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Posted by Joe Johnson.   [PICTURE: SAME | NEW | HELP]


Engineer on team #47, Chief Delphi, from Pontiac Central High School and Delphi Automotive Systems.

Posted on 8/3/2000 9:11 PM MST


In Reply to: Re: Is the Chairman's Award fixed? I believe so, OFFENDED posted by Mike Faticanti on 8/3/2000 5:05 PM MST:



Open Letter to All:

I stick by the lights.

Co-opertition FIRST would have been a totally unviewable mess without those lights.

I am serious. Can you imagine trying to figure out whether a robot is scoring to win or scoring to even the score in order to gain Q-points without those lights? It was bad enough as it was. Without the lights, only fanatical fans with photographic memories could have made any sense of the game at all.

While I don't think the lights had anything to do with being a finalist for the Chairman's Award, I DO take credit (or blame) for them with pride.

Joe J.

P.S. Speaking of the Chairman's Award & kit related things, I note a tone in a lot of folk's messages of 'Big Budget' teams getting all the breaks.

I don't deny that strong, reliable funding brings many advantages, but I would hope that those same folks will give us a break once in for working to help the whole FIRST community with only marginal benefit to our own team. If I start to list the ways, it is likely this will only lead to more snide remarks like those I have already read too often. BUT…

…The issue of improving the FIRST kit is too dear to my heart to let pass without some words. With the exception of the paid staff of FIRST and perhaps Tony, Dave & Bob from Innovation First, I dare say nobody has had a larger impact on the FIRST kit of materials than I have.

It pains me to have this work disparaged and dismissed as the result of some endless bucket of money that I am supposed to have access to in order to buy the hearts & minds of FIRST judges. Well… …it just isn't so.

At the risk of blowing my own horn too loudly, let me list the items and ideas that I have played a major role in getting into the FIRST kit:
Tape Drive Window Lift Motor & Mechanism
The larger capacity lead-acid batteries
Fore/Aft Seat Adjuster
Power Sliding Door Motors
Globe Motors
Fisher-Price Transmissions & Motors
Keyang Seat Adjuster Motors
Power Distribution Blocks
Gyro Chip
Operator Interface powered via robot battery power via the tether
Rotating Lights

Seriously, can anyone really imaging building a robot to play the games we've had these past few years without these kit components in the kit? Yet, even so, I doubt that any of the judges had anything but the vaguest idea of any of these efforts.

So… Next time you are smearing 'big budget' teams for buying their way to awards, I hope that you will at least concede at least some folks on some of these teams are directing some of their efforts to advancing FIRST with something less than selfish motives.

P.P.S. I encourage others to join the effort of improving the FIRST kit. If your sponsor makes cool stuff that would be great on a FIRST robot, ASK THEM TO DONATE! If you see stuff in trade magazines that every fashionable robot simply can't live without, CALL THE MANUFACTURER. All they can say is no. AND... ...all it takes is time & a stamp.