Re: bill's latest
 

See post #8 above.

We're about 75 miles from the NJ regional and would have little problem schlepping the robot to the venue. We've brought it further for off-season events.

If FIRST can get, say, one half the shipping expense to 'disappear', it might be more palatable for FedEx.

Re: bill's latest
 

See my previous post in this thread or the FiM website.

Re: bill's latest
 

Let's not get into that. And I agree with nuggetsyl.

As for bagging and getting robots to events: Learn to work together more. 1676, we'd love to take a bus ride to Palmetto again sometime soon. ;)

Re: bill's latest
 

That would be TOO cool to endure, I'd have to ride on the roof!

Re: bill's latest
 

The bagging option is indeed interesting, but I have to call integrity into question on this one. I'm not entirely 100% on how this is implemented, for example how do they ensure that we actually placed the zip ties there at the moment we signed "off"?

But I would like to try to implement that FIRST-wide, but the issue then becomes the teams who have to endure the shipping costs anyways...it's not quite helping them any..

Re: bill's latest
 

Please, read the whole thread before posting. Consider it a birthday gift to me (also read the manual).

Re: bill's latest
 

I'm not saying that no teams break the rules or would given the opportunity as much as that the teams that would already have opportunities to do so if they get creative enough and really feel like cheapening their own experience, so not using bags as a preventative measure for cheating would be not as much of an enabler as it might seem.

Re: Bill's Blog -- Possible changes to regional agendas and shipping.
 

Ahhhh....the joy of NURC.....

(now, back to our regularly scheduled program)

Re: bill's latest
 

If it worked for Michigan and the Michigan teams can be trusted. Then why can't this "shipping" procedure be allowed throughout the FIRST community? Wasn't it the point of FIM to test new ideas and if they worked pass these things onto the rest of the community. FIM was declared successful, so it is time for the rest of the FIRST community to benifit where they can. Right?

Re: Bill's Blog -- Possible changes to regional agendas and shipping.
 

I'm not worried about teams cheating with the bags. There are a thousand ways to cheat that could never be detected by inspection but we work on the honor system in FIRST so I don't worry about it.

If they would use the bags for teams who can easily transport their robots they can save the FedEx donations for teams who can't.

Re: Bill's Blog -- Possible changes to regional agendas and shipping.
 

If you want to cheat the bagging system, it's not impossible to do. You just need the collusion of someone who is claiming to be an independent observer of you securing your bag. Or forge your bagging log.

But it's not that difficult to comply with the signature, tag and logging requirements. Just don't forget to bring your log to the competition.

Re: Bill's Blog -- Possible changes to regional agendas and shipping.
 

Exactly!

Even without bagging, teams still have ample opportunities to cheat the system.

They can build mechanisms in the offseason and use them on their competition machine. They can lie on their bill of materials. They can bring entirely new mechanisms into a regional, not having obeyed the fix it window or weight allowance rules. They can have adults write the Woody Flowers Award entries.

If we trust GP to prevent these infractions, then it's ridiculous to say that we don't think that GP will prevent teams from deliberately disobeying the bagging rules.

Re: bill's latest
 

What about bagging the robot and swapping robots with your closest FRC neighbor.
You might be relying on them to bring your robot, but they are relying on you !
That's gracious professionalism to the max !

Re: bill's latest
 

I dont know about that idea.
I wouldnt want to be responsible for another team's robot.

Re: bill's latest
 

Nor would I, bagging worked out fine with Michigan teams. So it should be good enough for the rest of us.

Bagging would work well for teams that are going to be driving to a regional, what did teams do for Atlanta this year in the Michigan area?

-RC