[DampRobot]

Reading your story is certainly interesting. Since I'm not familiar with your team, I'll respond regarding teams I am more familiar with, which may or may not have dynamics similar to your own.

Personally, what can make me begin to dislike a team isn't budget, or even mentor experience, but how much the kids actually work on the robot.

I know you don't "buy" your robot, and I wasn't trying to imply that. What often bugs me is where mentors do much of the design work, and sponsors do much of the machining work. It really seems that if it shouldn't be impossible to built the robot you want to build with students. Why not teach more kids CAD? Why have your students machine all the parts in-house? To me, the design and machining experiences are one of the things that makes the FIRST experience truly valuable.

To me (and there certainly are a lot of differing opinions on Chief Delphi on this), the students are the ones that should be learning, and the best way to foster this learning is hands on. Ask yourself if they learn much from others making the design and others giving them parts. Is this a "lesser of two evils" that allows students more learning somewhere else? In my opinion, no. There is very rarely anything that needs to be done in the build process that a student cannot do.

This is my opinion, and I know it may be unpopular. You may even see it as part of the "haterade," and if so, I'm sorry. I only want to present my thoughts and provoke discussion, not anger.