it. We complied, and i think the refs gave us a little bit longer to fix it, but 703, who also did not call a timeout, took about 8-10 minutes (their drive was broken to some extent and needed to be fixed). In the finals, You need to let teams fix their robots. watching a team lose because they couldn't replace a chain was silly, and the rule should have been enforced (even if that meant that 302 and 703 couldn't play).

Re: Least favorite rules?
 

I think the main reason would be that given how mangled poof balls got last year, internal storage of something inflateable would require a few warehouses worth of ringers for every regional.

As for tape, just change the rule so that it is "tape is allowed so long as a single strip of tape only contacts one object". That would prevent teams from using it for any bundling/construction, but would allow many legitemate uses such as labelling, grip, etc. We used masking tape to label all our PWM cables at GTR, and the inspector told us to take them off simply because it was tape.

Re: Least favorite rules?
 

1) the power distribution block rule. It's heavy and the wires refuse to stay in without outside help (i.e. epoxy)

2) the "ramp cannot rest on game-pieces rule". In Davis Quarterfinals, our ramp deployed and a stray tube got under it. Even though two robots successfully parked on top of us, we didnt get the 60 points b/c of that rule.

Re: Least favorite rules?
 

I'm wrong. Canadian teams like 1325 have an exemption to use SMC cylinders (explained here)

Re: Least favorite rules?
 

Thats funny... we did that too and had no troubles with the inspectors (although while they were inspecting it, we were replacing all the connections with better ones)

We were also told by the inspectors that any electrical contacts that were exposed (such as on the victors) had to be covered somehow, and he recommended electrical tape (which is legit).

I have to say that (after the competition) I wish the refs would make the same calls during the qualifying matches as they would in the elimination. Theres no reason to become stricter... in fact, it only ruins the play. If they were to be strict always, then it would be easy to learn how to avoid those situations.

Oh, and my least favorite rule was the 10 pt penalty for the human player stepping on the line....

Re: Least favorite rules?
 

<R35> "Adhesive backed tape and lables may be used for labeling purposes on wires, cables, pneumatic lines, etc."

It looks like the inspectors may have made a mistake.

Re: Least favorite rules?
 

Or I misinterpreted what he said, I guess. I just remember him saying "...and get rid of all this tape", although he might have said something similar that meant "mess", because our wiring was a mess at that point. I had to go home, so I wasn't involved in implementing the inspector's requirements to find out what he really said.

Re: Least favorite rules?
 

Probably the rockwell block. That caused us about 45 minutes of headaches trying to find the pieces to it the block from other teams and mount it all on din rail. The worst thing is that the block is poorly engineered, the screws to lock the wires in place are very small so applying torque is difficult. This caused our robot to fall dead on the field one entire round.

Re: Least favorite rules?
 

We had no such trouble. If you're having difficulty keeping the wires captured, you might not be inserting them properly. Is there another local team you can go "spy" on and see how they did it?

Re: Least favorite rules?
 

I would have to agree with the power distribution block all it is is more weight and it s pointless. all it does is power that huge light the is way excessive. I liked it when we just had the straight wiring into the circuit board and had the small light weight flashing lights they were so much nicer that the huge yellow light that ridiculous. Also the new Radio control is ridiculously huge, and the aren't nearly as reliable. Are radio was having signal problems and then half the time it would randomly cut out when we were testing it in the shop. Let me know what you think about some of the new rules.


Just be glad they took out the rule about no machines in the pits. {e.g. saws, grinders, etc} That was just retarted.

Re: Least favorite rules?
 

the no duct tape rule:(

Re: Least favorite rules?
 

I dislike all the rules that FIRST decides to change. I also dislike the rules that are very vague. Finally, I dislike all the rules that FIRST adds new meanings to. I also think it'd be a great idea if the referees underwent better training or so that they have some experience with the rules before the competition. My team goes to Portland which is in the first week, and every year, the referees are still figuring things out during the competition. Also, when a robot runs into you or a teammate, and gets tipped over, does anybody think that that should actually be called as intentional tipping. None of what I just said is meant to slam FIRST.

Re: Least favorite rules?
 

Hmm, Top 3 in order:

3. Tubes that "support" ramps disqualify all end-game points. Not sure how many people are familiar with how our robot ramped this year, but one of our support legs came down exactly in the middle of a tube. The drivers adjusted the bot so that the leg was perfectly in the middle of the tube and not touching it. Upon inspection for end-game points, a ref freely moved the tube around, but another ref (after this) said he witnessed a small vertical deflection in the tube -- but the tube ended up where the first ref put it, causing the deflection.

Perhaps it was purely situational, but it's pretty obvious they had to get technical to justify the rule when in all actuality every team that successfully ramped/lifted never had to rely on a field element anyways. The mechanics of matches would have been nearly exactly the same all season long without this rule, yet this one rule affected so many outcomes it's utterly ridiculous, IMO.

2. It is legal to ram an opposing team's ramps as they deploy in their home zone so long as you do not climb them and contact is made via your bumpers. That is correct, this happened to several teams and was brought up in the driver's meeting in Atlanta only to be stated that it is very legal. "Intentional contact outside the bumper zone" should apply to both robots.

1. And my most hated rule: You incurred penalties if you were disabled in the opposing home zone after the last 15 seconds even if the disabling was determined -->>by the IFI representative at the conclusion of the match in question<<-- to be the fault of the field and not the robot or human controllers. Look up the QuarterFinals for Vegas with teams 233, 1885, and 004 for an example. If you attended Vegas, you actually had a chance to witness the IFI guy reach under the Red control station and adjust something right after the SemiFinals.

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Personally I like the "no duct tape" rule and the fact that FIRST is attempting to use a safer (but heavier) means to wire the robot. 72"x72" and weight/size rules included, these are all in place to take you through the real-life constraints Professional Engineers have to deal with. Don't hate these rules; they (or some variant of them) are never going away.

Re: Least favorite rules?
 

For 2007, I had a few, which I present in countdown form:

5) The bicycle flags. It seems so simple, yet probably half of my stress this season (both as an inspector and a competitor) came from them. If it wasn't the fact that teams didn't put one on, it was the way FIRST made the mounting rules this year. Robots getting ringered wasn't pleasant either, but that seems largely to be an issue relating to this year.

4) The 72" Envelope Rule. It's survivable, but irritating. If folks believe they can build a superior robot with a bigger arm, let them!

3) Tape versus non-tape. I'm all for banning tape to hold a whole robot together, but I fail to see the benefit of forcing teams to look around for a box labeled "Safety Tread" instead of "Grip Tape". If FIRST is trying to stop teams from duct-taping their whole robot together (and rightfully so), then just ban the use of tape to join components.

2) Time-out rules. To this day, I have yet to see a clear, audience-friendly way to convey who can or has called a time-out in eliminations. A timer at the scoring table would be perfect for this; even better would be to put the time-out clock on the field clocks. (I believe that the NASA field does this already; it's doable since no matches happen during a time-out).

1) Update 16's restriction on tools. It's been beaten to death, and was revised in time for the following week's events, but boy was that not my idea of a good time.