Quote:
|
Originally Posted by Rich Kressly
3. I too would be a little wary of widening the gap.
|
Everyone who says this really needs to enlighten me a little bit, because I can't possibly see how eliminating the ship date is going to widen the gap. I can see many instances of narrowing the gap, such as:
Right now you have a lot of the "have" teams already working 15 week schedules building 2nd robots and using them for driving practice, autonomous testing, etc. The "have not" team cannot do this. By eliminating the ship date, now the "have not" teams are on even footing with the "have" teams since now the "have not" teams would have a robot for driver practice, autonomous testing, etc. This would significantly narrow the gap.
"Have not" teams can see how the good teams do it in week 1 and 2 regionals and gain a little design inspiration in time for their regionals or even in time for the championship. Once again, the gap is narrowed.
"Have not" teams could only afford to go to one regional before being trounced at nationlas while the "have" teams go to two or three regionals. Extra regionals mean the "have" teams get to work the bugs out of the robot, gain valuable driving time and match experience, and improve robot function and strategy. Allowing all teams to keep the robots would mean the "have not" teams could work bugs out of the robots, organize scrimmages with teams within reasonable driving distances, and gain valuable driving time and experience with the robot. Once again, the gap is narrowed.
I could list many more reasons how the gap is narrowed, but this post is already long enough.
As far as robot transportation goes, anyone can go to an Enterprise rent-a-car and rent a 15-person van for about $50 per day. Put the robot in the back and you still have room for 8 people. Robot shipping and transportation all in one - and cheaper than shipping a 300 lb crate.