[EricH]

Originally Posted by Lil' Lavery

*2009

Not going from the regolith to the carpet. And even the regolith could deform a bit, going into the carpet that was under it.

I draw a distinction between "flat" and "truly flat" for a reason. A "flat" field includes 2005, 2007*, 2008, 2009, 2011, and 2013; every single one of those had plates under the floor to support something, which affected the flatness (Exception: the loading zones in 2005, which were above the carpet), or a transition from one surface to another (2009). 2007 also had ramps, though those were on robots. Those shallow transitions MUST be accounted for when designing ground clearance, or you'll get slowed down/stopped. (I remember someone at AZ 2010 was a little annoyed at the transition plates next to the bumps--they'd been mentioned in the Manual all along.)

A "truly flat" field does not have those plates underneath or other irregularities, just floor, tape, and robots. 2002 and 2014 are both in that category; 2009 is not because of the regolith/carpet transition.

*This one is on a technicality--the floor base for the Rack was in a place no robot could be expected to come even close to it. But the robot-mounted ramps tip it to just flat, or even out of that altogether.