Posted by Andy Baker, Engineer on team #45, TechnoKats, from Kokomo High School and Delphi Automotive Systems.
Posted on 5/1/99 10:51 PM MST
In Reply to: Not mean but in violation posted by Tom Wible on 4/30/99 7:36 AM MST:
: If you read the rules they say that strategies aimed at intentional tipping of robots are NOT IN THE SPIRIT OF FIRST.
: You guys clearly used tipping as a strategy and clearly designed your robot to do that. I would contend that the refs made a big mistake allowing this type of strategy to be used.
: I hope FIRST is listening.
: Tom Wible
Tom,
Good points. I appreciate your post. But, you don't
really know what our strategy was and why we designed
our robot's arm the way we did. It may be 'clear' to
you, but it wasn't that way in the beginning of this
year's competition.
Let me tell you some history about how our robot and
strategy developed.
Our arm was originally designed to hold opposing robots
at arms length (like a straight arm), and to grab ahold
of a basket and raise it, much like 192's robot (if any
of you noticed them

). Our problem was the basket.
We worked so long on our arm and drive base, that we had
a really bad basket.
During the Chicago regional, out of frustration, we ended
up taking our basket off and just playing with our arm.
During a match against team 74, we pushed (tipped) them
off of the puck with our arm. Many people at that time
either loved the move or hated it, thinking it was not
gracious professionalism. I was worried. I wasn't sure
if it was legal or not.
Well, we made it through the match by not being DQed.
Then we were really suprised when FIRST gave us the Defensive
Play of the Day for that very move. Since FIRST rewarded
us, we threw away our basket design and concentrated on
playing defense with the arm. I guess that we used that
Defensive award as a license to play the way that you
didn't like.
Maybe this clears some things up, maybe not. If not...
then hopefully we can agree to disagree about this.
Andy B.