[KenWittlief]

One of the defining characteristics of engineering is that: Real engineers don't care about appearance!

Esp when you are designing what is clearly a prototype (one of a kind, tweak and improve as you go along) machine, like a FIRST robot, the only things that matter are form, fit and function.

Any time you spend making your robot pretty is wasted resources, because with the short 6 week design cycle you could ALWAYS put those resources to better use, making your robot function better, giving your drivers practice time, tweaking the SW in your control routines.

Real engineering is not about buffing and polishing metal and paint, its about finding the best solution to a real-world problem.

In the realm of a FIRST competition, a higher quality robot is the one that performs on the playfield and wins.