[dtengineering]

1) I inspected a robot... in Atlanta... that didn't have a pressure relief valve anywhere in their pneumatic system. Fortunately they had it with them in their supplies, and were quite appreciative to have someone explain what it was and what it did. It wouldn't have been crazy to see this at a regional... but in Atlanta? Thank goodness for inspections, eh?

2) A crazy good story, though was the time we carelessly re-used a 3/4" pneumatic cylinder on our Rack'n'Roll robot that was either 1/2" too long or too short for the pneumatic specs of that year's competition. It cleared tech in Portland no problem (hey... I'd missed it, too... it was a pretty minor thing) but got nabbed by the very careful inspectors at GTR. We had a spare at home that was the right size... but home was on the other side of the country.

Tristan Lall was the lead inspector. He took a look at the problem, pulled out his cell phone, made a couple calls and said, "Talk to ______ at ______. Here's the address, they have a legal one waiting for you." A mentor ran out at lunch, and we were legal that afternoon. The robot actually performed better with the slightly shorter stroke cylinder. Who woulda thunk it?

3) I was at a competition where a team was 30 pounds overweight. Not a big deal... except they were an all-girls team and quickly became known as "The girls with the weight problem." at least until we realized how easily that could be taken out of context. (If only I could shed weight as quickly as they did!)

Jason