[Peter Matteson]

Originally Posted by Nemo

You could start with things that you are nearly guaranteed to need:

Bumper materials (noodles, fabric, plywood, fasteners)
CIM motors
Wire
Fasteners
Jaguar and/or Victor motor controllers
Controllers (gamepads / joysticks / custom controls of your team's choice)

Items bolded by me are things to be cautious about ordering. These are items that can easily be eliminated from the kit without warning no matter how likely you think they are. Proceed with your own caution when purchasing these until we see the 2012 rules.

Originally Posted by CalTran

Check your batteries as well. If you don't have at least 3 chargers and 4 batteries, I'd stock up.

What battery will be competition legal this year?
We're on the 3rd or 4th different battery in my tenure as a mentor so I would never reccomend a team with limited resources buy them until the season starts.

I agree with folks saying stock up on tools, fasteners, and raw material. Those are items you can use no matter what. Anything like controllers, other than the FRC specific cRIO that we know is coming, is at risk of not being in the rules if FIRST decides on a whim to eliminate it. I can think of many kit items and rules that were thought unchangeable over the years that we were proven wrong on.