[Ed Crammond]

True, FIRST will never be completely fair, thats just some of the things we have to live with. However i think compromises can be made to even things up in regards to overseas teams.

Pre-shipping of the parts to at least the country (or hawaii!) that they are intended for sounds like a good idea. However i have a suspicion that kits may be changed at the last minute so things could be left in or out of preshipped kits. Someone may correct me on this one.

I accept that teams shouldnt really be building in the first two weeks anyway however there were some quite critical things that needed to be looked at from the kits, when designing.

First and most obviously are the bins, we dont have them here and there were no detailled documentation regarding them that we could find. At present, two weeks after kickoff, the two prvided with the kit have still not arrived. If we had no contacts like Nick in the US or the generosity of Jaqui and 388, we really would be in trouble.

Other items need to be ordered from the US during the build period, like pnuematic cylinders. Last year they took 3 weeks to arrive, so after ordering them in the middle of the 2nd, they arrived with just over a week to spare. Had there been any trouble with shipping (like our 2002 robot taking 3 months to arrive back from the NYC regional), again we would have been in trouble.
One way around this is to permit alternative suppliers of parts and although i confess i havent examined the suppling rules in great detail this year, i applaud the efforts of FIRST to "open up" the supplying market. (Can we have RS and Maplin on the suppliers list next year please!).

Although things are never going to be perfect, if there was some specific provision to encourage overseas teams it would increase the appeal for people to start new teams overseas. These provisions need not give these teams an advantage, but some recognition of difficulties would be appreciated!