[Covey41]

I guess I did not express my thoughts very well in my first post. The original intent of the rule goes back to the "old days" when the robot controls left alot to be desired. It was strickly a case of radio interference, that the no 2 way radio rule was developed. This was also before the popularity of small hand held cell phones. The old transmitters and receivers were very sensitive to any type of radio frequency intererence, causing the robots to be uncontrollable. While the IFI controls are much better, they are still susceptible to RFI.

Any good RF engineer will tell you that filling a area full of RF energy, is like a room full of noise, it gets hard to hear the one voice that you want to hear. Radios use filters to single out a single the frequency that they want to use. These filters and associated circuitry can get quite expensive, and bulky. In an effort to control costs, minimal filtering is used. Necessitating the the no 2 way communication rule.

This is also the reason anytime a team wants to put a wireless TV camera on their robot they have to have it approved by IFI. To ensure it does not cause interference to the control system.

It has only been a secondary ruling that the no communications with the drive team was put into effect. It is also the reason that 2 way radios are not allowed to be used in the pits, by the teams.