[dtengineering]

To concur with much of what has been said above:

Every robot needs a full inspection at every event. In Atlanta, I once had the opportunity to explain to a team (who had previously passed inspection at two regionals) what a pressure relief valve was, and why it was an important part of the pneumatic safety system. They found the part in their toolbox, said, "Oh... so THAT's what THIS is! Thanks!" and put it on their robot. Then we discussed bumpers, which they also fixed... although that took a bit more effort. But they had passed inspection without the valve or proper bumpers twice previously.

Secondly, there IS an unofficial priority queue at most events I've been to... but the priority isn't for teams who have been to a previous event, it's for teams who are organized, have followed the rules, and did their own tech inspection prior to bagging/shipping their robot. All they need to do is send a representative to the inspection station early Thursday morning and say "Ready whenever you are." They'll have priority over all the teams doing last minute repairs and modifications and saying "Not yet! Not yet!"

Finally, and I don't think I can stress this enough... inspectors want to see teams pass inspection. Teams need to know that if they need help, they should also request an early inspection.... one year during an early inspection I identified a problem that was going to be very difficult for the team to solve (at least not in a way that would make them happy), so I was able to discuss it with a few other inspectors over lunch. I figure that between the inspectors at the table we had probably built at least 30 FRC robots between us. We batted around a few ideas and then someone suggested a brilliant solution that while "out of the box" was still within the rules. I took the suggestion back to the team, they implemented it, and darned if the solution wasn't cited as part of one of the awards that they won. Had we found the problem at 5:00 on Thursday afternoon, it would have been a much... less happy... outcome.

Jason

Edit: One more example... at GTR once, after previously having passed inspection in Portland, we got called for having a pneumatic cylinder that was either 1/2" long or 1/2" short... our spares were all in Vancouver. Tristan <yep... same guy who made the previous post!> was the LTI and while he was quite clear that we couldn't use an illegal cylinder, he was also on his phone to his buddy at the pneumatics supply shop and had a legal replacement waiting for us (at a nice discount) in about half an hour. I'm glad we were inspected in the morning, and not in the late afternoon! I still use that as my personal example of how inspection "should" work.