[cj3958]

Yes. The doors are extremely thin. I was at the full field in Manchester, and yes, they are incredibly thin and incredibly bendy. The sally door is a little bit less flexible because it has a triangle brace thing so it is only floppy like polycarb the upper half of it.

The draw bridge on the other hand is ridiculously floppy. Not only will it be hard to just get to the ground, but when its on the ground if you hold it there from the edge of the door, the polycarb bows up quite a bit from the springs that pull it back up when you let go*. It will be extremely difficult for any team to open it without just going through the courtyard and holding the door open for your partners.

As far as the punching idea goes, that ones a toss up as to whether or not its legal. I think it most likely will be illegal because its too much work to ask the refs to keep track of that and I believe that they said somewhere the robot has to be free and clear of the defense in the neutral zone for it to count as a breach(I forget the exact wording), and even though you may not be touching the defense, I personally would not call you free and clear of it. But that is just my 2 cents.


* As a sidenote... The plywood door Ri3D 1.0 used is not at all acurate and there is no way that robot will be able to lower the door on its own. Make sure you plan on this when you design your mechanisms. I know soooooooo many teams will think that their robot will be able to do the door and show up at the event only to find that the door is not even close to the door they had at home.