[Alavinus]

First off- the motors
The motors are donated by companies that FIRST has asked to donate. In order to keep the costs of the kit low, the motors that are used are the ones that have been donated. Unless First gets more generosity from the suppliers these are the motors that you will get.
As for the robot's weight- Your robot does not have to be 130 lbs. That is a max, your robot could very well be thirty pounds. FIRST used to have a featherweight in the finals award. Maybe it would be a good idea for that to return.

On the 24 volt system- A lot of people have been throwing that around lately and it would require a major changeover in the kit of parts. Most of the motors that we receive are designed to run off of 12 volts. Over volting the motors will make them put out more power but it will also wear out the motors much faster. Also, a 24 V system could be very intimidating for rookies. After seeing some of the wiring schematics this year, I am not sure that moving up to 24 V would be a wise thing.

The reason that the rules are there is to keep a team from hurting themselves. Yes it does have a lot more rules than battle bots or other robotics competitions. However, all other competitions that I have seen require a pretty extensive knowledge of Engineering to begin undertaking the building of the bot. If you follow the FIRST rules, it is somewhat difficult;lt to make a robot that will turn into a fire hazard. It is possible, but I believe FIRST wrote the rules with a good margin of safety built in. Also, remember that resistance increases as length increase in terms of wire. With some of the motors pulling the juice they do, 10 gauge is not really a bad idea.

In my opinion, FIRST is more about unique design rather than brute strength. FIRST seems to prefer a mechanism that accomplishes a task in a different manner. While brute strength is always nice, it is not a necessity in FIRST competition.