Re: Bumper question
 

Al,

Thanks for the quick reply. But the rule says minimum 3/4" stroke or my robot will not pass inspection. I hope the bumper rule is not going to force 4 digit teams to have minimum 10 inch bumpers just to be able to satisfy the bumper rule. That would be silly and unfair to high number teams.:)

Re: Bumper question
 

Ed, I had that exact same question in mind when I read that over lunch today. It certainly seems to make things interesting!

Re: Bumper question
 

This caught me also. Thanks.

Re: Bumper question
 

Please standby, just don't add numbers to that bumper until we have a firm answer.

Re: Bumper question
 

Find another font?

Franklin Gothic Heavy, 400 pt 440 pt (with slightly condensed spacing) works nicely. If my estimation is correct, the narrowest stroke on the "4" should be around 0.77 in.

See the attachment. I used Inkscape (free download); you could also use Adobe Illustrator or something similar.

Edit: See this slightly better version. In this version, the short stroke is even thicker.

Re: Bumper question
 

Al, I trust you won't be lobbying for bumper segments wide enough to hold the whole team number, considering your team number is 111 and your team won't be harmed regardless of the answer! ;)

I would hope that the GDC sees the issue here and either allows split numbers or else requires that all teams have at least one contiguous bumper segment on each "side" that is wide enough to display *ANY* four digit number with 4"x3/4" numbers.

Re: Bumper question
 

You should actually have about 10.5 to 11 inches, since the short segment over 8" of frame can extend past the vertex for the corner area. But it is still a very tight fit for four digit teams without any 1's or 7's

Re: Bumper question
 

Something else to consider:

While you're required to put your team number on your bumpers, I haven't been able to find anything saying that putting your number elsewhere on the robot, in addition to on the bumpers, is illegal. It might be a good idea to show that number above the bumpers on a section of robot where you can put full-size numbers (or larger, or slightly smaller). Back in my day, that's the only place we had to put numbers, and most teams did OK in terms of making them visible. (A few... well, let's just say that black tape on Lexan does not show up at all, and leave it at that.)

Re: Bumper question
 

John,
Fitting 111 on bumpers is never a problem for us. Getting the numbers in the right order is a constant issue....

Re: Bumper question
 

And incidentally, this does involve a bit of a liberty with the "stroke width" requirement. I would typically measure this perpendicular to the stroke axis at the largest part of the stroke, since FIRST does not give guidance on acceptable typography.

If FIRST means that every stroke on every numeral must be 0.75 in wide at every point (presumably measured perpendicular to the central axis of the stroke), then this is a whole lot more complicated. (Also, that would mean nearly every bumper ever numbered over the last couple of years was illegal.) I suppose you could ask the Q&A.

Re: Bumper question
 

Letters and numbers are taller than they are wide. A 4 inch TALL number is not 4 inches WIDE, even a wide number like 0 or 8.

Plus, you have the extra 3.5 inches from the "end grain" of the bumper on the adjacent side.

Re: Bumper question
 

Re: Bumper question
 

True... however, look at what is more or less "normal" numbering (at least for our team, and I don't remember us being exceptionally large compared to other teams) from the past few years:
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/36401
http://www.chiefdelphi.com/media/photos/34968

Those numbers are about 1/3 of the long length of the robot (including the bumper corners), and over half the short length (plus corners) - that's well over what you can get with an 8 inch segment + corners.

Re: Bumper question
 

I agree completely. Plus if you make block letters it will be much easier (round will take up too much space). Our 3464 has no 1s or 7s, but with block lettering and a bit of vertical stretch has enough room to spare. It's not overly distorted, either.

Re: Bumper question
 

Those seem rather wide, the slant seems to be the culprit. Also the spacing between your numbers could be reduced. Vertical, closer numbers should get you down to 8" easily.