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Originally Posted by Richard
I read 'design' as used in <R16> to mean 'decide how to build'. Design doesn't have to mean 'invent' or even 'improve'.
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I think you are saying the same thing I am, but you dont realize you are saying it.
Ok, we have a battery holder on a robot from two years ago. Back then a couple students were presented with the problem "We gotta attach the battery to this surface, in this orientation, with access to the wires here and here".
If they did a real design cycle on the task, they would figure out the mass of the battery, the acceleration it would experience when the robot hit a solid object going 15 fps, with 2" bumpers on the robot, how much force that will create on the holder
and then look at the specs for sheet metal and alum, and the shear strength of #8 and #10 and 3/8" bolts..... and designed a battery holder that will keep that 10 lb lump of lead where its suppose to be, no matter what.
Ok, now its this year - I dont see anyway I can honestly say "design a battery holder" means "get the drawings from two years ago and hand them to the machinist on the shop floor".
If they dont go through the same design cycle / exercise, then they have no idea why the battery holder is the way it is.
and the rule that we have quoted a few times now says all "designing" for this years robot must be done after this years kickoff meeting. If you can buy something off the shelf, or pull it out of the KOP, then you dont need to design that part of the system
but you would still have to go through a bit of work to analyse the thing you are buying to make sure it will work as intended.
That battery holder you end up copying from two years ago, or from another team, for all you know it may have broken in every single match.
Engineering is a single point position of responsibility - if we are showing students what its like to be an engineer, then they cannot let something onto the robot that they cannot explain, verify, or say with understanding "this will work, this will do what it needs to do".