Illegal? No. Immoral? Not really.

I could tell FIRST that this so called "practice bot" is just an extra non-FIRST-related project that just happens to look like my competition robot.

As for money, like I said, non-FIRST-related project.

As for the immorality of it, there is nothing stopping other teams from doing it. If you say money is an issue, then go out and work on your business end of the team and get more sponsors. Every team is capable of getting a practice bot, though it may be harder for some than others.

You just need to work hard sometimes to get what you want, and in the end it's totally worth it.

Or you can do the "poor man's practice bot", which would basically just be your drive train and maybe 1 or 2 other components (Like this year it could be your drive train and ball sucker/magnet thing.)