Quote:
Originally Posted by ASD20
In NE:
Like pretty much every other question about districts, it depends. At a lot of events there is a machine shop area in the corner of the gym with tools lent by teams. There is usually at a minimum a drill press and a bandsaw, but it varies a lot. In these situations, if there is a tool you want and you have room for it in your trailer, bring it and lend it to the machine shop. You will have the tool you need, it won't have to fit in your pit, and everyone will like you. At Granite State this year, the machine shop used Windham's shop. At RIDE this year, there was no machine shop at all. Since we had a drill press and bandsaw in our pit, we were REALLY popular. At DCMPs this year, we had the NASA trailer. Basically, most tools are lent by teams (host or not), so the quality of the machine shop lies on the teams.
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This is what you can expect at most district events: local team's shop if you are at a high school or some tools in a corner staffed by volunteers. 125 has been a big resource in keeping NE events stocked with tools for a machine shop and some transportation issues left RIDE uncovered but teams worked together and everyone shared what they had. It also prompted us to start bringing a larger vice, bandsaw, and belt sander to Boston the next weekend and our pit became a machine shop outpost with volunteers using our tools more than we did.
The machine shops aren't as nice as what teams see in reigonals but you have to keep in mind with teams getting six hours of unbag time in their shops a lot of the machining work teams need to do gets done at their shops. The machine shops still get plenty of use for the times we need it however we use it less than we did during a regional.
It does get beefed up for the District Championships. Connecticut had one of the NASA mobile machine shops this year and I believe WPI uses the shop on campus.